key of our present and past development. We have a timber area of 560,000,000 acres, and across our Canadian border there are 900,000,000 more acres; in coal and iron production we are approaching the Old World. Coal 1842. Great Britain... 35,000,000 miles and 12,000 tons; this has saved one-theorizers. We have spread out in every fourth freight and brought producer and direction and the promise of the future consumers into such contact that we no beggars imaginations attuned even to the longer hear "of the earth's products being wasted, of wheat rotting in La Mancha, wool being used to mend wads and sheep being burned for fuel in the Argentine Republic." England has mainly profited by this enormous development, the shipping of the United Kingdom earning $300,000,000 yearly, and employing 200,000 seamen, whose industry is therefore equivalent to £300 per man, as compared with £190 for each of the factory operatives. The freight earned by all flags for sea-borne merchandise is $500,000,00, or about 8 per cent. of the value transported. Hence the toll which all nations pay to England for the carrying trade is equal to 4 per cent. (nearly) of the exported values of the earth's products and manufactures; and pessimists who declare that ship owners are losing money or making small profits must be wrong, for the merchant marine is expanding every year. Iron 1879. Tons. Tons. 135,000,000 60,000,000 6,300,000 2,742,000 Great Britain... 2,250,000 Britain. "It is unnecessary to wire-draw statistics, but it may, as a last word, be interesting to show, with all our development, the nationality and increase of tonnage enter During these thirty-seven years the relative increase has been in coal 300 to 2,900 per cent., in iron 200 to 400 per cent., and all in our favor. But this is not enough, for England, with a coal area less than either Pennsylvania or Kentucky, has coaling stations in every part of the world and our steamers cannot reach our "The maximum tonnage of this country California ports without the consent of the at any time registered in the foreign trade English producers. Even if electricity was in 1861, and then amounted to 5,539,- takes the place of steam it must be many 813 tons; Great Britain in the same year years before the coal demand will cease, owning 5,895,369 tons, and all the other and to-day, of the 36,000,000 tons of coal nations 5,800,767 tons. Between 1855 and required by the steamers of the world, 1860 over 1,300,000 American tons in ex-three-fourths of it is obtained from Great cess of the country's needs were employed by foreigners in trades with which we had no legitimate connection save as carriers. In 1851 our registered steamships had grown from the 16,000 tons of 1848 to 63,920 tons-almost equal to the 65,920 tonsing our ports since 1856:— of England, and in 1855 this had increased to 115,000 tons and reached a maximum, for in 1862 we had 1,000 tons less. In 1855 we built 388 vessels, in 1856 306 vessels and in 1880 26 vessels-all for the foreign trade. The total tonnage which entered our ports in 1856 from abroad amounted to 4,464,038, of which American built ships constituted 3,194,375 tons, and all others but 1,259,762 tons. In 1880 there entered from abroad 15,240,534 tons, of which 3,128,374 tons were American and 12,112,000 were foreign-that is, in a ratio "This," writes Lindsay, "is surely not of seventy-five to twenty-five, or actually decadence, but defeat in a far nobler con65,901 tons less than when we were twenty-flict than the wars for maritime supremacy four years younger as a nation. The grain between Rome and Carthage, consisting as fleet sailing last year from the port of New it did in the struggle between the skill and York numbered 2,897 vessels, of which industry of the people of two great na1,822 were sailing vessels carrying 59,822,- tions." 033 bushels, and 1,075 were steamers laden with 42,426,533 bushels, and among all these there were but seventy-four American sailing vessels and not one American steamer. "While this poison of decay has been eating into our vitals the possibilities of the country in nearly every other industry have reached a plane of development beyond the dreams of the most enthusiastic Country. Increase. Decrease. ..6,977,163 922,903 596,907 208,412 164,683 226,277 204,872 104,009 Norway and Sweden...1,214,008 65,901 We have thus quoted the facts gathered from a source which has been endorsed by the higher naval authorities. Some reader will probably ask, "What relation have these facts to American politics?" We answer that the remedies proposed constitute political questions on which the great parties are very apt to divide. They have thus divided in the past, and parties have turned "about face on similar questions. Just now the Democratic party inclines to "free ships" and hostility to subsidieswhile the Republican party as a rule favors subsidies. Lieutenant Kelley summarized his proposed re edic in the two words: "free ships." that cause, made the path of his successor far more difficult than if he had been called to the succession by the operation of natu ral causes. That he has met these difficulties with rare discretion, all admit, and at this writing partisan interest and dislike are content to "abide a' wee" before be Mr. Blaine would solve the problem by bounties, for this purpose enacting a geLe-ginning an assault. He has sought no ral law that should ignore individuals and enforce a policy. His scheme provides that any man or company of men who will build in an American yard, with American material, by American mechanics, a steamship of 3,000 tons and sail her from any port of the United States to any foreign port, he or they shall receive for a monthly line a mail allowance of $25 per mile per annum for the sailing distance between the two ports; for a semi-monthly line $45 per mile, and for a weekly line $75 per mile. Should the steamer exceed three thousand tons, a small advance on these rates might be allowed; if less, a corresponding reduction, keeping three thousand as the average and standard. Other reformers propose a bounty to be given by the Government to the shipbuilder, so as to make the price of an American vessel the same as that of a foreign bought, equal, but presumably cheaper, ship. changes in the Cabinet, and thus through personal and political considerations seems for the time to have surrendered a Presidential prerogative freely admitted by all who understand the wisdom of permitting an executive officer to seek the advice of friends of his own selection. Mr. Blaine and Mr. MacVeagh, among the ablest of the late President's Cabinet, were among the most emphatic in insisting upon the earliest possible exercise of this prerogative-the latter upon its immediate exercise. Yet it has been withheld in several particulars, and the Arthur administration has sought to unite, wherever divided (and now divisions are rare), the party which called it into existence, while at the same time it has by careful management sought to check party strife at least for a time, and devoted its attention to the advancement of the material interests of the country. Appointments are fairly distributed among party friends, not divided as between factions; for such a division systematically made would disrupt any party. It would Mr. Blaine represents the growing Republican view, but the actual party views can only be ascertained when bills covering the subject come up for considera-prove but an incentive to faction for the tion. Current Politics. We shall close this written history of the political parties of the United States by a brief statement of the present condition of affairs, as generally remarked by our own people, and by quoting the views of an interesting cotemporaneous English writer. sake of a division of the spoils. No force of politics is or ought to be better understood in America than manufactured disagreements with the view to profitable compromises. Fitness, recognized ability, and adequate political service seem to constitute the reasons for Executive appointments at this time. The Democratic party, better equipped in the National Legisture than it has been President Arthur's administration has for years-with men like Hill, Bayard, Penhad many difficulties to contend with. The dleton, Brown, Voorhees, Lamar and GarPresident himself is the legal successor of land in the Senate-Stephens, Randall, a beloved man, cruelly assassinated, whose Hewitt, Cox, Johnson in the House-with well-rounded character and high abilities Tilden, Thurman, Wallace and Hancock had won the respect even of those who de- in the background-is led with rare abifamed him in the heat of controversy, while lity, and has the advantage of escaping rethey excited the highest admiration of those sponsibilities incident to a majority party. who shared his political views and thoughts. It has been observed that this party is purStricken down before he had time to for- suing the traditional strategy of minorities mulate a policy, if it was ever his intention in our Republic. It has partially refused to do so, he yet showed a proper apprecia- a further test on the tariff issue, and is tion of his high responsibilities, and had seeking a place in advance of the Republifrom the start won the kindly attention of cans on refunding questions-both popular the country. Gifted with the power of say-measures, as shown in all recent elections. ing just the right thing at the right moment, and saying it with all the grace and beauty of oratory, no President was better calculated to make friends as he moved along, than Garfield. The manifestations of factional feeling which immediately preceded his assassination, but which cannot for a moment be intelligently traced to It claims the virtue of sympathy with the Mormons by questioning the propriety of legal assaults upon the liberty of conscience, while not openly recording itself as a defender of the crime of polygamy. As a solid minority it has at least in the Senate yielded to the appeal of the States on the Pacific slope, and favored the abridg ment of Chinese immigration. On this question, however, the Western Republican Senators as a rule were equally active in support of the Miller Bill, so that whatever the result, the issue can no longer be a political one in the Pacific States. The respectable support which the measure has latterly received has cast out of the struggle the Kearneys and Kallochs, and if there be demagoguery on either side, it comes in better dress than ever before. Doubtless the parties will contest their claims to public support on their respective histories yet a while longer. Party history has served partisan purposes an average of twenty years, when with that history recollections of wars are interwoven, and the last war having been the greatest in our history, the presumption is allowable that it will be freely quoted so long as sectional or other forms of distrust are observable any where. When these recollections fail, new issues will have to be sought or accepted. In the mere search for issues the minority ought always to be the most active; but their wise appropriation, after all, depends upon the wisdom and ability of leadership. It has ever been thus, and ever will be. This is about the only political prophecy the writer is willing to risk -and in risking this he but presents a view common to all Americans who claim to be "posted" in the politics of their country. What politicians abroad think of our "situation" is well told, though not always accurately, by a distinguished writer in the January (1882) number of "The London Quarterly Review." From this we quote some very attractive paragraphs, and at the same time escape the necessity of descriptions and predictions generally believed to be essential in rounding off a political volume, but which are always dangerous in treating of current affairs. Speaking of the conduct of both parties on the question of Civil Service Reform, the writer says: แ What have they done to overthrow the celebrated Jacksonian precept, to the victors belongs the spoils?' What, in fact, is it possible for them to do under the present system? The political laborer holds that he is worthy of his hire, and if nothing is given to him, nothing will he give in return. There are tens of thousands of offices at the bestowal of every administration, and the persons who have helped to bring that administration into power expect to receive them. 'In Great Britain," once remarked the American paper which enjoys the largest circulation in the country, the ruling classes have it all to themselves, and the poor man rarely or never gets a nibble at the public crib. Here we take our turn. We know that, if our political rivals have the opportunity to-day, we shall have it to-morrow. This is the philosophy of the whole thing compressed into a nutshell.' If President Arthur were to begin to-day to distribute offices to men who were most worthy to receive them, without reference to political services, his own party would rebel, and assuredly his path would not be strewn with roses. He was himself a victim of a gross injustice perpetrated under the name of reform. He filled the important post of Collector of the Port of New York, and filled it to the entire satisfaction of the mercantile community. President Hayes did not consider General Arthur sufficiently devoted to his interests, and he removed him in favor of a confirmed wirepuller and caucus-monger, and the administration papers had the address to represent this as the outcome of an honest effort to reform the Civil Service. No one really supposed that the New York Custom House was less a political engine than it had been before. The rule of General Arthur had been, in point of fact, singularly free from jobbery and corruption, and not a breath of suspicion was ever attached to his personal character. If he had been less faithful in the discharge of his difficult duties, he would have made fewer enemies. He discovered several gross cases of fraud upon the revenue, and brought the perpetrators to justice; but the culprits were not without influence in the press, and they contrived to make the worse appear the better cause. Their view was taken at second-hand by many of the English journals, and even recently the public here were gravely assured that General Arthur represented all that was base in American politics, and moreover that he was an enemy of England, for he had been elected by the Irish vote. The authors of these foolish calumnies did not perceive that, if their statements had been correct, General Garfield, whom they so much honored, must also have been elected by the Irish vote; for he came to power on the very same 'ticket.' In reality, the Irish vote may be able to accomplish many things in America, but we may safely predict that it will never elect a President. General Arthur had not been many weeks in power, before he was enabled to give a remarkable proof of the injustice that had been done to him in this particular respect. The salute of the English flag at Yorktown is one of the most graceful incidents recorded in American history, and the order originated solely with the President. A man with higher character or, it may be added, of greater accomplishments and fitness for his office, never sat in the Presidential chair. His first appointments are now admitted to be better than those which were made by his predecessor for the same posts. Senator Frelinghuysen, the new Secretary of State, or Foreign Secretary, is a man of digence; and it has been stated that after great ability, of most excellent judgment, Andrew Johnson left the White House, and of the highest personal character. He he was reduced to the necessity of followstands far beyond the reach of all un- ing his old trade. General Grant was worthy influences. Mr. Folger, the Secre- much more fortunate; and we have retary of the Treasury, possesses the confi- cently seen that the American people have dence of the entire country, and the subscribed for Mrs. Garfield a sum nearly nomination of the new Attorney-General equal to £70,000. But a pension system was received with universal satisfaction. for Civil Servants is not likely to be All this little accords with the dark and forbidding descriptions of President Arthur which were placed before the public here on his accession to office. It is surely time that English writers became alive to the danger of accepting without question the distorted views which they find ready to their hands in the most bigoted or most malicious of American journals. "Democrats and Republicans, then, alike profess to be in favor of a thorough reform in the Civil Service, and at the present moment there is no other very prominent question which could be used as a test for the admission of members into either party. The old issue, which no one could possibly mistake, is gone. How much the public really care for the new one, it would be a difficult point to decide. A Civil Service system, such as that which we have in England, would scarcely be suited to the poor man," who, as the New York paper says, thinks he has a right occasionally to get a nibble at the public crib.' If a man has worked hard to bring his party into power, he is apt, in the United States, to think that he is entitled to some 'recognition,' and neither he nor his friends would be well pleased if they were told that, before anything could be done for him, it would be necessary to examine him in modern languages and mathematics. Moreover, a service such as that which exists in England requires to be worked with a system of pensions; and pensions, it is held in America, are opposed to the Republican idea.* If it were not for this objection, it may be presumed that some provision would have been made for more than one of the ex-Presidents, whose circumstances placed them or their families much in need of it. President Monroe spent his last years in wretched circumstances, and died bankrupt. Mrs. Madison 'knew what it was to want bread.' A negro servant, who had once been a slave in the family, used furtively to give her 'small sums they must have been very small -out of his own pocket. Mr. Pierce was, we believe, not far removed from in adopted. Permanence in office is another principle which has found no favor with the rank and file of either party in America, although it has sometimes been introduced into party platforms for the sake of producing a good effect. The plan of quick rotation is far more attractive to the popular sense. Divide the spoils, and divide them often. It is true that the public indignation is sometimes aroused, when too eager and rapacious a spirit is exhibited. Such a feeling was displayed in 1873, in consequence of an Act passed by Congress increasing the pay of its own members and certain officers of the Government. Each member of Congress was to receive $7,500 a year, or £1,500. The sum paid before that date, down to 1865, was $5000 a year, or £1000, and mileage' free added that is to say, members were entitled to be paid twenty cents a mile for traveling expenses to and from Washington. This Bill soon became known as the 'Salary Grab' Act, and popular feeling against it was so great that it was repealed in the following Session, and the former pay was restored. As a general rule, however, the spoils' system has not been heartily condemned by the nation; if it had been so condemned, it must have fallen long ago. 66 President Arthur has been admonished by his English counsellors to take heed that he follows closely in the steps of his predecessor. General Garfield was not long enough in office to give any decided indications of the policy which he intended to pursue; but, so far as he had gone, impartial observers could detect very little difference between his course of conduct in regard to patronage and that of former Presidents. He simply preferred the friends of Mr. Blaine to the friends of Mr. Conkling; but Mr. Blaine is a politician of precisely the same class as Mr. Conklingboth are men intimately versed in all the intricacies of ' primaries,' the 'caucus,' and the general working of the machine.' They are precisely the kind of men which American politics, as at present practised and understood, are adapted to produce. Mr. Conkling, however, is of more imperious a disposition than Mr. Blaine; the first disappointment or contradiction turns him from a friend into an enemy. President Garfield removed the Collector of New York-the most lucrative and most coveted post in the entire Union-and in stead of nominating a friend of Mr. Conk- | radical of the Republicans, and the most ling's for the vacancy, he nominated a conservative of the Democrats, are of one friend of Mr. Blaine's. Now Mr. Conk-mind on this point. Mr. Wendell Philling had done much to secure New York lips, an old abolitionist and Radical, once State for the Republicans, and thus gave publicly declared that Republican governthem the victory; and he thought himself ment in cities had been a complete failentitled to better treatment than he re-ure.* An equally good Radical, the late ceived. But was it in the spirit of true re- Mr. Horace Greeley, made the following form to remove the Collector, against still more candid statement:-There are whom no complaint had been made, merely probably at no time less than twenty for the purpose of creating a vacancy, and thousand men in this city [New York] then of putting a friend of Mr. Blaine's who would readily commit a safe murder into it-a friend, moreover, who had been for a hundred dollars, break open a house largely instrumental in securing General for twenty, and take a false oath for five. Garfield's own nomination at Chicago? * Most of these are of European birth, Is this all that is meant, when the Reform though we have also native miscreants party talk of the great changes which they who are ready for any crime that will pay.'† desire to see carried out? Again, the new Strong testimony against the working of President has been fairly warned by his the suffrage-and it must have been most advisers in this country, that he must unwilling testimony-was given in 1875 by abolish every abuse, new or old, connected a politician whose long familiarity with with the distribution of patronage. If he caucuses and 'wire-pulling' in every form is to execute this commission, not one term renders him an undeniable authority. of office, nor three terms, will be sufficient Let it be widely proclaimed,' he wrote, for him. Over every appointment there that the experience and teachings of a will inevitably arise a dispute; if a totally republican form of government prove untried man is chosen, he will be suspected nothing so alarmingly suggestive of and as a wolf coming in sheep's clothing; if a pregnant with danger as that cheap sufwell known partizan is nominated, he will frage involves and entails cheap represenbe denounced as a mere tool of the leaders, tation.' Another Republican, of high and there will be another outcry against character, has stated that the methods of 'machine politics.' 'One party or other,' politics have now become so repulsive, the said an American journal not long ago, corruption so open, the intrigues and permust begin the work of administering sonal hostilities are so shameless, that it the Government on business principles, is very difficult to engage in them without and the writer admitted that the work a sense of humiliation."" would cost salt tears to many a politician.' The honor of making this beginning has not yet been sought for with remarkable eagerness by either party; but seems to be deemed necessary to promise that something shall be done, and the Democrats, being out of power, are naturally in the position to bid the highest. The reform will come, as we have intimated, when the people demand it; it cannot come before, for few, indeed, are the politicians in the United States who venture to trust themselves far in advance of public opinion. And even of that few, there are some who have found out, by hard experience, that there is little honor or profit to be gained by undertaking to act as pioneers. "It is doubtless a step in advance, that both parties now admit the absolute necessity of devising measures to elevate the character of the public service, to check the progress of corruption, and to introduce a better class of men into the offices which are held under the Government. The necessity of great reforms in these respects has been avowed over and over again by most of the leading journals and influential men in the country. The most The undeniable facts of the case were as we have briefly indicated above See, for example, a letter to the 'New York Nation,' Nov. 3, 1881. Passing to another question, and one worthy of the most intelligent discussion, but which has never yet taken the shape of a political demand or issue in this country, this English writer says: 66 Although corruption has been suspected at one time or other in almost every Department of the Government, the Pres idential office has hitherto been kept free from its stain. And yet, by an anomaly of the Constitution, the President has sometimes been exposed to suspicion, and still more frequently to injustice and misrepresentation, in consequence of the practical irresponsibility of his Cabinet officers. They are his chief advisers in regard to the distribution of places, as well as in the higher affairs of State, and the discredit of any mismanagement on their part falls upon him. It is true that he chooses them, and may dismiss them, with the concur rence of the Senate; but, when once appointed, they are beyond reach of all effective criticism-for newspaper attacks are easily explained by the suggestion of party malice. They cannot be questioned in |