It consists of talks with the people about the recent election in New York State and Vermont. It is, largely, the observations of a correspondent who has walked through the State, asking farmers and workingmen why they voted for Cleveland. Let it not be forgotten that Whitelaw Reid is the editor of this paper.
“The politician who attempts to explain defeat is ‘crying over spilt milk.’ The newspaper which tells ‘how it was done’ is ‘whining.’ The writer of a political obituary has hardly an enviable task. A defeated party is supposed to accept with philosophical resignation the rejection of pet policies, and with the calmness of the fatalist, tell itself that it ‘was to have been.’ The reasons given for the result of the recent election are as numerous as there are differences in the minds of the two parties. Some say that the desire for free trade is the cause of the Republican overthrow. Others, that the thing that did it is the McKinley bill; others again, that the people want the ‘repeal of the Bank Tax law’; but to him that looks beneath the surface, there is ample evidence that the defeat of the Republican party is not mainly due to the ‘unpopularity’ of its candidates, nor to the love which the people are said to bear for Grover Cleveland; not to the McKinley bill, nor to any ‘desire on the part of the people for free trade;’ not because free silver is or is not wanted. Not through the ‘superb generalship’ of the Democratic National Committee was a victory gained, nor was the battle lost through the ‘lamentable incompetency’ of the Republican leaders. The chief cause of Republican defeat and Democratic victory is the modern tendency toward socialism.
“This statement by no means implies that the socialistic propaganda has taken a firm hold upon the citizen of the United States, or that its tenets have but to be sowed in American soil to bear an abundant harvest. The people have not subscribed to the mild doctrines of Henry George, nor to the more radical and incendiary plans of John Burns, nor do they place confidence in the ability or stability of the leaders of the ‘New Order of Things.’ They have not the slightest desire to overturn existing government; the ravings of the Anarchists they repudiate altogether.