UNITED STATES OP AMERICA. 



cial countries of the world. However firmly Re- 

 publican legislation may seem to have secured 

 the country against the peril of base and dis- 

 credited currency, the election of a Democratic 

 President could not fail to impair the country's 

 credit and to bring once more into question the 

 intention of the American people to maintain 

 upon the gold .standard the parity of their money 

 circulation. The Democratic party must be con- 

 vinced that the American people will never toler- 

 ate the Chicago platform. 



" \Ve recognize the necessity and propriety of 

 the honest co-operation of capital to meet new 

 business conditions, and especially to extend our 

 rapidly increasing foreign trade, but we condemn 

 all conspiracies and combinations intended to re- 

 -trict business, to create monopolies, to limit pro- 

 duction, or to control prices, and favor such legis- 

 lation as will effectively restrain and prevent all 

 such abuses, protect and promote competition, 

 and secure the rights of producers, laborers, and 

 all who are engaged in industry and commerce. 



" We renew our faith in the policy of protection 

 to American labor. In that policy our industries 

 have been established, diversified, and maintained. 

 By protecting the home market competition has 

 been stimulated and production cheapened. Op- 

 portunity for the inventive genius of our people 

 has been secured and wages in every department 

 of labor maintained at high rates, higher now 

 than ever before, and always distinguishing our 

 working people in their better conditions of life 

 from those of any competing country. Enjoy- 

 ing the blessings of the American common school, 

 secure in the right of self-government and pro- 

 tected in the occupancy of their own markets, 

 their constantly increasing knowledge and skill 

 have enabled them finally to enter the markets 

 of the world. 



" We favor the associated policy of reciprocity 

 so directed as to open our markets on favorable 

 terms for what we do not ourselves produce, in 

 return for free foreign markets. 



"In the further interest of American workmen 

 we favor a more effective restriction of the im- 

 migration of cheap labor from foreign lands, the 

 extension of opportunities of education for work- 

 ing children, the raising of the age limit for child 

 labor, the protection of free labor as against 

 contract convict labor, and an effective system of 

 labor insurance. Our present dependence upon 

 foreign shipping for nine tenths of our foreign car- 

 rying is a great loss to the industry of this coun- 

 try. It is also a serious danger to our trade, for 

 its sudden withdrawal in the event of European 

 war would seriously cripple our expanding for- 

 eign commerce. The national defense and naval 

 etlicieney of this country, moreover, supply a com- 

 pelling reason for legislation which will enable us 

 to recover our former place among the trade- 

 carry ing Hi-els of the world. The nation owes a 

 debt of profound gratitude to the soldiers and 

 sailors who have fought its battles, and it is the 

 Government's duty to provide for the survivors 

 and for the widows and orphans of those who 

 have fallen in the country's wars. The pension 

 laws, founded in this just sentiment, should be 

 liberal and should be liberally administered, and 

 preference -liquid h- ^j V( , n \ v | H .rever practicable 

 lib respecf to employ;,;,.,.! in the public service 

 Idiers and sailors and to their widows and 

 We commend the policy of the Repuh- 

 *an party in maintaining the efficiency of the 

 service. The administration has acted 

 Wtoely in its effort to cure tor public service in 

 ba. lotto Rico, Hawaii, and the Philippine 

 Islands only those whose fitness has been deter- 



mined by training and experience. We believe 

 that employment in the public service in these 

 territories should be confined as far as practicable 

 to their inhabitants. 



" It was the plain purpose of the fifteenth 

 amendment to the Constitution to prevent dis- 

 crimination on account of race or color in regulat- 

 ing the elective franchise. Devices of State gov- 

 ernments, whether by statutory or constitutional 

 enactment, to avoid the purpose of this amend- 

 ment are revolutionary and should be condemned. 

 Public movements looking to a permanent im- 

 provement of the roads and highways of the 

 country meet with our cordial approval, and we 

 recommend this subject to the earnest considera- 

 tion of the people and of the Legislatures of the 

 several States. We favor the extension of the 

 rural free-delivery service wherever its extension 

 may be justified. In further pursuance of the 

 constant policy of the Republican party to pro- 

 vide free homes on 'the public domain, we recom- 

 mend adequate national legislation to reclaim 

 the arid lands of the United States, reserving con- 

 trol of the distribution of water for irrigation to 

 the respective States and Territories. We favor 

 home rule for and the early admission to state- 

 hood of the Territories of New Mexico, Arizona, 

 and Oklahoma. The Dingley act, amended to 

 provide sufficient revenue for the conduct of the 

 war, has so well performed its work that it has 

 been possible to reduce the war debt in the sum 

 of $40,000,000. So ample are the Government's 

 revenues and so great is the public confidence in 

 the integrity of its obligations that its i\ewly 

 funded 2-per-cent. bonds sell at a premium. The 

 country is now justified in expecting, and it will 

 be the policy of the Republican party to bring 

 about, a reduction of the war taxes. 



" We favor the construction, ownership, control, 

 and protection of an isthmian canal by the Gov- 

 ernment of the United States. New markets are 

 necessary for the increasing surplus of our farm 

 products. Every effort should be made to open 

 and obtain new markets, especially in the Orient, 

 and the administration is Avarmly to be com- 

 mended for its successful effort to commit all 

 trading and colonizing nations to the policy of 

 the open door in China. In the interest of our 

 expanding commerce we recommend that Congress 

 create a Department of Commerce and Industries 

 in the charge of a secretary with a seat in the 

 Cabinet. The United States consular system 

 should be reorganized under the supervision of 

 this new department, upon such a basis of ap- 

 pointment and tenure as will render it still more 

 serviceable to the nation's increasing trade. The 

 American Government must protect the person 

 and property of every citizen wherever they are 

 wrongfully violated or placed in peril. 



" We congratulate the women of America upon 

 their splendid record of public service in the vol- 

 unteer aid associations, and as nurses in camp 

 and hospital during the recent campaigns of our 

 armies in the Eastern and Western Indies, and wo 

 appreciate their faithful co-operation in all works 

 of education and industry. 



" President McKinley has conducted the foreign 

 aflnirs of the United States with distinguished 

 en dit to the American people. In releasing us 

 from the vexatious conditions of a Kuropoan alli- 

 ance for the Government of Samoa his course is 

 especially to be commended. By securing to our 

 undivided control the most important island of 

 the Samoan group and the best harbor in the 

 southern Pacific, every American interest has been 

 safeguarded. We approve the annexation of the 

 Hawaiian Islands to the United States. We com- 



