The matter was settled at last by the
people. For a hundred years, between 1793 and 1893, the American
people had hesitated, vacillated, swayed forward and back,
between two forces, one simply industrial, the other
capitalistic, centralizing, and mechanical. In 1893, the issue
came on the single gold standard, and the majority at last
declared itself, once for all, in favor of the capitalistic
system with all its necessary machinery. All one's friends, all
one's best citizens, reformers, churches, colleges, educated
classes, had joined the banks to force submission to capitalism;
a submission long foreseen by the mere law of mass. Of all forms
of society or government, this was the one he liked least, but
his likes or dislikes were as antiquated as the rebel doctrine of
State rights. A capitalistic system had been adopted, and if it
were to be run at all, it must be run by capital and by
capitalistic methods; for nothing could surpass the nonsensity of
trying to run so complex and so concentrated a machine by
Southern and Western farmers in grotesque alliance with city
day-laborers, as had been tried in 1800 and 1828, and had failed
even under simple conditions.
There, education in domestic politics stopped. The rest was
question of gear; of running machinery; of economy; and involved
no disputed principle.
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