The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, July 7, 1904, Page 5

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL,: THURSDAY, JULY 7, 1904 WILLIAMS OF MISal5aIPPI OUTLINE N {EW CREED EXPLAINED IN SPEECH! Southerner States; Dominant Fac- | tion's Will. | Lays Down the Law to Party’s Rank and File. pres ng of the Demo- ms of Mississipy e g d lead- | a s led the keynote of | m for the party. His ut- e a comprehensive idea | € f the “reorganized” De- | for s 0 the nature pri £ to which they wiil be | »e under the new | nge nt ful text jis here | : * en appropriate place and time for a | CIZES ROOT'S SPEECH. progress sacred shibboleth drawn Stand Pat,” a e and fear to move. attention 1o the tem- Republican conven. ogating, in light of | tterances. 1 shall pass on to | tative volce of his party, which | for proof of the fact that Mr. | 1o pay @ debt. The countrs yet forgotten when Mr. Roosevelt paid ng his~ Cabinet, which | wit *“And the great let me read first | { the junior mem. | soclety. I find w of Reviews from the onty chairma After § of the United tions to all Presi- his opin- | services of | a few weeks ig to re- | of War, the Pres- | et I am very glad to do that great Secretary of Sta ve & gn wbinet p wel those & ry of War 1 have known will go furth In John Hay | Philan- take n g . | Ro any of those | e man who is | he is what | men_could be, u Root s th nmental He is the great has appeared in the public life | n any position, on either side | time.” e, indeed.” adds Wellma I have never heard denled this official indeed! ~ Yes rful ‘mutual <ody ant it as n our im What adequate in repay- | 2dmiration Mr. Root’s | constdered from of course? Is it the man selected by | idate t t on strong?’ A man | ty. toc R He had defended end the Republican party | act passivity, negation | and Tweed. non and mere obstruction. indeed, he and the President have minds so much alike that they » pected of “‘unconsclous identity | o ¢ vl thinking the same thoughte Ik heard that in October, 1902, Mr, Root | made & political speech in Conper TUnion in New York. In which }e used this language: If & tarlfl jaw has on the whole worked well and If business has prospered under it pering, it is better to endure some onveniences and " incqualities for a uncertainty and dis- which necessarily resuits processes of making changes. The mere fact that different rate of duty would be hetter than the rate fixed in the statute does not settle the question whether the change should be made now or ghould be de. Terred, Every tarlfl deals with duties one vast number of articles and involves & vast number of interests often conflicting. and whepever the law is taken up in Congress for consideration with reference to one change every schedule in that law is going to fing some one Urging a change in that schedule, and sl the business interests of the ocountry are going to be left during a long continned discussion in & state of uncertainty as to what will be the outcome of duties upon thinge they are producing, and, therefore, i | due to the Republican party. to what _competit! will be obliged to meet.’ QUOTES ANOTHER SPEECIIL I bave heard that the President in his r through the W the spring a speech In which he used thix has on the worked has prospered under it be better to endure ti e than by mak- sturbance and and _business he fa e change in ty may b ught d. question whetl r it iatel interests g are, then of he question of r changing in 5% MUust consid souls with but a single thought, usly expressed, is not to f ial interest to take lips from breast for fear the publie, finding to be wondered at that greatest of these” was of him who had dubbed was 2lmost as It was only this n in How v our fellow-clti- = White House in the long line en who have filled the seat he now s himself found only about three his opinion worthy of anything ke unstint- od pr George Washington, Abraham Lin- 1 hims Verily, the other humorists e to retire from business. |, ‘The chief of these” is Mr. Root. The temporary chairman sald, speaking of the an part “Through it more than er party, th moral sentiment of the ple finds expression.”” God save Golng back to anctent history, in bilter In th long saturnalia uction? Or, in recent his- tfice Department? In the In the full sway of bosses 0 bitterly and now taken so <o © the President? In the inquiring just when the unassisted revolution” of fifty or one hundred men was “‘slated” to come off unexpectedly in Panama? In the celebrated order of “'Hell Roaring Jake” Smith, pre- scribing ten as the age above which children in the Po public land bureau ed his b telegrams c and were to be killed in one of the islands in the | Philippines? The universal honeycombing of our pational life with the corruption of legls- lation-bought _special_ privileges? Time fall me to task where. hat has anclent history to_fo with present iniquities, anyhow? ? Mr. Root says: ‘‘Offenders have besn re. lentiessiy prosecuted and stern punished Isn't this remarkable “thundering in the in- dex” for you, when compared with actual Republican” accomplishments, especially when | compared with the refusal of a Republican | House of Representatives to make face even #o much as Congressional investi. gation: when compared with the absolute and constant refusal of the Republican Speaker to recognize anybody for the purpose of malk ing a motion even of that character? It there ever was a determination fully enter- tained and finally earried out, it was the de. termination of the Republican administration and the Republican legislatiye body to see to it that nobody should Investizate the alleged culprits in the Postoffice Department excer their colleagues in the executive branch o the Government. INCREASED CIRCULATION. There follows something, however, will be taken seriously. The Secretary hoasts that the per capita of circulation of money among the peonle fn the United States in- creased from $23 14 {n March, in May last. and that the credit for that and consequent prosperity following it w What a curior boast this is for those lately denying so strenuously that the quantity of money had enything to do with the circulation of money or the price of other things as measured in money. or with an ascending scale of prices, or with national prosperity. This was all de- nled but yesterday. Now It is asserted that the volumn of metallic money has been im- menscly increased: that it has brought pros- perity, and that it bas all been due to Re- publican legislation, Was Republican leglislation operative South Africa and the Kiondike, and did it cause the discoveries of gold there? Did it cause the new inventions for the more profita- ble extraction of gold from gold ore? Did Re- publican legislaticn add $2,000.000,000 of .old o the worid's stock of momey metals in' the last eight years? Was it Republican legisla- tion which made the immense crops of cot- ton, wheat, corn etc., which enabled the United_States to draw more than their pro rata share of the world’s stock of money metals, thereby increasing their own etock of gold by $700,000,0007 Wh-* partnership Is this,_ between God, human industry and in- genuity and the Republican party, of which fhe Renublican party claims to be the self.as- sertive senfor member? What monumental af. frontery is this, which enables them to boast of the bemefits of the increased volume of ctandard metallic money and consequent pros- perity by the operation of the ‘“‘quantitative theory of money,” which theory they found no lang: strong enough to deny and ridi- cule but yesterday? The temporary chairman next boasted that the Republican party had by mamipulation, which he degcribed, of the currency and cer: tificate denomination made it so difficult to get gold out of the Treasury iIn exchange for other forms of money, that practically it can- not be done at all to any large extent and hence that all danger of an endless chain, thereby produced, has ended. If so, is this culprits the in al which | 1897, to $31 02 | keeping the gold redemption but breaking it The ex-Secretary promise to to the hope? then boasts that the Sec- | ¢ of the Treasury can and does contract expand the country's currency at his I, and illustrates this the occurrences which happened in 1902, which he gfiotes. Re- member, he boasts that this Is a fact. 1f so, what & magnificent one-man power It fs. It is almost as great as that lately wielded by the ex-Secretary himself, when he was ex- officio Emperor of the Phillppine archipelago, when, as he himself subsequently said in & public s, questions affecting inter- est of millions of people had to be by him upon not much more than a moment’s notice and entirely within his own discretion. What do the men who belleve that the Government ought to go out of the | banking bu i the men who belleve that the L to g0 out of the Gov- ernment of this remarkable, this boastful 1 one man in the United States and does contract and ex- pand the currency, which furnishes the life and blood of at his sweet will? temy man told the country e e of the trust the a 11, 1803— 1% islation He forgot to Democrat voted for it, and ection av xnown a more Ingenious mind than that of cretary Root. His ingenuity is mever so - ita power fa illustrated by g5 he forrot to mentlc the Root of evil en it king the- worse appear the betts £ reason. POLICY OF McKINLEY. The ex-S v then tells us, in a burst | of eloguer the fatal 14t Septem- | ber, 1901, m no change of that when the ki fraternal soul “Kinley nded its way from the earth he left behind no break—his policy _was _continued in spirit by his successor. Who is there in America of common sense Who does not know better? The changed spirit of the policy of the administration with regard to reclprocity with foreign nations, with regard to local self- t in the South and in twenty re- spects which it would take too much time to particularize will suggest themselves to your mind at once. 3ut to go on to the authoritative utterance of the Republican platform In convention assembled. The platform, like the temporary chairmanship, deals definitely in the boast that the Republican party is responsible for everything £ood which has happened. It also deals much in ancient history. It did well to g0 back fifty years ago. The present Republi- | can par#y needs a running start ot fully fifty years to enable the imagination of the people to jump over its present obstructiveness and its evasion of live issues which lie in the path- way. The platform, In speaking of the access | of the Republican party to power after Mr. Cleveland's second administration had expired, uees this language: “We then found the country, after four vears of Democratic rule, In evil plight, op- | pressed with misfortunes and doubtful of the I future, Public credit had been lowered, rev- enues were declining, the debt was growing, ] the administration’s attitude toward Spain was feeble and mortifying, its standard of values | was threatened and uncertain. Labor was un- employed. Pusiness was sunk in the depres- | sion which succeeded the panic of 1893. Hope | was faint and confidence was gone. Suppose I paraphrase that utterance by saying t “when Mr. Cleveland succeeded | to” the Presidency in March, 1893, after four | years of Republican administration under Mr. Harrison, the Democratic party found the | country, ‘after a long period of public misrule and extravagance, in evil plight, oppressed with misfortune and doubtful of the future. Public credit had been lowered; the revenues were declining.” The outgrowing administration was prepar- ing to fssue bonds. A Government deflcit was confessed. The panic which devastated the world wae relentlessly approaching our shores. A lonz saturnalia of extravagance, public and private, and of reckless’ speculation had been Iready followed b; depression. Corn was burned for fuel in Kansas and elsewhere in the West in 1890 and after. Cotton was at | or below the price of production. The acute | reaction which we call panic was Inevitably approaching even before Mr. Cleveland was elected. ‘‘Business was sunk in the depression which preceded the panic of 18903, Labor was unem- | ploved or poorly remunerated in factcry and fleld, especially the latter.’” | _ Indeed, business depression, especially in | agricuiture. and the lack of adequate remune- | rn:'(nn for labor, taken together with the high prices of manufactures under act, constituted the chief industrial reason n the’ public mind for tyrning Mr. Harrison and the Republicans out ahd putting Mr. Cleveland and the Democrats in. - To go With the paraphrase, under Harrl- son's administration for three vears, “‘hope was | faint and confidence gone.” The plight of the | people was so desperate that, like “drowning men, they were ‘‘catching at straws." Agra- rianism and socialism in the shape of sub- treasury and other schemes 1890 and thence on, “The two cld parties,”” as they were called, were blamed for it all, but the one in power | was blamed most, hence the outer power got in. Men advocating these nostrums, in the state of public despertion then existing, counted their audiences, throughout the suffering West and depressed South, no longer by numbers, but by the area. Who will deny the truth, the historical fruth of a single sentence Gt raphrase? Why pretend to have forgotten N1 this? Why not be honest with the Peopl as men ought to be? It is true that after the election of Mr. Cleveland the chronic business depression con- tinued. It s true that It became acute—in a word reached the banks; and then the fright or panic of 1893 came, which was not a local or American condition. but one which had ex- isted from where Vienna nesties on the Danube to where Buenos Ayres compiands its bay: one whose foundations had been laid long be- fore it reached us, almost the last among the nations. ‘Then, with the panic upon us once more, nostrums of & national character were sug. gested to cuve an evil of world character. One of them, as you will all remember, was the were rife from the McKinley | | were released from the | | | | | 1 { | i | that the panic was not brought about as they pete In the Furopean markets with | ours. Simultaneously With an immense American _crop of wheat and small | the retailers could buy more goods; the re- { tailers with empty shelves or shelves becom- | commerce - s E S s [ MAN WHO CALLED CONVENTION | TO ORDER AND ITS TEMPO- | | | RARY PRESIDING OFFICER. | o+ — —3 repeal of the purchasing clause of the Sher- man act.. This nostrum was suggested by wise men and it was administered to the patient. It did no good, of course. The panic went on went on until when? Until the boll upon the body commercial having burst, the poison of speculation, boom ‘values and credit operations | stem. It went on | until agriculture, the basic industry, revived. In the midst of the panic all the wise men, | and chlef among them the Republican leaders, | told us it was the lack of confidence in the money of the country that had brought on the | panic. The Democratic administration with a | sufficlent number of votes of both parties In the two houses beyond it took that view of | the situation and demanded and secured the rassage of the act repealing the purchasing | clause of the Sherman act, thereby, for the | first time, practically establishing the gold | etandard in the United States. Without elther free or limited colnage of standard silver money, the country was, immediately after the passage of that act, necessarily and actu- ally, as it has been since, and is now, and | as it ia destined to remain for a length of | time beyond my power of computation, on & gold basis, I was not one of those who thought the legisiation adopted wise, but, wise or other- wise, the result is an accomplished fact, plain, palpable and obvious to all men who have | common sense, and, like many another step | in history, it is bevond recall. This accom- plished fact was the accomplished fact of gold basis then, not by the Republican party, but by the dogzed persistency and indomitable will of Grover Cleveland, aided, it ls true, by Republican legislators, who thought they saw in it the final disruption of the Democratic party. That was In the main their motive, NoW they would ‘“’steal his thunder” and thls | Republican platform boasts that it was the Republican party which established the gold ba! Moreover, they would now eat their words and thelr votes of 1893 and tell us then sald, by “lack of confidence in our money and too ‘much silver,” but, forsooth, by a tarift act which was not passed until more than & vear after, to wit, in 1894, when the panic—that Is, the acute and fright stage of depression—was virtually over. Do not misunderstand me. A panic, of course, i3 mot succeeded all ‘at once by the golden' hues of prosperity. Industrial depres- slon must follow it for a while, as depression must precede it. So depression continued until when? As I have sald, when the boll bursts and ths poison Is eliminated from the body commerclal the flesh begins to heal. It can- not begin to heal one minute earifer. The process of recovery was aided by many, for us, fortultous cirenmstances. The first of these was famine in India—no Indlan wheat to com- | crops elsewhere, wheat rose from about 48 cents to about 70 cents in a few weeks during the Bryan-McKinley campaign, while Cleve- land was yet President. There is not a man within_the sound of my voice that does not remember that. With 70-cent wheat farmers could pay the retailers’ debts due them: and ing empty by sales could order from the job- bers; the jobbers, who had been overstocked, were enabled then to order from the factorfes. ‘When the factories got orders then they had a reason for making £o0ods and they proceeded to make them, and then the wheels of indus- try went round. The farmer in the wheat country with 70-cent wheat could pay the “beker, the butcher and the candlestick-mak- er,” ard then they cculd pay others and they in torp could buy more goods. This endless chain of human relationship in the world of | s no mysterious thing to anybody except the platform making politiclan. But wheat golng up had another effect. | When wheat went up during the campaign, | while ¢llver bullion went down, there was furnished & seeming object lesson of the fn- accuracy of the contention of Mr. Bryan and his followers, of whom I was one, that thers ‘was necessarily a connection In price between the two. Western and border State farmers in the wheat belt, who had originally been Republicans anvhow and who had gone off from the Republican party becauses of their belief in this very theory, began to leave the Bryan column and join the McKinley column, first by the dozen, then by the score. then by the hundreds end then in shoals. Thus it came about that Mr. McKinley was elected because wheat went up and because the going up of wheat and the consequent increased de- mand for other things, leading to higher prices and a better volume of trade, promised 1o their miinds prosperity without free silver. GREAT INCREASE OF GOLD. A greater falsehood was never uttered than that wheat went up ‘“because McKinley was elected.” Things bad struck rockbottom and { a Democrat, bad begun to revive before McKinley was -elected, and the first infalllble test of that fact was the rise in the price of wheat, fol- lowed by the rise of other agricultural pro- ducts. Then came the immense increase of Bold that kept prices up here and elsewhere. Not only Is the boast that Mr. McKinley's elec- tion was responsible for high prices not true, but it 1s a very dangerous falsehood. The Populists first told the people in certain sec- tions of this country that prosperity was chiefly dependent on government. Some men preach the doctrine with the hope that during periods of prosperity the average man will let even the extravagant, dishonest and unjust govern- me in whi he is Interested continue unin- terrupted. This is the chler. if not the whole, hope of the Republican party to-day. Let the | against ‘the | 1 Republican party beware. and let all men who | love thelr country beware of carrying this doctrine of government-created prosperity any | farther. 1t the idea js once firmly imbedded In the human mind there will be no saving t¢ teacher from the wrath to come—State oclalism I guote agatn from the platform “We refused to palter longer with the miseries of Cuba and declared war agqgast Spain.” Bad history again! Democrats demanded the recognition of b gerent rights and Inde- pendence for Ci day in and day out. The Republican Speaker constanti fused the even so much as a parliamentary recognition The Republican President was thorcughly out of sympathy with their wishes. Finally treach- ery and cruelty unprecedented led to the blow- Ing up of the Maine and her crew. Public opinion would no longer be restrained—'‘Re- member the Maine,” became the battle ecry. It wes not ‘‘the miseries of Cuba” at all that led the Republican party to fall into line with public demand and fight Spain. Hearing the echo of that cry ‘‘Remember the Maine,”” and | amid the universal excitement and anger, the Republican Speaker and the President both stood out of the way, as well they might, and the former advised ~interventic tis patriotic to pretend that even this, long « layed as it was, was in any proper sense Republican’ measure. Democrat: s fully as Republicans. They did this and oted for the act of intervention, not because it was a Republican President or a Republican measure, but because ths American Govern- meat was at least pursuing an American policy a —a_poliey which bad always heen Demoeratie, | Then the platform adds these words: ‘We fought a quick, victorious war with Spain.” Bad history again! Americans fought it. It would be Invidious to state the politics of heroes, but it seems to me_that I have heard it sald that Dewey was that Schley was a Democrat, that Miles’' was a Democrat, and It seems to me, tod. that I have heard that a Republican administration snubbed the first, tried to di grace the second and insulted the third. seems, too, the fighting line that Joe Wheeler was as much in evidence as the President himself. It seems to me that I have heard that Hobson was a Democrat. Tt seems to me, too, that 1 have heard that young Bagley of North Caro- lina, the first offering of the war upon the altar of a common country, was a Democrat. I quote from the platform agatn: ‘‘We set Cuba_ free.” Bad history once more. But for the Demo- cratio Senators and Representatives demanding and voting for a proviso to the act of inter- entlon, to the effect that the people of Cuba ‘were and of right ought to be free and inde- pendent’ and pledging our faith that we would wage no ‘“‘war of conquest or territorfal ac- quisition, but would withdraw our troops after pacification.” the Republican administration would doubtless be furnishing to the world to- day in the case of Cuba a companion plece to the picture which has been exhibited in the Philippines. ON THE TRUST QUESTION. Let us see what the Republicans have to say for themselves In_connection with the great trust question. This is the language of the platform: “Laws enacted by the Republican party and which the Democratic party failed to enforce, have been fearlessly enforced.” Here are three statements—First, That the Republicans, instead of both parties, snacted the laws, which is not true; second, that the Democratlc party had done nothing: and, third, the Republican party has enforced the law, which is only partially true. Now, the fact is that, although the Demo- crats only had a four-year opportunity, and although the trust evil was neither very acute nor very prevalent at that time, Aftorney- General Harmon, under the Cleveland adminis- tration, filed the suit for the Government agaist the Trans-Missouri Freight Assoclation, took it up, revived it and won it. He then instituted suit against the Joint Trafflc Asso- clation and also against the Addvstone Pipe Company. These two cases were decided for the Government after Mr. Cleveland went out, it is true, but on the lines laid pwn oy nis \ttorney General. Nor 3 11 irua in any proper sense that the Republican party deserves much credit for en- foreing the anti-trust law. What has the Re- publican_party done in this regard? One of the chairmen of the Republican convention (I have forgotten whether it was the tempo- rary or permanent) says it has “enjoined the beef trust." We would not have known it if somebody had not told us, The injunction does not eeem to have had any practical effect upon the beet trust or upon the price of beefsteak. 1 think it was the permanent chairman of the Republican committee who said that the Democrats killed trusts with wind, the Re. publicans with law. Where are the corpses? There is but one that T know of, but it prop- erly belongs to Governor Van 'Sant. It is the spolls of his sword and his wpear. The boast that the administration has exe- cuted the anti-trust law is, of course, ridieu. fous. The Attorney General. in response to a resolution of my own. frankly confessed that nothing had been done, and left the inference that nothing would be done toward the crim- inal prosecution of the men found guilty by the Supreme Court in the Northern Securities cas» of having violated the law and incurred its nalties. The entlre Republican party at the last session of the House of Repre- sentatives, with three exceptions, voted against a oroviso instructing the Secretary of the Navy. un- | voted for it | that I have heard from men on | | | Tt | mets | that Tot to enter into governmental contracts with trusts and unlawful combinations convicted by law of being such. The Attorney General in answer to ‘another resolution falled to show that anything substantial was being done Anthracite Coal Trust. The At- torney General in that case hid behind the pretext that it would be ‘‘contrary to publie | policy” s for him to give Congress any Informa- ton ‘as to what he was This same “trust buster, Joe Cannon, would have us believe him to be, Attorney Goneral Knox, just been appoint- | #d by the Govérnur of Pennsylvania Senator | from that State, €0 the newspapers say, on the demnand of the very men who constitute this | unlawful-combination, or who are at any rate doing or would do. as my good friend, the presidents of the railroad companies and | the ow of the mines constituting it. What are you gomng to do about it? What are ¥ going to do with the trust buster—-busted or_removed, or ‘‘promoted” out of the way? Then there follows the beast of having ‘‘per- fected the interstite commerce law. The | bsurdity of this statement is demonstrated | the actual conditicn of things. The Inter- | state Commerce Commission has been knock- | ing at tha doors of Congress for years asking for d power, asking for this power At least when a given rate, after investigation | and full hearing of both side been de- cided by the commission to be onable, 10 declare what rate would be reasonable in’ jts to make this rate operative until due process of law by appeal, view or otherwise. | A mbre ridiculous piece of official Impotency than is the Interst Commission | at present does not an declare Iven rate of G0 cents. let us say, ~easonable but as it cannot prescribe what | be reasomable in its stead the raliroad | of two things: It can elther take | which suspends the decision of the an appeal, commiasion while the appeal is being long | dravn out by the raflroads interested, or it | can change the rate to 49% cents, and when that has beeh declared unreason B v | change it again to 49% cents, and when that as heen declared urr-asonable can change it to | 4934 cents and 80 on ad infiinitum, peiling | the newly aggrieved cit n in each case to bring suif, at the risk of being punishéd In- | dustrially by the ramiroad for what it calls “‘unfriendly conduct” and without the hope of any subsfantial Immediate redress. | A Dill to give the Interstate Commerce Com- | mission_power, not to declare rates generally, not .to fix a. schedule of rates for all the roads in the country engaged in interstate commerce, but power merely to declare a rea- sanable rate in its stead in particular cases | where u rate has been declared unreasonable, | this rate to be maintained until set aside by | law, has been pending before the committee on ‘interstate and forelgn commerce in the House of Representatives since this Congress | and, aithough the Democrats on that committee again and again demanded consicer- | ation of the bill_ and although delegation atter | dslogation of merchants and members of mer- ¢ and_shippers’ assoclations have been | hington begging the enactment of it | or like legislation, nothing bas been dons. The Republican party here, as elsewhere, ‘‘stands pat.” REVISION OF THE TARIFF. I read from the platform again: “Tariff | rates should be radjusted only when conditions | have so changed that the public interests de- | mands thelr alteration.” “‘Public interest” in this connection, consid- ering the voice which has uttered the words, is 00d. - “‘Public Interest” from the men who te 1t anduthe convention which adopted it, really means “‘protected interests.” How ean | public interest “‘demand the alteration? How can it make the demand heard? There is only one way that I know of to make a demand of thls sort hedrd, and that Is to vote down the men who say that all is “well enough™ and that the gospel of humanity, as far the tariff is concerned, is all included in the phrase “stand pat.” Is it possibie that the American people can be decefved by empty verblage like that? Does not everybody know that the Republican party has no idea of making any alterations | in the tariff, unless it can thereby purchase the support of additional spec to tle those already bought by ests by vet closer bonds? Are there no ‘‘conditions” demanding any | changes in any of the schedules of the present interests, or spectal inter- | tarift law, when dozens of highly protected | steel and iron products, including rails, loco- | motives, barhed wire and agricultural imple- ments of American make are being sold daily | in competition with the so-called pauper labor , of the world in the home of this sams= pauuer | labor? - More than that, when they are being carried rizht by the south door of Great Britain on through the straits of Gibraltar to Great Pritain's own colony of South Africa And soll theye, and when, even more than | they gre eold, after freight has been | paid and profit obtained, at a less price than the same things are sold to Americans in American markets five miles from the factory? ' Will any sane men say that “public interest’ has not ‘‘demanded” some alterations in the tariff? The trouble fs, and will be as long as the Republicans are in power, that private Interests won't allow" any. The curious thing about a man who is ob- taining benefits. by speclal legislation is that he insists upon playing two antagonistic roles, One day he is an industrial baron. boasting of having ‘“‘conquered the markets of the world'” and of being able to keep them becausa his goods are better or cheaper. The next day he is knocking at the doors of the com- mittee rooms of the National Legislature, beg- ging a cortinuance of protection against the pauper labor of the very market In_which he actually already sells his goods. What sort of condition is it that will justify public in- terest in demanding an alteration? Suppose the following plank had been pre- sented to the Republican convention. does any- believe that it would have been adopted. namely: “Demanding a reduction of tariff taxation upcn trust produced articles to the point where forelgn competition may enter the American market, which favored trust and combines seem to monopolize and raise their | try in the world is agi prices to the American consumer above a just and reasonable profit, thus using the Ameri- can’ law-as a shelter to protect them in ex- tortion upon the American people while they o THE POLICY OF THE REORGANIZED DEMOGRAGY - CRITICIZES ROOSEVELT AND ROOT Sarcastic Attack on Present Admin- istration. it President Accused of Usurpation of Power. - charge them higher price: foreigners for ide: Suppese that an o+ than those charged cles.” condition of that sort had been shown, as it has been, would anybod advocating an e of sort 1 have Indicated, with W to meeting that condi- tion, have oblained any hearing from that convention? The platform then gres on to say that thess alterations cannot be safely committed to any other hands than the Republican party. What has been the matter with the hands of the Republican party since 1897, or for the last four years? Even if it were admitted that tariff changes ought to be made by the friends of the Iniquitous discriminations and extorticns of the present law, the friends of e general interests and oom monwealth (which is the same thing as ad mitting that the changes ought to be made by the Republican party) why has not that party already made any them? It ha been in full power in the Senate, overwheim- ingly in power in the House and unantmously and strenuously in power in the White House Who is there not kmow that this verblage was ins o the Republican piat form with the view enabling the “Towa idea’ nd the ““Wisconsin idea’" men 80 back home and say they have ‘‘gotten some- thing’” and thereby ‘‘save their faces, as th Chinese say. Who believes for a minute that the par which has refused every tariff alteration th far propcsed intends to recognize smy sort o “‘condition: any of “‘demands’ any sort of “‘public rest”” in connect with the question” Who does not know the only way public interest can make demand for any alteration ¢ ive is by T ting the Democratic party into power? DEMOCRACY'S TARIFF LAWS. Of course this platform had to contain the usual historical ruth, to wit, that ‘A Democratic tariff has always been followed by busineas adversity, a Republican tariff by bus: ness prosperity. Designing and_ignorant men n have repeated it so often that I am afrald to tell it to really good people; and yet it is bad history again. The great panic of 187 it was caused by any tariff law at all, was necessarily caused by the then existing tariff law, which is the first ever passed by the Republican party. It Was passed as a war measure. Speaker Can non, tion, in his address to t sald that Republican conven- when the Republican par came into power: it “recur the tarif policy of George Washington,” This Is a short sentence, and im it th are only wo mistakes.cne of which constets of he in that ¢ rge Washington was a high ta man. The tariff in vogue In Washington's da uld be dencunced as rampant “fres trad day. The second mistake onsists in tion that the Kepublican party had he policy. The platfor; n it went into power In 1961 contained f any intention to raise the tariff snithe Whigs had become perfectiy satisfied with\ the Walker tarlff of 1836 any the amendments to it passed in 1857, and ths Republicans, as well as the Whigs, recognized that the country therefore had uBpreconiied prosperity under that law, which was & Demo. cratic tariif law, being a tariff for revenus aly. ,An eminent a Republican ns James G aine had recorded this historical black and whte, o _From 1301 down to outbreak of the Civil War. the country was nine-tenths of ihg tima under Democratic ascendency with Derm oeratic tariff legislation. and nine-tentha of hat_time our peo praoperous bevond all precedent as compared with other peopie n the surface of the earth confamporancons with them or prior to _their time. What publican platform calls “a Demoeratic tariit law based on free trade principles. referring fo the tariff of 104—the so-called Wilac Gorman bill—was the farthest removed from of any tariff law that has ever is country, except the one which bore the name of McKinley and the one wh afterward bore the name of Dingley. Fut even this was a tariff law which followed adver sity instead of preceding it. Besides all that, statistics chow that ou were not in did mot hurt us by ind andue "% foreign competition, Williams read an editorial from the ew York Times of June 29, entitled A Question of Facts,” giving statis- tics to disprove the Republican plat- form’'s statement that “a Demoecratic tariff has always been followed by bus- iness adversity, a Republican tariff business prosperity Williams ¢ tinued: Remember that the author of the Repub liean platorm & pretends to be a his torfan. This is true. no matter which of the two s pected parties be guilty f t - President or Senator Lodge. T volce was undoubtedly the volce of the Massachusetts Jacob but the hand may have bee the hand of the Presidential Esau. But both knew tha facts. We are called upon In the Republican platform “‘not to falte allegiance o protectionism when t! trade ¢ tection. This has reference t W Great Britaln. The author forgot to sa that what is really being agitated In Great Britain is retaliation against protectionist countries by a proposed system of legislation to contaln as little protectionism as is poas ble. He also neglected to state that the ment b mally failed, and that it would not h had a leg to stand on hut for the enmity created in the minds of many Brith subjects by our trade legisiation. He negleated to say that the supreme evil of tectlonism is the excitation of this spirit enmity and commercial Pernaps the richest piece of humer Republican atform is where it is said have extended widely our foreign market and, in another place, “We conquered new markets and created a volume of exports which far surpass imagination.” The “‘we” in each sentence Is the cornerstone of the humer of it They might just as well say that a man had a right to boast that he had increased the ¢ rent of & river by putting a dam in it, be- cause the current had not stopped, but had gone on over the dam—the man who would attribute the current fo the fact that the dam was in the river, or to the fact that he had placed any other obstruction there, would not be a greater fool than he who would at- tribute an increase of international or na- tional commerce to the operation of & policy attempting vitally to obstruct It. A perfectly ideal protective poliey would be one which did not admit a single possible competing product of another country to the “protected” market. In so far as protection- ism falls short of that result, it is a fallure from a protectionist standpoint. The non-ad mission of the produets of other countries into your own markets and the refusal to purchase from others certainly doe it tend to make them purchase from you, whatever else it dees As McKinley said “We cannot always con- tinue to sell without buying." Plainly our foreign commerce has grown, not because of but in wpite of the obstructions which have been placed in the current of trade. How ridiculous the boast is, t0o, in connec- tion with the flat-footed refusal of the Re- publican party in the Senate to approve the reciprocity treaties Instituted and completed by Mr. McKinley and sent to that body by him for approval. especially the highly benefl cial reciproeity treaty with France, and in the teeth of the refusal of the Republican administration to take any Initiatory step look- ing toward the reconveming of the joint high commis#lon for the purpose of establishing reciproca! trade relations between out neigh- bor, Canada, and our children there and our- selves. Could complacent and reckless ef- frontery have gome further than It has gone in making_this statement? COMMERCIAL RECIPROCITY. There is d succeeding statement. however, which will vie with it. It is where the piat- form favors ‘‘commercial reciprocity wherever reciprocal arrangements can be effected with- Continued on Page 6, Column 1, ., the We n