776 



UNITED STATES. 



abandonment has always been followed by general 

 disaster to all interests except those of the usurer and 

 the sheriff. 



We denounce the Mills Bill as destructive to the 

 general business, the labor, and the farming interests 

 of the country, and we heartily indorse the consistent 

 and patriotic action of the Republican representatives 

 in Congress in opposition to its passage. 



We condemn the proposition of the Democratic 

 party to place wool on the free list, and we insist 

 that the duties thereon shall be adjusted and main- 

 tained so as to furnish full and adequate protection to 

 that industry. 



The Republican party would effect all needed re- 

 duction of the national revenue by repealing the taxes 

 upon tobacco, which are an annoyance_ and burden to 

 agriculture, and the taxes upon spirits used in the 

 arts and for mechanical purposes, and by such re- 

 vision of the tariff laws as will tend to check imports 

 of such articles as are produced by our people, the 

 production of which gives employment to our labor, 

 and release from import duties those articles of for- 

 eign production except luxuries the like of which can 

 not be produced at home. If there shall still remain 

 a larger revenue than is requisite for the wants of the 

 Government, we favor the entire repeal of internal 

 taxes rather than the surrender of anv part of our pro- 

 tective system at a joint behest of whisky trusts and 

 agents of foreign manufacturers. 



We declare our hostility to the introduction into 

 this country of foreign contract labor and of Chinese 

 labor alien to our civilization and our Constitution, 

 and we demand the rigid enforcement of existing laws 

 against it and favor such immediate legislation as 

 will exclude such labor from our shores. 



We declare our opposition to all combinations of 

 capital organized in trusts or otherwise to control ai - - 

 bitrarily the condition of trade among our citizens, 

 and we recommend to Congress and State legislatures 

 in their respective jurisdictions, such legislation as 

 will prevent the execution of all schemes to oppress 

 the people by undue charges on their supplies or by 

 unjust rates for the transportation of their products to 

 market. We approve the legislation by Congress to 

 prevent alike unjust burdens and unfair discrimina- 

 tions between States. 



We reaffirm the policy of appropriating the public 

 lands of the United States to be homesteads for 

 American citizens and settlers not aliens which the 

 Republican party established in 136'2 against the per- 

 sistent opposition of the Democrats in Congress, and 

 which has brought our great Western domain into 

 such magnificent development. The restoration of 

 unearned railroad land grants to public domain for 

 the use of actual settlers which was begun under the 

 administration of President Arthur should be con- 

 tinued. We deny that the Democratic party has 

 ever restored one acre to the people, but declare that 

 by joint action of Republicans and Democrats about 

 fifty million acres of unearned lands, originally 

 granted for the construction of railroads, have been 

 restored to the public domain in pursuance of the 

 conditions inserted by the Republican party in the 

 original grant. 



We charge the Democratic Administration with 

 failure to execute the laws securing to settlers titles 

 to their homesteads and with using appropriations 

 made for that purpose to harrass the innocent set- 

 tlers with spies ana prosecutions under the false pre- 

 tense of exposing frauds and vindicating law. 



The government by Congress of the Territories is 

 based upon necessity only to the end that they may 

 become States in the Union ; therefore, whenever the 

 conditions of population, material resources, public 

 intelligence, and morality are such as to insure stable 

 local government therein, the people of such Terri- 

 tories should be permitted as a right inherent in 

 them to form for themselves constitutions and State 

 governments and be admitted into the Union. Pend- 

 ing the preparation for statehood, all officers thereof 



should be selected from bona-fide residents and citi- 

 zens of the Territory wherein they are to serve. 

 South Dakota should of right be immediately admit- 

 ted as a State in the Union under the Constitution 

 framed and adopted by her people, and we heartily 

 indorse the action of the Republican Senate in twice 

 passing bills for her admission. The refusal of the 

 Democratic House of Representatives, for partisan 

 purposes, to favorably consider these bills is a willful 

 violation of the sacred American principle of local 

 self-government, and merits the condemnation of all 

 just men. The pending bills in the Senate for acts 

 to enable the people of Washington, North Dakota, 

 and Montana Territories to form constitutions and 

 establish State governments should be passed without 

 unnecessary delay. The Republican party pledges 

 itself to do all in its power to facilitate the admission 

 of the Territories of New Mexico, Wyoming, Idaho, 

 and Arizona to the enjoyment of self-government as 

 States : such of them as are now qualified as soon as 

 possible, and the others as soon as they become so. 



The political power of the Mormon Church in the 

 Territories as exercised in the past is a menace to free 

 institutions too dangerous to be long suffered. There- 

 fore we pledge the Republican party to appropriate 

 legislation asserting the sovereignty of the nation in 

 all Territories where the same is questioned, and, in 

 furtherance of that end, to place upon the statute- 

 books legislation stringent enough to divorce the po- 

 litical from the ecclesiastical power and thus stamp 

 out the attendant wickedness of polygamy. 



The Republican party is in favor of the use of both 

 gold and silver as money, and condemns the policy of 

 the Democratic Administration in its efforts to demon- 

 etize silver. 



We demand the reduction of letter postage to one 

 cent per ounce. 



In a republic like ours, where the citizen is sover- 

 eign and the official the servant, where no power is 

 exercised except by the will of the people, it is im- 

 portant that the sovereign the people should pos- 

 sess intelligence. The free school is a promoter of 

 that intelligence which is to preserve us a free nation. 

 Therefore the State or nation, or both combined, 

 should support free institutions of learning sufficient 

 to afford to" every child growing up in the land the 

 opportunity of a good common-school education. 



We earnestly recommend that prompt action be 

 taken by Congress in the enactment of such legisla- 

 tion as will best secure the rehabilitation of our Ameri- 

 can merchant marine, and we protest against the pas- 

 sage by Congress of a free ship bill, as calculated to 

 work injustice to labor by lessening the wages of 

 those engaged in preparing materials as well as those 

 directly employed in our ship-yards. 



We demand"appropriations for the early rebuilding 

 of our navy ; for the construction of coast fortifica- 

 tions and modern ordnance, and other approved mod- 

 ern means of defense for the protection of our defense- 

 less harbors and cities ; for the payment of just pen- 

 sions to our soldiers ; for necessary works of national 

 importance in the improvement of harbors and the 

 channels of internal, coastwise, and foreign commerce ; 

 for the encouragement of the shipping interests of the 

 Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific States, as well as for the 

 pavment of the maturing public debt. This policy 

 will give employment to our labor, activity to our 

 various industries, increase security of our country, 

 promote trade, open new and direct markets for our 

 produce, and cheapen the cost of transportation. We 

 affirm this to be far better for our country than the 

 Democratic policy of loaning the Government's money 

 without interest to " pet banks." 



The conduct of foreign affairs by the present Ad- 

 ministration has been distinguished by its inefficiency 

 and its cowardice. Having withdrawn from the Sen- 

 ate all pending treaties effected by Republican Ad- 

 ministrations for the removal of foreign burdens and 

 restrictions upon our commerce and for its extension 

 into better markets, it has neither effected nor pro- 



