Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 3.djvu/358

332 That such a policy will displease many Republican politicians, I have no doubt; so much better will it please the honest Republican masses. That it will be bitterly opposed in the Congress to be elected this year is not improbable; but that will not defeat the reform. Let the first Congress under the new Administration ever so insidiously endeavor to hamper it, let it ever so stubbornly refuse all friendly legislation, yet there is not the end. I have already shown how much the President alone can accomplish by the exercise of his Constitutional powers. And if then Congress refuses to aid and perpetuate the reform by such legislative measures as may be necessary, let the President appeal to the good sense and patriotism of the people. In an election held without the civil service as a party agency, such an appeal will scarcely remain without a response.

I, therefore, declare this to be my honest conviction, not only that Governor Hayes, as a man of patriotism and integrity, will, if elected to the Presidency, be true to his word, in using all the Constitutional powers of his office to carry out to the letter the program put forth by himself, but that, powerful as the opposition he will have to encounter may be, the chances will be strongly in favor of the success and lasting establishment of the reformed system, sustained as it will be by the best elements of the Republican party and a patriotic public opinion.

Indeed, when examining the relative positions taken by the two candidates for the Presidency, and the prospects they open to us, the opponents of Governor Hayes seem to be utterly at a loss to discover a flaw in the systematic reform he proposes to establish. They find themselves forced back upon the small expedient of discrediting his intentions. “Governor Hayes,” they say, “cannot be in earnest with this plan, for if he were believed to be in earnest there would be a multitude of Republican