The Writings of Carl Schurz/To Thomas F. Bayard, May 6th, 1886
TO THOMAS F. BAYARD
The enclosed correspondence, as I am informed, is going the round of the newspapers. I am also told that it is not altogether wrong in the description of impressions prevailing in Administration circles. As my name is conspicuously mentioned as one of those who are “more disposed to blame than to commend” the President, it is perhaps proper that I should say a word about it. I should write to the President directly had not my last letters to him remained without the courtesy of an acknowledgment. But presuming upon your friendship I would ask you to mention occasionally to the President, that, while I, of course, reserve to myself the right of freely expressing my opinions, I have made it a rule not to say anything about him to others, that I have not said about him to himself, and that in the letters I have addressed to him are criticisms far more pointed than any I have expressed to anybody else. And as to the disposition rather to censure than to commend, I may add that if anybody has borne the brunt of the battle for Mr. Cleveland when he was a candidate, I have. If anybody has had to suffer for it, I have. How could I possibly be inclined to depreciate rather than commend the fruit of a victory so dearly bought? If there is a man in this country who praises every good thing done by this Administration with real gladness and who feels every one of its failures as painfully as if it were his own, I am that man. And I can assure you, the Independents generally are of the same way of thinking.
Now, as to my real opinion of the state and tendency of things, I see good reasons to fear that the President will finally sit down between two chairs, having done enough in the way of reform to exasperate the spoils politicians, but not enough to satisfy the reform sentiment and to make converts. There are two ways out of this dilemma. One is to throw all reformatory purposes overboard and to unite the party by satisfying the spoils politicians. This, however, will mean dishonor and certain defeat. The other is to follow a bold reform policy which will appeal to the best instincts of the people. This means a leadership which, the more determined and uncompromising it is, the more it will command popular respect and, probably, party following. Partisans are apt to submit to a leader who has the advantage of power and position, and whom they know they cannot subjugate. In any event such a policy will revive public confidence and win recruits of the best kind, and thus a good chance of victory.
The Democratic party is not as strong to-day as it was a year ago. The unfortunate practice of making removals upon the ground of secret ex-parte charges has much weakened it. The helplessness of the majority in the House presenting the spectacle of a party without a policy has weakened it still more. And I am afraid the Jefferson Davis business in the South, although some of the large Republican papers take a sensible view of it, has furnished to the demagogues just the political capital they wanted for the rural districts. If a new Presidential election were to take place next fall, Blaine would inevitably be the Republican candidate. I should, for my part, of course, march to the breach again, but with a presentiment of certain defeat.
President Cleveland can save the situation, and, as things now stand, nobody else can. But he can do it only if, as the honest and sincere man he is, he drops the policy of gaining small points by management of the patronage, and acts with the firmest determination upon his best impulses. This would have been easier and more effective a year ago than now; it will be easier and more effective now than a year hence, for then it may be altogether too late. In my view, the boldest policy in situations of this kind is the safest; it is, in fact, the only safe one. Every uncertain step brings forth new difficulties. Every concession to an evil tendency creates a clamor for more.
This is my diagnosis of the case. It is not prompted by a hot and impatient temper. For that I am too old. It is a conclusion drawn calmly and impartially from the observations and experiences of a long public life.
Believe me when I say that I watch this Administration with an intense and altogether friendly anxiety. I know of few things that would be more disastrous to the country and more painful to my feelings than its failure.