I'NITKI) STATKS. 



751 



Two yearn ago this revolutionary policy wan em- 

 phatically condemned by the people at the polls, 

 tint in contempt of that verdict the Republican 

 party has defiantly declared In its latest authorlta- 

 Uv Utterance that Its success In the coming elec- 

 tions will mean the enactment of the Force bill, and 

 tin- u -ii r| lilt ion of despotic control over elections In 

 all the States. Believing that the preservation of 

 republican government in the United States Is de- 

 pendent upon the defeat of this policy of legalized 

 f..ivr and fraud, we Invite the support of nil citizens 

 win. desire to see the Constitution maintained in its 

 integrity with the laws pursuant thereto which have 

 our country a hundred years of unexampled 



prosperity ; and we pledge the Democratic party, If 

 it be intrusted with power, not only to the defeat of 

 the Force bill, but also to relentless opposition to 

 the Republican policy of profligate expenditure 

 which, in the short space of two years, has squan- 

 dered an enormous surplus, emptied an overflowing 

 Treasury, after piling new burdens of luxation upon 

 the already overtaxed labor of the country. 



Tariff. We denounce Republican protection as a 

 fraud,' a robbery of the great majority of the Ameri- 

 can people for the benefit of the few. We declare 

 it to be a fundamental principle of the Democratic 

 party that the Federal Government has no constitu- 

 tional power to impose and collect tariff duties, 

 except for the purpose of revenue only, and we 

 demand that the collection of such taxes shall be 

 limited to the necessities of the Government when 

 honestly and economically administered. We de- 

 nounce the McKinley tariff law enacted by the 

 List Congress as the culminating atrocity of class 

 legislation ; we Indorse the efforts made by the 

 Democrats of the present Congress to modify its 

 most oppressive feature in the direction of free raw 

 materials and cheaper manufactured goods that 

 enter into general consumption, and we promise its 

 repeal as one of the beneficent results that will fol- 

 low the action of the people in intrusting power to 

 the Democratic party. Since the McKinley tariff 

 went into operation there have been ten reductions 

 of the wages of the laboring man to one increase. 

 We deny that there has been any increase of pros- 

 perity to the country since that tariff went into 

 operation, and we point to the dullness and distress, 

 the wage reductions and strikes in the iron trade, as 

 the best possible evidence that no such prosperity 

 has resulted from the McKinley act. We call the 

 attention of thoughtful Americans to the fact that 

 after thirty years of restrictive taxes against the 

 importation of foreign wealth, in exchange for our 

 agricultural surplus, the homes and farms of the 

 country have become burdened with a real estate 

 mortgage debt of over $2,500,000,000,exclusive of all 

 other forms of indebtedness; that in one of the 

 chief agricultural States of the West there appears 

 a real estate mortgage debt averaging $165 per capita 

 of the total population, and that similar conditions 

 and tendencies are shown to exist in other agricul- 

 tural exporting States. We denounce a policy which 

 fosters no industry so much as it does that of the 

 sheriff. 



Reciprocity. Trade interchange on the basis of 

 reciprocal advantages to the countries participating 

 is a time-honored doctrine of the Democratic faith, 

 but we denounce the sham reciprocity which jug- 

 gles with the people's desire for enlarged foreign 

 markets and freer exchanges by pretending to estab- 

 lish closer trade relations for a country whose 

 articles of export are almost exclusively agricul- 

 tural products with other countries that are also 

 agricultural, while erecting a custom-house barrier 

 df prohibitive tariff taxes against the rich and the 

 countries of the world that stand ready to take our 

 entire surplus of products and to exchange therefor 

 commodities which are necessaries and comforts of 

 life among our people. 



Trusts. We recognize In the trusts and combi- 

 nations which are designed to enable capital to 



secure more than its Just share of the Joint product 

 of capital and labor, a natural consequence of the 

 prohibitive taxes which prevent the free competi- 

 tion which Is the life of honest trade, but believe 

 their worst evils can be abated by law, and we de- 

 mand the rigid enforcement of the laws made to 

 prevent and control them, together with such 

 further legislation iu restraint of their abuses as 

 experience may show to be necessary. 



The Republican party, while professing a policy 

 of reserving the public land for small holdings by 

 actual settlers, has given away thr people's heri- 

 tage, until now a few railroads and non-resident 

 aliens, individual and corporate, possess a larger area 

 than that of all our farms between the two seas. 

 The last Democratic administration reversed the im- 

 provident and unwise policy of the Republican party 

 touching the public domain, and reclaimed from 

 corporations and syndicates, alien and domestic, 

 and restored to the people nearly one hundred mil- 

 lion acres of valuable land to be sacredly held as 

 homesteads for our citizens, and we pledge our- 

 selves to continue this policy until every acre of 

 land so unlawfully held shall be reclaimed and 

 restored to the people. 



Silver. We denounce the Republican legislation 

 known as the Sherman act of 1890 as a cowardly 

 makeshift, fraught with possibilities of danger in 

 the future, which should make all of its supporters, 

 as well as its author, anxious for its speedy repeal. 

 We hold to the use of both gold and silver as the 

 standard money of the country, and to the coinage 

 of both gold and silver without discriminating 

 against either metal or charge for mintage, but the 

 dollar unit of coinage of both metals must be of 

 equal intrinsic and exchangeable value, or be ad- 

 justed through international agreement, or by such 

 safeguards of legislation as shall insure the mainte- 

 nance of the parity of the two metals, and the equal 

 power of every dollar at all times in the markets, 

 and in payment of debt ; and .we demand that all 

 paper currency shall be kept at par with and redeem- 

 able in such coin. We insist upon this policy as 

 especially necessary for the protection of the farm- 

 ers and laboring classes, the first nnd most de- 

 fenseless victims of unstable money and a fluctuat- 

 ing currency. 



Tax on State Banks. We recommend that the pro- 

 hibitory ten per cent, tax on State bank issues be 

 repealed. 



Civil Service Reform. Public office is a public 

 trust. We reaffirm the declaration of the Demo- 

 cratic National Convention of 1876, for the reform 

 of the civil service, and we call for the honest en- 

 forcement of all laws regulating the same. The 

 nomination of a President as in the recent Republi- 

 can Convention, by delegations composed largely of 

 his appointees, holding office at his pleasure, is a 

 scandalous satire upon free popular institutions, 

 and a startling illustration of the methods by which 

 a President may gratify his ambition. We denounce 

 a policy under which the Federal office-holders 

 usurp control of party conventions in the States, 

 and we pledge the Democratic party to reform these 

 and all other abuses which threaten individual lib- 

 erty and local self-government. 



Our Foreign IWicy. The Democratic party is 

 the only party that has ever given the country a 

 foreign policy consistent and vigorous, compelling 

 respect abroad and inspiring confidence tit home. 

 While avoiding entangling alliances, it has aimed to 

 cultivate friendly relations with other nations, and 

 especially with our neighbors on the American con- 

 tinent, whose destiny is closely linked with our 

 own, and we view with alarm the tendency to a pol- 

 icy of irritation and bluster which is liable at any 

 time to confront us with the alternative of humilia- 

 tion or war. We favor the maintenance of a navy 

 strong enough for all purposes of national defense 

 and to properly maintain the honor and dignity of 

 the country abroad. 



