The Chance Of Years

THE CHANCE OF YEARS.

If the democracy of Michigan generally is embued with the same sentiments as those expressed by the Hon. T. E. Barkworth in a Detroit interview recently, Bliss is likely to have a walkaway in the election this fall. The democrats may not be able to win this year, but certainly there will be a better chance of doing it, if Bliss is renominated, than there has been for some years heretofore. There is undoubtedly a serious schism in the republican party of the state and thousands of our best citizens are simply disgusted with Bliss and what he stands for and are ready to rebuke him and those responsible for the corruption which has disgraced the state and made such a governor possible. When there is the possibility of adding all this dissatisfied element to the democratic column the democrats should be encouraged rather than discouraged by the fact. But if the democrats have not the spirit to seize the opportunity by putting forward men who will command the confidence of the voters who are opposed to Bliss, if they are too lethargic to avail themselves of this opportunity ready made, then they are unworthy of the confidence of the majority of the voters of the state and should remain on the outside as at present.

Such a campaign as was put up by the democracy at the time Governor Winans was elected would do much toward rescuing the state from the conditions in which it is drifting today, and might result as did the campaign of 1890. At any rate the chance is worth the effort. There are men within the democratic organization who would command the united democratic strength and the greater part of the disaffected element of the republicans, and if the democracy is competent and fit to administer the affairs of the state, they should be brought out and placed before the people fort heir suffrages. With a strong ticket of clean men, the chances for democratic success are brighter than they have been for years. Why not seize the opportunity and make the most of it? Even though the present regime might not be overthrown, public sentiment would be aroused to such an extent that some good would accrue to the state from such a battle. The matter of needed reforms might be so impressed upon the republicans that they would see the writing on the wall and feel the necessity of doing something to satisfy the demands of the decent people who are so loudly protesting against present conditions.

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Dr. Angell in his baccalaureate address spoke warningly of the tendency of the times toward extreme specialization. This concentration on some relatively narrow line of work, he said, would undoubtedly yield some most valuable results but there was the danger in it of the specialists losing appreciation of other departments of learning than their own and, in the case of teachers who become original investigators, that they become negligent of their work as teachers that they may press their work as investigators. The first of these dangers was shown in the spirit of rivalry and dispute and even hostility which these specialists sometimes manifest. The second danger is shown in the disposition of teachers to do their class room work in the most perfunctory manner that they may devote their energy to their solitary work of investigation. Such specialization, he held, was not apt to result in the greatest advance of knowledge for the reason that it prevents the development of that catholicity of spirit which should unite the forces of all scholars in the different branches of human knowledge for the uplifting of mankind. The teacher investigator would be more certain of his results, if called upon to test the validity of his reasoning and the soundness of his processes by trying to make himself understood by a class of advance pupils. He deprecated that spirit which engenders hostility between men engaged in different lines of research work and that spirit that causes them to shut themselves off from mankind.

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Secretary of the Navy Moody has placed Admiral George Dewey in charge of the fleet which is to maneuver in the vicinity of Celebra island in the West Indies next winter. This fleet will be composed of the North Atlantic, European and South Atlantic squadrons and will be the most powerful fleet ever assembled under the command of an American admiral. This selection indicates that the secretary of the navy is disposed to show a more catholic spirit than his predecessor.