Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 September 1883 — HENDRICKS. [ARTICLE]

HENDRICKS.

The Indiana Statesman on the Stump in lowa.* A Monster Democratic Meeting at Council Bluffs. One of’the largest political assemblies ever seen in lowa listened to ex-Gov. Hendricks in the park at Council Bluffs on the 11th Inst., in addressing lowa Democrats upon the tariff, prdhibition and Republican corruption. Mr. Hendricks began his speech by an acknowledgment of assistance rendered the Indiana Democracy in past campaigns by the present Democratic nominee for Governor of lowa He proceeded to a denunciation of the last Republican Congress for an extravagant increase of public expenditures, and condemned the policy which collects $70,000,000 of revenue annually above the requirements of an economical administration of affairs. Upon the tariff question he said: Reduction of revenue and tariff reform must come hand in hand The country expected much of the Tariff Commission, and had a right to expect much. Under the circumstances, any disappointment was grievous. The selection of the Commissioners was authorized with a view to a fair consideration of all the important interests of the country and the necessities of the treasury. They stood forbidden to carry into their consultations the spirit of the partisan. The adjustment of the tariff, justly and wisely, so as to satisfy the country, would have given quiet and confidence to business, and promoted the prosperity of all its branches. To that work the Commission seems not to have been adequate; and Congress, in the measure which it afterward adopted, fell below the standard of the Commission. Much of the work of tariff reform remains yet to be done. . A tariff will not be abandoned during the continuance of the public debt, and will probably be a means of ordinary revenue, along with the tax upon whisky, beer and tobacco. Its proper adjustment is of the greatest importance to the people in all their interests. After quoting the tariff planks of the lowa and Ohio Democratic platform of tnis year, and the Indiana and Virginia Democratic platforms of last year, he continued: A State so largely interested in agriculture as lowa is, cannot under any pressure of party politics consent that duties on imports shall be permanently so adjusted and imposed as to bear unequally and unjustly upon her great interests. In her resolution lowa does not demand that modifications shall be rudely and roughly enacted so as to disturb and destroy useful investments already made, and important enterprises already undertaken, but that “protective duties” shall be placed in the line of “gradual and persistent” reduction.” The purpose and object of any tax, whether upon imports or upon domestic productions, should be to raise needed revenue; but in either case the sagacious legislator will carefully consider the effect of his action and policy upon the important interests of the country. In the adjustment of a tariff it becomes a question of infinite detail what shall be the rate upon each article taxed; and, in the sentiment of the Ohio and Indiana resolutions, inequalities of burdens and monopolies should be prevented, and care taken that the industries of the country and the interests of labor buffer no harm. , During the period since the close of the war, now eighteen years, the Republican party has held every department of the Government in its control, save only the House of Representatives for a brief period. Has it sought the common welfare in tariff reform, in the reduction of the revenues and in the economy of public expenditures? You will not, you cannot, claim that in these material respects it has taken care that the people should suffer no harm. It has fallen far short of the measure of its responsibility. '®an you then demand of this great agricultural State its confidence and support, upon (assurances that your leaders will in good faith, work out great and essential reforms, (which they have neglected in the past l Dropping the tariff question, Gov. Hendricks arraigned the Republican party for its 'course upon questions of public virtue and {political morality. For more than twenty years, he said, that party has been in power, distributing offices, controlling patronage and the expenditure of money. Fraud and force have reached and polluted the ballotbox; corruption has interrupted and perverted the execution of the revenue laws and written the biographies of high officials in the records of the penitentiaries; the United States mails have been made to carry jobs and schemes of plumber, and, when the .people invoked the authority of the law for the punishment of the offending parties, it turned out that the officials, who had been unable to preserve a pure administration of the laws, were equally inefficient in vindicating tne cause of public justice, and the manner of the prosecutions, and the attendant scenes and incidents became only less offensive than the crimes prosecuted. The confessions of ex-Senator Dorsey and his lieutenants as to the enormous expenditure made by the Republicans to carry Indiana in 1880 were quoted from freely and commented upon as follows: I would not have asked your attention to the confessions of Dorsey and his “trusted lieutenant” but for the fact that what they did was known to the most distinguished leaders of the party, and approved by them No warrior Returning from fields of victory, no representative to foreign lands, bringing home the sheaves of successful diplomacy, no Irving, or Longfellow, or Hawthorne, crowned with the wealth and glory of literature, has been welcomed by their countrymen with such distinguished marks of admiration and approval as were awarded to Dorsey on his return from the field of successful political crime The feast in his honor at Delmonico’s was right royal. Wealth contributed its vessels of gold. Wine flowed as waters run. The charms of literature were invoked in its pndse. It was a distinguished assemblage. An exPresident sat by his side, and proposed his “health, long life and prosperity.” A Vice President-elect made the speech of the evening, in which he said that “Mr. Dorsey was selected as the leader of the forlorn hope to carry Indiana. ” Beecher and Newman were there. Did they represent your clergy? Gould was there. The giant monopolies were there, and towered above Presidents and Vice Presidents and clergy. The fraud of 1876-7 breathed its poisoned breath into the debauch; and presiding over all was the genius of the occasion, the spirit of partial and unequal legislation, the enemy of the common people. For a full description of that reeling and noisy approval of a great political outrage I refer you to the New York Timet of Feb. 12, 188 L I am sure you will not believe that $400,000 (nearly $1 to every voter) were necessary for the legitimate expenses of a State campaign, nor that it was necessary to a fair election that men should be brought from other States “to intimidate voters, to create brawls and disturbances, to knock men down, and to repeat at the pools ” Can such things receive your approval? Will you commend them as right to the young men of Iowa? May I not appeal to you as paen who love your country, to help remove these influences, so hurtful, so pernicious? ' These things cannot be denied, nor can ithey be defended. Safety for the party is found only in diverting attention from them. To that end calumnies, long since buried under Congressional investigation and report, are dragged forth against the distinguished Democratic leader of 1876, pnd paraded before the public as new discoveries. If not to divert attention, why are they dragged forth? Is that gentlemen a candidate, to be feared and if possible destroyed? He is not a candidate, and I believe does not desire to be made one. His home in the country has all the attractions that natural beauty and elegant culture can give it. With it he seems contented and happy and undisturbed by the contests of ambition. The care of cattle and the cultivation of fruit trees seems more agreeable to him than the cares of Office. As I rode with him, not long since.

over the* beauJful and well-cultivated grounds, I thought there was enough to satisfy the most exacting taste, and that such retirement was a shield against the poisoned arrows of person® fed partisan malignity. Perhaps the reproducers of their calum nies fear the profound sentiment of the peo pie calling for a rebuke of the great-wrong of 1876-77, and that in respect thereto our history shall be corrected, and national integrity vindicated, making him again the Democratic leader. If that thought be behind this movement and instigating it, those who entertain it may be assured that calumny will fall harmless at his feet, and at the feet of the Democracy; that the attention of the people cannot be diverted from the political arraignment of 1884, but that the issue upon the wrongs of the past, reform for the future, must be met. The speaker then made a pass.n? allusion to the Monroe question, condemning the Republican party for its failure to grapple with polygamy while they have the power. The remainder of the speech was devoted to a discussion of prohibition The Governor declared himself in favor of the license svstem, which had been tested in Indiana with good effects, producing a large revenue for the school fund. He considered it sound morals as well as good policy to allow each man to decide for himself whatever effected himself only and none others As to the proposed prohibitory measures in lowa he repeated arguments made by him in opposition to similar legislation in Indiana a year ago, concluding in these words: For more than twenty years the Government of the United States has declared the product of the still and of the brewery to be property; has taxed it as property; and witn the proceeds of such taxation has made war, discharged debts, and maintained public credit. And do you now ask me to join you in applying the tordh and reducing to ashes a vast property which bears the sanction of both the Governments that are ovfer us? I will not go with you. I will not join in the destruction of my neighbor’s property which he holds by the same sanction of law which makes my title good. Do you tell me that it is required of conscience, and that they obey conscience? Conscience requires you and me to be honest, and to pay our neighbor before we confiscate his property. lam in favor of individual sobriety and temperance, but will not do wroug that good may follow. “A good tree can not bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit ”