Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 2.djvu/339

Rh of laws enabling the National Government to set aside the most essential guarantees of the liberties of the citizen, and to invade the rightful domain of local self-government, and the readiness with which such things were submitted to under the influence of party discipline, should convince us how necessary is a speedy return to sound Constitutional principles. Constitutional government is so great a boon, and so difficult to be regained when once lost, especially when the appreciation of its importance is once weakened in the popular mind by the habit of acquiescence, that no effort should be spared to stem the current before it becomes irresistible. We should not permit any consideration of partisan advantage to divert our minds from a duty which we owe to our own safety, as well as to those who are to enjoy the blessings of free government in the country after us.

One of the healthiest and most encouraging signs of the times we find in the overthrow of that combination of public robbers in New York whose hold upon power seemed to defy all attempts at resistance or opposition. The successful cooperation of honest men, without distinction of party, to which it at last succumbed, indicated the commencement of a moral revolution in politics, and nothing could be more desirable than that this revolution should not be confined to the limits of one State or one political organization. An imperative demand for honest government is indeed beginning to be heard all over the land. Public opinion has with significant unanimity sustained those who insisted upon a thorough investigation of the abuses of the Government, and it is to be hoped that the work of purification will not be arrested before it has overcome that partisan spirit which for its own selfish ends is still endeavoring to belittle and whitewash corrupt practices, and to shield men who participated in them, or who rendered them