Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 October 1884 — THE MUST GO. [ARTICLE]

THE MUST GO.

The Long Dominance of the Republican Party and Its Ideas Has Corrupted the Public Morals and Inaugurated the Era of Bribery and Fraud. Eloquent Speech of Gen. J. C. Black, Delivered at Freeport, HL, Sept 6. It always tries the endurance of men to summon them to pass through the excitement of such a day as this. You have heard from the man who, I Believe, will be your Governor next November; but you may bear with me while I state the reasons for my convictions. You are interested, as I am, in a pure administration of the laws and in an economical Government. Therefore I appeal to the judgment and patriotism of all the people. If it occur in the course iOt what I say that there is an occasional ringing on the Republican party, remember I have mucn respect for a majority of the individual members of the party, though I am positive that the ©arty as a whole is thoroughly corrupt If the rule of a party has been conducive to the welfare of the country, we should consider long before making a change; but if it has been the means of retarding progress, if it has filched from the people while pouring honeyed words in their ears, then a change is necessary. Such a change is wanted now. The Republican party bases its demand to the public confidence notJibly on three claims: 1. Its administration of the finances and its faithful care of the public property. 2. Its attitude upon the tariff question. 3. The moral fitness and high character of the Republican party. Of these I will speak in their order. And, first, of its financial administration. I shall set forth some dry statistics, but you should remember that you must consider dry statistics, for otherwise you can not decide wisely what you should do. Here in this community and in like communities are being formulated rules for government Listen to a lew facts. The public debt amounted Aug. 1,1885, when at its highest point, to $2,756,431,571. Sept 1, 1884, it was >1,437,514,094. There had therefore been paid 31,318,917,477. To pay this there had been collected, exclusive of loans, from Aug. 1, 1865, to Sept 1, 1884, in round numbers, $7,000,000,000. Uhe debt discharged in this time was only >1,300,000,000. Therefore the money expended, exclusive of the payment of debt, was $5,760,000,000, so that the Republican party during that time, conceding to them the credit of the whole affair, had reduced the debt only $1,300,000,000, While for other purposes a sum had been expended which is greater than the assessed value Of Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Missouri, lowa, and Michigan, a sum greater than the national debt of any foreign country, although in many of them debts have been accumulating for oenturies. Even the payments referred to—have they been paid by the Republicans? Have only Republicans been assessed for the ostensible benefit of the nation? You know that the payments have been made by the people generally, and not by any party. If you should find that your agent had, in the ordinary affairs of life, so managed your business, you would immediately discharge him. Here for nearly one hundred years fifty millions Of people have lived, toiled, saved, suffered, and died—have made the waste places inviting. The result of the product of those people, ten millions of whom are still alive, is Jess, fellow-citi-zens, than the Republican party expended in nineteen years, independent of the reduction of the national debt. What has become of this enormous sum? At the close of the war, in 1865, we had a navy which numbered 800 sailing •hips, with 575 guns; a navy which stretched along the seaboard and hermetically sealed the ports of the Confederacy. To-day that navy is reduced to fifty-two ships, so inefficient that there are 100 ships any one of which could sail Into the port at New York and bid defiance to ns. Yet upon that navy since the war there has been spent $391,000,000. You have a vast territory, the sections of which have to be brought together by some means of communication. To establish these means contracts are let and “expedited.** The contracts entered into by the Government for the establishment of means bf communipation is a proof of the venality of the Republican leaders. Once upon a time lye and grease used to be put together to make soap, but now a star-route lie and the people’s money are put together to make soap to carry Indiana. The horde of officeholders under the Republican administration is constantly increasing. There is a peg for every hole in the official void, and the success of Republicanism means the addition of offices to the already large number -an army of 120,060. Under the skillful management of this army SBOO,000 has been accredited yearly for the past eighteen years to “losses.” It was not stolen; oh, no; there is no reason why it should be stolen. Oh, they say, we have expended a large amount of money, but we have not stolen jt ; we are the honestest set of rogues and scoundrels on record—we have appropriated iff If you meet a highwayman and ne relieves you of your pocket-book, do you call that theft? Where is the difference between that offense and the misappronriation of public funds? The Republicans confess to enormous losses, and yet you are called on to support the party on the ground that it has discharged the trust you reposed in it with honor to itself and satisfaction to you. What care has the Republican party taken of the public property? The reports of the Land Office show at this time that there are in the occupancy of foreign capitalists and fraudulent entrymen 9,060,000 acres of the public lands. Buch occupancy is impossible, except by the connivance or supineness of the public officials. A change is demanded, and it must occur. Since 1861 the grants to railroad companies alone have amounted to 176,000,000 acres. The efforts of a Democratic House to reclaim the fairly forfeited grants was defeated in 1884 by a Republican Senate.

The Republican party claims support because of its position as regards the tariff, and its mouthpieces assert that it has produced the vast ■wealth of the republic. Let us see. The gain in population since 1865 has been 17,000,000. There has been a proportionate increase in the taxable values of the property owned by the people. Has this been brought about bv high tariff. Who has been benefited ? For every dollar of revenue there has been $4 of duty. It appears by the manufacturing statistics of Massachusetts, as presented by Senator Hoar, that, in the year 1879, 525,000 workmen took $386,000,000 worth of raw materials (cotton, wool, iron, hides, wood, etc.), and by adding their skilled labor, converted them into finished manufactures worth in the aggregate $631,000,000. The Increased value which they gave to this $386,000,000 worth of raw material was, therefore, $245,000,000—and this sum represents labor. But it appears further that of this $2(5,000,000 added value, the 325,000 wonringmen got only $158,000,000; the remaining $87,000,000, or more than one-third went to the employers—the manufacturing capitalists. ■The workingmen made only wages—s 449 each a year, or about $1.25 a day. One effect of the administration has been a constantly increasing surplus. One hundred millions of dollars is added to the Treasury yearly. Aug. 1 there was $400,000,000 in the Treasury, and during the month of August $8,000,000 was added. These vast sums are drawn from 55,000,000 of people. If the Republican party succeeds, the enormous surplus must'increase, for so the Republican pl atform and Blaine and Logan declare. The Republican members of the House of Representatives, voting as a mass, steadfastly refused to consent to a reduction. Yet there can be no doubt that something must be done with the surplus. It must be drawn from the Treasury and distributed. All concede this. Then why, if the Republican party be honest, does it allow the money to accumulate? The Republican party claims that it is a party of progress and exalted ideas. Let the young voter, to whom this claim is made, make out a schedule of some of the features of Republican rule, and ponder over it long and earnestly before he acknowledges that that is truly the igrand old party and throws his hat high in the air at the beck of its chosen leaders. He may put down among other items: The Credit Mobilier swindle. The Boss Shepherd ring frauds. The sate burglary iniquity. Th? whisky frauds. The Freedmen’s Bank swindle. The Belknap impeachment. The Robeson naval frauds. The Sanborn bureau frauds. The Indian Bureau frauds. The pension bureau frauds. The Black Friday rascality. The theft of the Presidency in 1876. The Indiana bribery in 1880. The Blaine Speakership jobbery. The star-route frauds. Concealed within the toga of Republicanism are creatures so hideous, that honest, loyal men, knowing their natures, would spurn them as a reptile from their path. Blaine, it is claimed, is not of those. It is said that he is a statesman. To those who make the -declaration, I give a challenge to point to one act in his life that indicates the economist or the reformer. -In a speech recently delivered at Madison, Wis., the Republican candidate for Vice Presl■dent sald-s-- "The Dem'traratlc party-represented

the English Interests as against the American interests. Its monuments were built to free trade. State banka, a rotten and depreciated currency. State rights, and slavery. The Democrats had opposed every advance measure for the last twenty-five years. Their monuments were raised over false creeds, failures in statesmanship, the putrid carcass of secession, and the dry bones ot State sovereignty.” That distinguished gentleman may speak for the Democracy of twenty-five years ago; with him then be that issue. He knows whether the great confiding mass, who lookecfto the leaders tor guidance, were properly led; he knows who rode at the front of that column; he knows whose hand, honored with the trust of the rank and file, upbore the standard of slavery and secession ; he knows whose bold and daring blow, by use of law, struck manhood's form to the earth in Hlinois and planted the banner of slavery on humanity's bleeding heart; he knows whose tall plume waved at the front of that old-time host. He knows when Douglas sent the cross of fire and blood throughout the Northwest, and summoned the Dem< cracy to the support of an impoverished republic, whose foot lagged in the race; whose hand was late in the fray; whose voice was late in the acclaim. He may speak for the old time and the old ways, but he shall not in this year assail the Democracy of to-d y, nor cloak wrong by the magnificence of his imperishable record as a soldier. That gentleman won renown, and set the stars of his martial glory high and forever in the American sky, but our warfare is of the present; we seek to perform what is ours to do now. The Democracy, for which I speak, and for whose principles I contend, freed from its ancient leadership and their pernicious councils, fresh-recruited from the ranks of a virtuous people, filled with the young blood and heroic purposes of to-day, has arisen to call in judgment the oppressors of the people and the spoilers of the weak; it accuses Republicanism of corruption, of wrong, of extravagance, of threatened violence, and actual usurpation; it will not allow that the shameless be sheltered by splendid deeds in arms, nor turn attention from the reforms of the day by a recital of the abuses of the past. With. steadfast front it abides the result of the great contest. The Republican party holds control in the United States by usurpation, violence, and defiance of the will of the people and the law of the land. The Republican party has been the prolific parent of numberless corporations that have covered the whole field of wealth, and made it possible for vast fortunes to be built, when a few years since a greatly diffused wealth Showered its blessings on all. The long dominance of the Republican party and its ideas has corrupted the public morals, inaugurated the era of bribery and fraud, and obscured the high models of other days. It must go.