THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY
"Well, Mrs. Lathrop," said Susan Clegg one pleasant May evening, as she
and her devoted listener leaned their elbows on the top rail of the
fence, "I can't but thank Heaven as these boards is the only thing as
you ever take opposite sides from me on. I don't say as your never
disagreein' ain't sometimes wearin', but there _are_ days as I feel I'd
enjoy a little discussion an' then Elijah an' I discuss on those days
till it seems like I can't live to get to you an' do it all alone by
myself. Elijah's a very young man but he's a man after all an' there's
somethin' about a man as makes him not able to see any side of anythin'
except his own side. Now it don't make any difference what we talk
about I _always_ take the other side, an' I will in confidence remark as
the South fightin' Grant had a easy job compared to me tryin' to get
Elijah to see any side but his own. Elijah's a very pig-headed young man
an' I declare I don't know I'm sure what ailed him last night--seemed as
if he was up a tree about somethin' as made him just wild over the
Democratic party. I must say--an' I said it to his face, too--as to my
order of thinkin' takin' sides about the Democrats nowadays is like
takin' sides with Pharaoh after the Red Sea had swallowed him an' all
his chariots up forever, but Elijah never gives up to no man, an' he
said, not so, the Democrats was still ready to be the salvation of the
country if only Bryan would give 'em a chance. He says they 've been
handicapped so far an' it's very tryin' for any party to have to choose
between a donkey an' a tiger for its picture of itself, for no sensible
person likes to have to ride on either, an' no politics could _ever_
make a success of a donkey for a mascot, whether you judge him from his
ears or his heels. I had it in my mind to say somethin' then about
turnin' around an' takin' a fresh start with a fresh animal as a
sensible person would find it nothin' but a joy to ride, but Elijah,
like all newspapers, rips a thing up the back an' then shows you how you
can't do better than to sew up the tear an' go on wearin' it again, so
after he'd skinned the donkey an' the tiger both alive, so to speak, he
went on to say as never's a long game an' him laughs best who keeps
sober longest an' altogether his own feelin' was as America 'll soon
perceive her only hope lays in electin' a new Democratic party. I just
broke in then an' told him it looked to me as if the natural run of
mankind would n't let Grover Cleveland skip eight years an' then try it
again more 'n six times more, an' that if the Republicans keep it up as
they have awhile longer no money won't be able to get 'em out 'cause
they'll have all the money there is in the country right in with them,
but by that time Elijah'd got his breath, an' he just shook his head an'
asked me if I remembered what a lot of fuss the first billion dollar
congress made an' if I'd observed how calm they was took now? I told him
I had an' then we went at it hammer an' tongs, Elijah for the Democrats
an' me against 'em, although I must say I wished he'd give me the other
side, for in spite of their actin' so silly I must say I always have a
feelin' as the most of the Democrats is tryin' to be honest which is
somethin' as even their best friend couldn't say of the most of the
Republicans as a general thing."
"Did--" asked Mrs. Lathrop.
"Yes, I did, an' I don't know but we'd be talkin' yet only Mr. Dill come
in on us to ask me if I would n't consider takin' Gran'ma Mullins to
board for a month or two, just to see how Hiram an' Lucy would get along
if they had the house all alone to themselves."
"What--" asked Mrs. Lathrop.
"Well, I told him I'd think about it," said Miss Clegg. "I don't know
I'm sure why I should bed an' board Gran'ma Mullins to help Lucy an'
Hiram to try to get along any better. They 're a good deal more
interestin' to talk about the way they're gettin' along now. I never see
Mrs. Macy but what she has somethin' amusin' to tell me about Hiram an'
Lucy an' Gran'ma Mullins, an' I like to hear it. She says the other
night they was all three runnin' round the house one after another for a
hour an' she said she most died laughin' to watch 'em. Seems Lucy got
mad an' started to run after Hiram to pull his hair, an' Gran'ma Mullins
was so scared for fear she _would_ pull his hair that she run after Lucy
to ask her not to do it. Hiram run so much faster than Lucy that finally
he caught up with Gran'ma Mullins an' then they all went to bed. Mrs.
Macy says that's the way they act all the time, an' she certainly would
n't see any more than I should why I should break up the family. I'm
sure I never cooked up that marriage an' I told Mr. Dill so. I asked him
why he did n't take Gran'ma Mullins to board with him, if he was so wild
to get her away from Lucy, but he said he did n't think it'd be proper,
an' I said I did n't say nothin' about _bed_--I just spoke about board,
an' if there was anythin' as was n't proper about boardin' Gran'ma
Mullins he'd ought not to of mentioned the subject to me."
"What--" asked Mrs. Lathrop.
"Oh, there was n't nothin' left for him to say then, of course; but law!
I did n't see no use mooley-cowin' around Mr. Dill; what I wanted was
for him to go so Elijah an' me could go on discussin'. Elijah thinks our
paper ought to come out strong now that we've got one an' he said he
would in confidence remark to me as he intended to say some very pointed
things soon. He says all the editors in the country know as the plans
an' the parties is all fixed up beforehand nowadays; the Republicans
say how many they'll have in each state an' then they never fail to have
'em an' that's a national disgrace for nobody ought to know beforehand
how a election is goin' to pan out for it would n't be possible if folks
was anyways honest. He says for a carefully planned an' worked up thing
a Republican victory is about the tamest surprise as this country ever
gets nowadays, an' yet we keep on gettin' them an' openin' our eyes over
'em every four years like they was somethin' new.
"I bu'st in then an' said as there was sure to come a change afore long
with prices goin' up like they is an' a reaction bound to drop in the
end. Elijah laughed then an' said he knowed well enough as when the
deluge come the Republicans would grab the Democrats an' hold 'em just
like that rich man who grabbed the clerk an' held him in front of him,
when they throwed that bomb at him in his office."
"At the--" cried Mrs. Lathrop, opening her eyes.
"Yes, the bomb was meant for him, but he held the clerk in front of him
so the clerk caught it all. That's what they call presence of mind, an'
as far as my observation 's extended, Mrs. Lathrop, the Republicans have
got full as much of it--they must have, for they both make money right
straight along an' I've observed myself as they always step out when a
crash comes an' let the Democrats in to do the economizin' till there's
enough money saved up to make it worth while for them to take hold again
which comes to much the same thing in the end. I tell you, Mrs. Lathrop,
I see after a little as it was n't no use talkin' to Elijah so I just
had to listen to him an' he really did kind of frighten me in the end.
Livin' with an editor an' readin' that book of Mr. Fisher's has opened
my eyes to a many new ideas. I've lived in a small town all my life but
I've got brains an' there's no use denyin' as a woman with brains can
apply 'em to the president just as easy as to the minister, once she
gets to thinkin' on the subject. This country is in a very bad way an'
it's all owin' to our bein' satisfied with what's told us an' not
lookin' into nothin' for ourselves. We've got the Philippines now an'
we've got Hawaii an' we've got the niggers an' we've got ever so many
other things. We've got the Mormons down to one wife as a general thing
an' the Italians comin' in by the thousands an' more old soldiers bein'
born every year an' the fifth generation of Revolutionary orphans out
filin' their pensions--an' we owe 'em all to the Republicans. Elijah
says we owe 'em a lot else, too, but I think that's enough in all
conscience. Elijah says too it costs a third more to live than it did
ten years ago an' he knows that for a fact, an' you an' I know that,
too, Mrs. Lathrop. Coal's gone up an' everythin' else. I tell you I got
kind of blue, thinkin' about it after I went to bed last night an' it
took me a long time to remember as Elijah was maybe more upset over not
bein' able to go an' see 'Liza Em'ly on account of the rain, than
anythin' else; but then too, Mr. Shores is very much cast down over the
country, only I must admit as it's more 'n likely as he ain't really
half as mournful over the Democrats as he is over his wife; an' then
there's Judge Fitch as is always mad over politics an' we all know that
that's just 'cause he's always been called 'judge' ever since he was
born, an' nobody ain't never made him judge of nothin' bigger 'n us yet.
I guess if he was sure as our paper could get him elected to congress
he'd cheer up pretty quick, but he told me yesterday as Elijah did n't
know how to conduct a campaign to his order of thinkin'. He don't like
that cut of Elijah's being David to the city papers bein' Goliath. He
says a cut to do him any good had ought to have him in it somewhere an'
I don't know but what he's right.
"But, Mrs. Lathrop, we are mighty bad off an' that's a fact, but still I
will say this much an' that is that as far as my observation 's
extended folks as complains openly of anythin' is always findin' fault
with the thing because there's some secret thing as they can't find
fault openly with, like Elijah an' the rain, an' Mr. Shores an' his
wife. The world's great for takin' its private miseries out publicly in
some other direction, an' my own feelin' is as the Democrats is a great
comfort to every one as the Republicans can't very conveniently give
nothin' to these days. If the president was to suddenly make Sam Duruy a
minister to somewhere there'd be a great change of opinion as to
politics in this town, you'd see. It would n't give Sam any more brains,
but every one 'd be pleased an' the Democrats would n't cut no figure no
more."
"But--" said Mrs. Lathrop.
"That's just it," said Susan, "that's just the trouble. We're like most
of the rest of America an' the whole of Cuba an' the Philippines, too
little an' too far off to make the big folks really care whether we
like the way they do or not. I don't have no idea of carin' whether
potato bugs mind bein' picked or not, an' no matter what they said about
me before or after their pickin' it 'd be all one to me. An' that's just
about the way our government feels about us. An' I guess most other
governments is much the same. Which is probably the reason why potato
bugs is gettin' worse an' thicker all the time."