Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 3.djvu/137

Rh have no separate interests to bind you together in political action. The memories you have in common you may cultivate, as we cultivate ours, but you should not make them a political element, as we do not. You have no true interests of your own which are not the interests of every other citizen. Does not every patriotic instinct tell you it is time, and indeed, it is best for you, as it is best for all of us, that at last you should sink the Confederate in the citizen; that you should not keep alive distinctions which cannot be cultivated without injury to yourselves and to the common good; that as citizens you should make the public welfare your only object in political life, and at last throw off those partisan shackles which hinder you in doing so? That is a nobler, and surely a more useful ambition, than to wrangle among yourselves as to whose war record entitles him to the best office, or to make a point against an honorable man because he was an officer in the home guards.

What is there that can prevent any sincere man among you from joining our effort to give this State good government, when your own consciences must tell you that the partisan rule against which we have risen was an injury to the best interests of the State, and certainly no honor to those who supported it? What prevents you from doing what your own best instincts must prompt you to do?

Do you want to do something that will serve your friends in the South? Let me say to you that, better than by stubbornly perpetuating the evils under which this State suffers, will you serve them by giving them an example of wise discrimination, of courageous independence and of an enlightened public spirit. Show them that in your opinion the late Confederate should not be the last but the very first to seize with zeal and earnestness every opportunity to work for the common good, resolutely turning his back upon the past and throwing aside all the