Toothaker's Stable is the favorite Livery with the students. Hacks always in waiting
THE WEEKLY University Courier.
The largest College Journal circulation in the United States.
COURIER COMPANY For Kansas University Students.
PUBLISHED EVERY FRIDAY MORNING
M. O. BILLINGS. | A. L. WILMOTH,
    President. | Sec'y
EDITORIAL STAFF.
W. S. JENKS, *Editor-in-Chief*
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The meeting of the delegates on the Inter-State Association met yesterday afternoon at 3 o'clock. The meeting was called to order by the president, Mr. Parker. The report on credentials was made by the committee. The committee reported Mr. Harrison as delegate from Indiana but was objected to by Mr. Stack barger, who claimed to represent that state. After a few words by the gentleman from Iowa, the delegate from Ohio moved that the report be adopted, but the motion was objected to. The motion was then made that the report be adopted excepting the report on Indiana. It was moved that a committee of three be appointed by the chair to consider the respective rights of the two contestants from Indiana; motion lost. The convention then resolved itself into a com of the whole to take action on the case. It was moved and carried that each gentleman be allowed to state his grounds for claiming the place. After a squabble as to which should be the plaintiff and which the defendant, it was agreed to hear Mr. Harrison first. Mr. Ha.rison then read a statement signed by the principal officer of the Indiana association which placed his claims in a very good light. After a severe cross questioning by several members, Mr. Harrison was allowed to step out, and Mr. Stackbarger was placed on the witness stand. At his request the secretary read a letter written by Shaw, vice president of the Indiana Association, which pleaded his cause. Mr. Starkbarger also made a speech. The discussion then became general, and after a great deal of college eloquence it was moved that the committee rise and report that the convention recognize no delegate from Indiana. The motion was amended to read that when they arise they report Mr. Harrison as the recognized delegate. This turned loose another discussion which lasted until almost 5 o'clock when a vote was taken resulting favorably to Mr. Harrison. The president then took the chair, and on motion a committee was appointed to draw up an order of business. After their report* the president appointed the following committees:
Constitution, Russell, Gilmore and Pellet.
Admission of states, Ward, Lovell and Harrison.
Time and place of holding next contest, Spencer, Cross and Dennison.
Resolutions, Glover, Millegan and Randall.
The convention then accepted the invitation to attend the banquet, after which an adjournment was taken until this morning at 8 o'clock.
THE WINNING ORATION.
CONSERVATISM, AN ESSENTIAL ELEMENT OF PROGRESS.
E. C. BITSHER, Beloit College, Beloit, Wisconsin
The nineteenth century has been a century of wonders. Prodigies have marked her onward course. The mechanical appliances of ages have been revolutionized. The most stubborn forces have yielded to man.
The present generation seeks new worlds to conquer. It penetrates the social and moral life of man and their endeavors to rival the material world in startling revolutions. This invasion of unknown regions calls together men of energy and character, but it also gathers its reckless adventurers. Vandals have arisen in the very realms of thought, wielding their intellectual weapons with ruthless hands. They cry out against those who counsel moderation. They declare war on what they call the bigotry of the past. To avoid conservatism they leap into fanaticism. Determined to reform society by a single stroke, they bid defiance to reason and produce their legitimate fruits—Socialism, Nihilism and Rebellion. Is there truth in their doctrines? Is there method in their madness? Let the horrors of the French Revolution be your answer!
If we pause to examine the facts in the case, we find no truth in the cry of these Philistines. No yawning gulf separates the conservatives from the reformers. Their ultimate aim is the same. They differ only in their methods. The conservative people of the world are not bigots. They are not the enemies of progress. They grasp the truth with unerring mind. They strive for its success with loyal hearts. The difference between the conservative man and the so-called reformer is a difference not of heart but of brain. It is the difference between the practical man and the theoretical man.
The radical reformer acts in view of the ideal, rather than the actual world. He believes that a certain thing is right and that all else is wrong; and he says, "Give me the right or give me nothing." He believes that he is entitled to the whole loaf, and he proposes to have the whole loaf or starve. The smallest portion of truth suffices so to engage his attention that he forgets everything else, and becomes blind to all that is not comprised within the narrow horizon of his belief.
These men have an idea, a plan, a theory, and mounting the lofty platform of "principle," they defiantly proclaim their ideas and proceed to attack the fixed institutions of centuries before they have secured the means of success. They do not consider that success in human affairs is not to be obtained by such absolute proceedings or by a mere appeal to philosophical argument. They do not consider that they deliberately insult the intelligence and common sense of their fellow-men. It does take principle and it does take courage to pursue such a course, but we are placed in the world to accomplish something—not merely to make martyrs of ourselves. And while we must admire the pluck of the so-called reformers, we can not but condemn their judgment. We cannot fail to see that their methods are futile and fraught with danger.
The truly conservative men, on the contrary, realize that man must be dealt with not as an ideal being, but as he is. They realize that tact must be exercised in human affairs. They appreciate the fact that the politic, like the human body, must develop strength and energy by slow, sure process—that all abnormally rapid growth is but the symbol of decay. These men take no narrow, visionary view of a subject, but grasping at once and as a whole the matter which comes to their notice, they so calculate, arrange and combine the conflicting elements, that while the everlasting principle is placed boldly forward so as not to be mistaken, care is taken that it shall not be endangered by a negligent or rash estimate of the circumstances which oppose it.
True conservative men respect an honest foe. They realize that the principle for which they are contending is not the only one in the world, but that there are other doctrines, other facts, other interests which demand recognition. They are willing to take even the crust if they cannot have the whole loaf. They are willing to make use of stepping-stones to reach the exalted position for which they strive. And they are none the less men of principle for so doing; they simply combine with their principles tact and common sense. They realize that yonder mountain height of achievement must be reached, not by a reckless and fanatical attempt to climb straight up its perpendicular sides, but rather by following the winding path of policy, which, with its gentle ascent, leads ever onward, ever upward to the glorious summit of success!
This is the only road to achievement. Step by step is the universal law of progress. The whole material world bows reverently to its sway. The wondrous power, which, out of chaos, produced the universe—the earth, the air, the heavens with all their starry splendor—was a power working not by mighty revolutions, but slowly, silently, through infinite ages. The forces of violent action—the wind, the flood, the earthquake shock—are the forces of destruction Wherever we turn our eyes the evidences of this law confront us. All nature is under its dominion. Is man so mighty a creature that he can safely defy the laws of the very power that gave him birth? History teaches them the reverse.
The English nation escaped from a condition of servitude and tyrannical oppression, not by violently throwing off the yoke, but by over a century of steady, systematic and intelligent growth. The Magna Charter, the Petition of Rights, the Bill of Rights—those three great documents which have been aptly termed the "Bible of the English Constitution"—were wrested from haughty kings not by a party of one idea; not by fanatics thoughtless of all else, but by men who considered the interests of all parties, and who for that very reason, were able to develop a symmetrical and powerful public sentiment. As one of our ablest political philosophers says, "The healthful development of the English Constitution was due to the fact that no particular principle ever obtained an exclusive influence. There was always a simultaneous development of the different forces, and a sort of negotiation
or compromise between their pretentions and interests."
Across the Channel, however, the case was different. The French people defied the law of progress, and as a consequence there arose in France certain factions with "Liberty" for their watchword — "Liberty though the heavens fall." Revolution, they considered the touchstone of progress; one idea, the condition of success. Violating the very principle for which they fought, they refused to consider other interests; they scorned to consider other factions; they listened not to the claims of monarchy, religion or law. And those dark pages in the history of France, from the perusal of which the very demons turn in horror, are the record of their deeds.
Biography, too, adds its testimony to the immutability of the law of progress and bears witnesses to the success of those who recognize this law. Who is the man who has transformed Prussia from a mass of petty states to that great and glorious nation, second to none on the European continent? Bismarck; a man of iron will, a man of dogged persistence, and yet withal, a man of such consumate tact and policy that for twenty years and more he has held his position as chief man of the realm in spite of opposition, aye, even with the consent of his bitterest political enemies! German Unification was not an idea original with him. Patriots and reformers for a century before had been longing to accomplish this very thing. Bismarck was the first to grapple with the problem as a statesman and not as an enthusiast. Others had sought to make a nation in a day; Bismarck was willing to give a lifetime for the work.
Who is the man who in England to day wields a power and an influence which, defeat and political overthrow have not been able to cripple? Gladstone; the Christian statesman, the man of principle, and yet, for the sake of the welfare of England, so conservative that, irrespective of party ties, he seeks for the symmetrical development of all English interests. His name is destined to become immortal, not as the leader of a party, not as a champion of one idea, but as a statesman who could be active without being partisan, conservative without being stationary, progressive without being fanatical.
Turn to our own history—to the name of one who will live forever in the memory and the heart of his country—to Abraham Lincoln, the emancipator of the slaves, the savior of the Union. Coming into power when the nation was at a crisis, when as a people we were wholly absorbed in watching one great event, he never forgot for a moment the multiplicity of our interests as a nation; he never allowed his hatred for an evil institution to triumph over his reason, but amid the reiliings of those fanatics who would have plunged us into ruin, he boldly declared: "My paramount object is to save the Union, and not either to save or destroy slavery. What I do about slavery and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union, and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help save the Union." And at that time when even among our northern men conflicting opinions prevailed; when fifty thousand of our troops were from the border slave states; when the salvation of the Union demanded the earnest and unqualified support of every loyal citizen; at that time, a policy less broad, a course less statesmanlike, a rallying cry less comprehensive, would have plunged us into irretrievable disaster and ruin. And I ask—and I voice the sentiment of men than whom there are none greater in this nation, than whom there are none more loyal—I ask if in 1856 the Garrisons and the Phillipses of the north, and the Davises and the Tombses of the south, had been replaced by men with the sagacity of Abraham Lincoln; if we had used more policy in our treatment of an institution morally wrong yet legally recognized; if we had considered all the interests of this nation, should we not have secured the emancipation of the negro without the cost of five billions of treasure; without devastating and beggaring one-half of our fair land; without the sacrifice of six hundred thousand human lives; without twenty-five years of sectional strife; without plunging the negro into a condition of political servitude more oppressive, if possible, than his former state?
There doubtless is a place in the world for radical reformers, and without question they perform a grand work by arousing to activity the public mind. But victory has rarely perched on their banners, and their watchword has been too often changed from "principle" to "intolerance." She sands of time are red with the blood of their slaughtered victims; yet the result of their warfare has been extermination, not peace.
The conservative men are the doers of the world. What reformers would bring about by violence and revolution, they accomplish by natural means. It is time to denounce the fanatical slander which is cast upon them. Malicious attack may dim the splendor of their successes, but it cannot efface the record of their achievements. The eulogy is engraved on the tablets of time. As long as civilization advances; as long as liberty endures, their fame is secure. And if, in the dim ages of the future, their forces ever should be outnumbered and the legions of wreck and ruin run riot, the traditions of a former civilization will yet remain. a glorious monument to the memory of Conservative men.
The Kansas Oratorical Association gave a grand banquet to the visiting delegates and the orators last night after the contest. The tables were spread in Grosscup's parlor, and delegates, orators and friends to the number of about forty sat down to an elegant repast. After an hour spent in partaking of the good things in store, the company was favored by a speech by Eugene Ware, which was entertaining and humorous. Owing to the late hour the toasts which had been prepared were dispensed with. President Ingalls closed the banquet with a few kind words.
The Courier is nothing if it is not enterprising. At this hour, 5 o'clock A.M., after the editors and composites have worked all night, the paper is just going to press, this being the last item which enters the paper,
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