FEARS OF FAILURE by Editor

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 19, 1879

FEARS OF FAILURE.

By Editor

In another column we give from the Alliance a short article expressing the fears which beset thoughtful men in reference to the stability of our own government. The following from the Temperance Advocate gives utterance to essentially the same forebodings, but from a different cause. Conflicting views of State rights, but more especially ignorance, corruption, and intemperance, are elements of weakness in such a government as ours which fully justify all the anxiety expressed by these writers from their standpoints. These will work trouble; they would in not a long space of time work ruin. But before that time, if we read the prophecy aright, this power goes alive into the lake of fire at the coming of Christ. Delay only aggravates the evil; and therefore we pray the Lord to come and establish his government, in which there will be no corruption, no bribery, no wanton lust of power, no evil habits of which corrupt demagogues can take advantage to accomplish unholy ends, no injustice, and no evil. “Fly swift around ye wheels of time, and bring the welcome day.” The Advocate says:—

“In a timely, thoughtful article in the May number of the Golden Rule, Mr. H. D. Cushing notes the fact that the last half century in America has greatly changed the relative populations of city and country; that cities have become greater and towns relatively less. It is also affirmed that ‘political power has changed more than population;’ that in our chief cities ‘the liquor traffic can defeat any party or candidate that opposes it;’ and that ‘the power to defeat is the power to control.’ Referring to the political methods which obtain in cities, it is declared that ‘votes are not often bought with money, but money is often placed in the hands of agents to be used at their discretion. Liquor dealers are the best agents, not because they are more willing or more wicked, but because they are more able to do the work. They know their men better, can reach them easier, can buy them cheaper. They do not buy with money. They pocket the money, and buy with whisky, lager, and the other influences of their occupation.’

“We are quite ready to concur in the opinion that ‘it would scarce be too much to say that every closely contested election—city, state, and national—turns on just the use of money.’ Under such corrupting influences popular suffrage in our large cities has already come to be distrusted by many thoughtful observers, as a means of promoting the general welfare, and of securing and perpetuating stable and equitable government. A system of government which rests upon the ballot must indeed have good citizens. Strong drink is the especial destroyer of good citizenship. It must somehow, by the combination of all good influences, political and otherwise, be exorcised from our cities, else the sequel will prove with only a too painful certainty that ‘if popular government fail in our cities it must fail in the States and in the nation.’”