INDIANA. 



395 



14. That official stealing has become an unendura- 

 ble burden in our political affairs. 



15. That the men who take advantage of the posi- 

 tions of trust and honor, to which the people elevate 

 them, to secure illegitimate gains, are unmitigated 

 thieves, more to be abhorred than highway robbers. 



16. That all such should forfeit their positions and 

 salaries, be disfranchised, and punished as other crim- 

 inals. 



17. That the most rigid economy in public affairs is 

 especially demanded by our indebted and depressed 

 condition. 



18. That the payment of the bonds in coin, orig- 

 inally payable in lawful money, was a gift to the bond- 

 holder, and the payment of tne soldier in depreciated 

 paper, when by contract payable in coin, was, and is, 

 an unjust discrimination in favor of the bondholder. 

 Therefore we demand, injustice to the soldier, that he 

 be paid according to contract. 



19. That we demand the immediate passage by Con- 

 gress of a law for the equalization of soldiers' boun- 

 ties. 



20. That the right of suffrage is the inalienable 

 right of every citizen of the United States. 



21. We endorse and demand the passage of what is 

 known as the " Reagan bill " on inter-State com- 

 merce, together with such other legislation as will 

 force the transportation companies to become what the 

 people designed them to be when they called them 

 into existence, namely, the servants, and not the mas- 

 ters, of the people ; aids to the development of the 

 nation's resources, and not a power of a few men to 

 build up an aristocracy of wealth, by crushing oat all 

 fair and honorable competition among business men. 



22. That we are opposed to the importation of the 

 Chinese servile labor. 



23. That we denounce the arrest and imprisonment 

 of American citizens for exercising the right of free 

 speech, as one more step toward the subversion of re- 

 publican institutions, and the enslavement of the 

 people. 



The Democratic State Convention met at 

 Indianapolis on June 9th. The nominations 

 on the State ticket were as follows: for Gov- 

 ernor, Franklin Landers ; for Lieutenant-Gov- 

 ernor, Isaac P. Gray, who had been elected to 

 the same office the preceding election, and had 

 occupied the Governor's chair since the death 

 of Governor Williams; for Secretary of State, 

 John G. Shanklin; for Auditor, Mahlon D. 

 Manson ; for Treasurer, William Fleming ; for 

 Clerk of the Supreme Court, Gabriel Schmuck ; 

 for Reporter of the Supreme Court, A. N. 

 Martin, the incumbent at the time ; for Attor- 

 ney-General, the incumbent, J. W. Woolen; 

 for Superintendent of Public Instruction, A. 

 C. Goodwin. On the first ballot for Governor, 

 Landers and Gray received nearly the same 

 number of votes, but, on the second, Landers 

 was nominated. The platform adopted ran as 

 follows : 



1. We, the Democracy of Indiana, in Delegate Con- 

 vention assembled, congratulate the Democracy of the 

 country upon the harmony prevailing within its or- 

 ganization^ and upon its unanimityln the purposes 

 to cast behind it every occasion and sentiment of dis- 

 cord, and to stand as one man for success in 1880 ; and 

 we give assurance to the Democracy of the country 

 that, accepting the declaration of principles and pur- 

 poses that may be made at Cincinnati, and the candi- 

 dates who may be there chosen, we will give to them 

 our earnest and undivided support. 



2. We believe that laws should be enacted, executed, 

 and administered only for the public good, and all 

 class legislation, and all favoritism in the affairs of 



government, should be defeated and made odious ; 

 that taxes should be levied justly, and the most rigid 

 economy should control public expenditures : that the 

 elections must be freed from the control of the army, 

 and of partisan officials, in that they shall be fair and 

 honest as they once were ; and that the rightful Juris- 

 diction of the State Courts must be restored, in all 

 cases where it has been usurped by the Federal author- 

 ity, so that justice may be administered cheaply and 

 speedily. 



3. The coin and paper money of the country should 

 be of uniform value, and readily convertible, and 

 should have as great purchasing power as the money 

 of other first-class commercial countries of the world, 

 and the paper money, like the coin, should be fur- 

 nished by the United States, and should not be in ex- 

 cess of such quantity as will be, and remain always, 

 at par with coin. 



4. Inasmuch as the outstanding Treasury notes are 

 no longer necessary to the Government in the use of 

 its credit, and are useful only as money, they should 

 be made subject to taxation, the same as other money. 



As tax-payers we declare our gratification at the 

 action of the Democratic members of Congress in re- 

 ducing public expenditure, and in cutting off the al- 

 lowance and payment of questionable and fraudulent 

 claims, resulting in a saving to the Treasury of more 

 than $100,000,000. 



5. We will stand with all our might against the ag- 

 gression of the Republican leaders upon the rights of 

 the States, made for the purpose of building up a 

 strong central power, dangerous to the liberty of the 

 people. 



We will in all fidelity maintain the constitutional 

 rights and powers of the United States, and as faith- 

 fully we will maintain and vindicate the rights of the 

 States as reserved to them in the Constitution. 



6. The Legislature of 1879 is entitled to honorable 

 mention for having redeemed the pledges of the Dem- 

 ocratic Convention of 1876 to provide by law for the 

 comfort and safety of laborers in the mines, and for 

 securing their wages to the persons employed by cor- 

 porations, and we are in favor of such further legisla- 

 tion in the premises as may be necessary and proper. 



We congratulate the people of the State that by the 

 action of the Democrats ot the last Legislature in bas- 

 ing representation on population and contiguity of 

 territory only, the shame and taint of fraud have 

 been removed from the apportionment of representa- 

 tion, and that now the people will be equally and 

 fairly represented. 



7. The people of Indiana are justly proud of their 

 system of free schools, and will maintain them in their 

 full force and usefulness, and to that end we must see 

 to it that the management thereof does not become 

 wasteful or extravagant, and that no part of the mu- 

 nificent fund which they have provided shall be used 

 for sectarian or for any other purposes whatever than 

 the support of common schools. 



8. We are gratified that the Democrats in Congress 

 have acted in respect to bounties and pensions for 

 soldiers and their families in the spirit of justice and 

 liberality. 



9. We hold up to public detestation the conduct of 

 the leaders in the Republican party in placing Hayes 

 and Wheeler, by criminal practices shocking to every 

 honest sentiment and damaging to our institutions, in 

 offices to which they were not elected. It was an out- 

 rage upon free government, and a crime against the 

 elective franchise that can not bo forgiven, and must 

 not be repeated, and for which the guilty parties must 

 be driven from power and consigned to infamy. And 

 we hold up to public detestation the conduct of the 

 President in rewarding the guilty parties by confer- 

 ring upon them high and lucrative offices. To reward 

 crime is itself criminal. 



10. During the past few years our country lias been 

 blessed in a high degree with favorable seasons, and 

 the production~of our valuable staples has been enor- 

 mously in excess of our own consumption. < We have 

 sold to foreign countries many hundred millions more 



