Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 June 1888 — WISE WORDS. [ARTICLE]

WISE WORDS.

Eloquent Utterances by Democratic Leaders in the National Conyention. Permanent Chairman Collins Makes a Clear Statement of the Political Situation. A Sparkling Speech by Delegate McKenzie Seconding Cleveland’s Nomination. oirited Talks by the Hon. Byron Stout of Michigan and Other Delegates. Permanent Chairman Collins. Gentlemen of the Convention : To stand by your favor in this place, so often filled by the foremost men in our grand party, is a distinction of the highest character, and an honor for which I am profoundly grateful. In performing the delicate and difficult service to which you have assigned me, I can scarcely hope to justify the wisdom of your choice. I shall at all times need a continuance of your indulgence and courtesy, ns well as your full co-operation, to promote order decorum, and good-will, until these proceedings are brought to a happy close. We represent in this convention more than 30,000,000 of the American people ; we bear the commission to act for them, and their injunction to act with all the wisdom which God has given us, to protect and safeguard the institutions of the .republic as our fathers founded them. In a time when the world was king-ridden and pauperized by the privileged few, when men scarcely dared to breathe the word “liberty, 1 ' even if they understood its meaning, the people scattered along our Eastern coast, with a sublime heroism never equaled, broke from all traditions, rejected all known systems, and established, to the amazement of the world, the political wonder of the ages, the American Republic, the child of revolution nursed by philosophy. The hand that framed the immortal Declaration of Independence is the hand that guided the emancipated country to progress and glory. It is the hand that guides us still incur onward march as a free and progressive people. The principles upon which our Government can securely rest, upon which the peace, prosperity, and liberties of the people depend, are the principles of the founder of our party, the apostle of Democracy, Thomas Jefferson. Our young men under 30 have heard more in their time of the clash of arms and the echoes of war than of the principles of government. It has been a period of jiassion, force, impulse, and emotional politics, so that we need not wonder that now and then we hear the question asked end scarcely answered: “What difference is there between the two parties ?” Every Democrat knows the difference. The Democratic creed was not penned by Jefferson for a section or a class of the people, but for all time. These principles conserved and expanded the republic in all its better days. A strict adherence to them will preserve it to the end, so the Democracy of to-day, as in the past, believe with Jefferson in: “1. Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political. “2. Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none. “3. Support of the State governments in all their rights as the most competent administrators of our domestic concerns, and the surest bulwark against anti-republican tendencies. “4. The preservation of the General Government in its wlple constitutional vigor as the sheetanchor of our peace and safety abroad. “5. A jealous cure of the right of election by the people, a mild and safe corrective of abuses/ which are topped off by the sword of revolution where peacable means are unprovided. “6. Absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism. "7. A well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and for the first moments in war. “8. The supremacy of the civil order above the military authority. “9. Economy in the public expenses, that labor may be lightly burdened. “10. The honest payment of our debts and the preservation of our public faith. “11. Encouragement of agriculture and of commerce us its handmaid. “12. The diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of public reason. “13. Freedom of religion. “14. Freedom of the press. “15. Freedom of the person under the protection of the habeas corpus. “16. Trial by juries impartially selected. Add to these the golden economic rule that no more taxes should be levied upon the people, in any way, than are necessary to meet the honest expenses of the Government, and you have a body of principles to sin against which has been political death to every party hitherto—to sin against which in the future will be political suicide. True to these principles, the Democratic party fought successfully our foreign wars, protected our citizens in every clime, compelled the respect of all nations for our flag, added imperial domain to our territory, and insured peace, prosperity, and happiness to all our people. False to these principles, the great Federal, Whig, and Know-nothing parties went down, never to rise, and we are here to-day, representatives of the party that bus survived all others, the united, • triumphant, invincible Democracv, prepared to strike down forever the last surviving foe in November. Our standard must be the rallying point now and in the future for all good citizens who love and cherish republican institutions, who love liberty regulated by the Constitution and law, who believe in a government not for a class or for a few, but a government of all the people, by all the people, and for all the people. This ha’s been the asylum for all good men from over the earth, who flee from want and oppression and mean to become Americans, but we invite and welcome only friends to this ground and liegemen to the republic. Our institutions cannot change to meet the hostile Wishes, nor be so much as sensibly modified save by the peaceful and deliberate action of the muss of our people in accordance with the Constitution and the laws of the land. Whatever problems the present has, or the future may present, so far us political action can affect them, will be dealt with by the American people within the law. And in the future, as in the past, the people will find security for their liberty and property, encouragement and protection for their industries, peace and prosperity in following the party of the American musses, which will ever shield them against the aggressions of power and monopoly on the one side and on the other the surgings of chaos. While almost all the rest of the civilized world is darkened by armies, crushed by kings, or nightmared by conspiracies, we alone enjoy a healthy peace, a rational liberty, a progressive prosperity. We owe it to our political institutions, to Democratic teachings, at least as much as to the exuberant soil. The man is not a good American who, knowing what we ’ are, by act or word, experiment or thought, in any way, will attempt to weaken the foundation of this splendid political structure—the Republic of the United States. We meet to-day under conditions new to the Democrat of this generation. How often we stood in conventions of the past, when to others it seemed as if the shadows of death hod closed about us—when the day of victory seemed almost as far away us the day of general judgment. It could not then be said that we met for spoils or personal advantage. We met to keep the fires of Democracy alive till the dawn of a better day. If we were a party of misfortune it must also be agreed that we were a party of undaunted courage and inflexible principles. Twenty-eight years ago the Democratic party, rent into fragments, heated by feuds that only time could allay or punishment destroy, met, as it looks now, merely to settle in 1 angry mood the terms upon which they should become exiles from power. By their mad dissensions they elected to go to defeat rather than wait for the sobering influence of time to close the breach. To the younger men of that day the act seemed suicide, mitigated by insanity. Their madness transferred to a minority of the American people the political government of allg That party, whatever the

honesty and respectability of its members, however patriotic its motives, was not broad nor national at its base. It had at most but one central idea, and when that idea was set in the Constitution and crystallized into law, it ran a career of riot that appalled all men. The history of that period of political debauchery is too sail and familiar to Americans to be recited anew. The Republican party, sometimes peacefully and sometimes by force, sometimes fairly and sometimes by fraud, succeeded in holding power twenty-four years; till at last the American people, no longer condoning its faults or forgiving its sins, hurled it from power and again committed to the historic partv of the Constitution and the whole Union the administration of our political affairs. We won the well-earned confidence of the country in the rectitude of our purpose by the aid of chivalrous and conscientious men who could no longer brook the corruptions of the Republican party. It was a great, deserved, necessary victory. The day on which Grover Cleveland, the plain, straightforward, typical American citizen chosen at the election, took the oath of office in the presence of the multitude —a day so lovely and so perfect that all nature seemed exuberantly to sanction and to celebrate the victory—that day marked the close of an old era and the beginning of a new era. It closed the era of usurpation of power by the Federal authority, of illegal forces, of general contempt for constitutional limitations and plain law, of glaring scandals, profligate waste, and unspeakable corruption of narrow sectionalism, and’the reign of a party whose good work had long been done. It began the era of perfect peace and perfect union. The States fused all their sovereignty into a Federal Republic, with limited but ample powers ; of a public service conducted with absolute integrity and strict economy; of reforms pushed to the extreme limit; of comprehensive, sound, and safe financial policy, giving security and confidence to all enterprises and endeavor—a Democratic administration, faithful to its mightv trust, loyal to its pledges, true to the Constitution, safely guarding the interests and liberties of the people. And now we stand on the edge of another era, perhaps a greater contest with relation to the electors than we have had for a generation—that of responsibility for the great trust of government. We are ho longer auditors, but accountants; no longer critics, but the criticised. The responsibility is ours, and if *we have not taken all the power necessary to make that-re-sponsibility good the fault is ours, not that of the people. We are confronted by a wily, unscrupulous, and desperate foe. There will be no speck on the record that they will not magnify into a blot, no circumstances that they will not torture and misrepresent, no disappointment that they will not exaggerate into a revolt, no class or creed that they will not seek to inflame, no passion that they will not attempt to rouse, no fraud that they will not willingly perpetrate. They fancy, indeed, that there is no imposture too monstrous for the popular credulity, no crime that will not be condoned. But we stand at guard, full-armed at every point to meet themOur appeal is not to passion, nor to prejudice, to class or faction, to race or creed, but to the sound common sense, the interest, the intelligence, and patriotism of the American people. The administration of President Cleveland has triumphantly justified his election. It compels the respect, confidence, and approval of the country. The prophets of evil and disaster are dumb.

What the people see is the Government of the Union restored to its ancient footing of justice, peace, honesty, and impartial enforcement of law. They see the demands of labor and agriculture met, so far as Government can meet them, by legislative enactments for their encouragement and protection. They see the veterans of the civil war granted pensions long due, to the amount of more than twice In number and nearly three times in value of those granted under any previous administration. They see more than 32,000,000 acres of lands recklessly and illegally held by the grantees of the corrupt Republican regime restored to the public domain for the benefit of honest settlers. They see the negro, whose fears of Democratic rule were played upon by demagogues four years ago, not only more fully protected than by his pretended friends, but honored as his race was never honored before. They' see a financial policy under which I reckless speculation has practically ceased and I capital freed from distrtist. They see for the first time an honest observance of the law governing the civil establishment, and the employe of the people rid nt last of the political highwaymen with a demand for tribute in one hand and a letter of dismissal in the other. They see useless offices abolished and expenses of administration reduced, while improved methods have lifted the public servie’e to high efficiency. They see tranquillity, order, security, and equal justice restored in the land, a watchful, steady, safe, and patriotic administration—the solemn promises made by the Democracy faithfully kept. It is “an honest government by honest men.” If this record seem prosaic, if it lack the blood-thrilling element, if it is not lit with livid fires, if it cannot be illustrated by a pyrotechnic display, if it be merely the plain record of a constitutional party in a time of peace, engaged in administrative reforms, it is because the people of the country four years ago elected not to trust to sensation or experiment, however brilliant and alluring, but preferred to place the helm in a steady hand, with a fearless, trustworthy, patriotic man behind it. Upon that record and upon our earnest efforts, as yet incomplete, to reduce and equalize the burdens of taxation, we enter the canvass and go to the polls confident that the free and intelligent people of this great country will say, “Well done, good and faithful servants.” To the patriotic, independent citizens who four years ago forsook their old allegiance and came to our support, and who since that time have nobly sustained the administration, the Democratic party owes a deep debt of gratitude. That they have been reviled and insulted by their former associates is not only a signal compliment to their character and influence, but another evidence of the decadence of the Republican party. Blind worship of the machine—the political juggernaut—is exacted from every man who will take even standing-room in that party. The Democratic temple is open to all, and if in council wo cannot agree in all things, our motto is: “In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty ; in all things, charity.” To all good men we say: “Cojne' in. Goodwillne’er halted at the doorstone.” As, four years ago, you voted with us to reform the administration, to conserve our institutions, for the well-being of our common country, so join with us again in appt-oval of the work so well accomplished, to complete what remains undone. We ask you to remember that it is a “fatal error to weaken the hands of u political organization by which great reforms have been achieved, and risk them in the hands of their- known adversaries.” Four years ago you trusted tentatively the Democratic party, and supported with zeal and vigor its candidate for President. You thought him strong in all the sturdy qualities requisite for the great tusk of reform. Behold your splendid justification. 4 No President in time of peace had so difficult and laborious a duty to perform. His party had been out of power for twenty-four years. Every member of it hud been almost venomously excluded from the smallest post where administration could be studied. Every place was filled by men whose interest it was to thwart inquiry and belittle the new administration ; but the master hand came to the helm, and the true course has been kept from the beginning. We need not wait for time to do justice to the character and services of President Cleveland. Honest, clear-sighted, patient, grounded in respect for law and justice, with a thorough grasp of principles and situations, with marvelous and conscientious industry, the very incarnation of firmness, he has nobly fulfilled the promise of his ’party, nobly met the expectations of his country, and written his name high on the scroll where future Americans will read the names of men who have been supremely useful to the Republic. Fellow-Democrats, this is but the Initial meeting in a political campaign destined to be memorable. It will be a clashing of nearly even forces. Let no man—here or elsewhere—belittle or underestimate the strength or resources of the opposition. Lut great us they qcre, the old Democratic party, in conscious strength and perfect union, faces the issue fearlessly. Delegate McKenzie, of Kentucky. Gentlemen of the National Convention: I bear the commission of the State of Kentucky to this National Convention, and in the name of the Commonwealth that has given to the nation a Clay and a Crittenden I desire to second the nomination of Grover Cleveland for the office of the Presidency of the United States. [Great applause and wild cheering.] Within the broad limits of this great land there is but one more popular Democrat than he, and that is the queenly woman he has made his wife. [Great applause.] It must be, Mr. Chairman, a matter of felicitation to every good citizen within the limits of our land that the historic White House, around

which cluster so many memories that are dear to every patriotic heart, is presided over by a man who has the courage to enforce the obedience to bad laws until they be repealed and recommend the enactment of good ones until they shall be enacted. [Applause.] At the same time its social destinies are guided by the fair hand of the uncrowned queen of our American womanhood. I never intend to let Mrs. Cleveland out of this canvass. [Laughter and applause.] In hoc sigao vinces. It was said, gentlemen of the jury [laughter], in our last National Convention that Grover Cleveland was loved for the enemies he had made; still later it had l»een said that he was loved for the rascals he had turned out [applause] ; still later it has been said that he was loved for the message he had written. [Applause.] Kentucky loves him for the fight that there is in him [laughter and applause] and for his splendid racing qualities. [Laughter.] .He is as game as Lexington «Uel as sjwedy as Ten Broeck. In his the Buffalo Mayoralty Stake hands down and he won the New York Handicap. He was then entered against the Florentine Mosaic from Maine [great applause and cheering] and won the National Derby by a neck. It does not matter, gentlemen of the Democratic jury, it does not matter how this National Sweepstakes shall be made up, whether it be filled out by hyperborean icicles, Florentine Mosaics, or dark horses, when the race is run through the bulletin-boards will show Eclipse first, the balance not placed. [Laughter and applause.] The State of Kentucky likes Mr. Cleveland for the reason that he has hail the courage to storm the intrenchments of subsidy and monopoly by recommending such judicious revision of our tariff system as will secure equality in the distribution of the public burdens and lighten the exactions of labor. [Applause.] He has had the courage to inaugurate such a war on that horrible misnomer called “trusts” as that before this national campaign shall close it will cease to be a popular name for a dog. [Applause and laughter.] He has had the courage and patriotism to regard the Presidency of the United States not as a personal perquisite acquired by purchase or discovery or diplomacy or escheat—{Mr. McKenzie had turned around to face the people on the platform when the audience set up a cry for Mr. McKenzie to turn around and face the audience]. Let me talk to these learned Thebans awhile. [Laughter.] But he has regarded the Presidency as a great public office confirmed by the unbought suffrage of the people to be administered wisely, fairly, judiciously, impartially, honestly, in the interests of everybody. [Cheers.] Well, the fact of the business is, he has got so much cou/age that it is unnecessary to enumerate. But there is one thing that I want to call special attention to. While others have wavered and others have presented doubtful messages, he has written a message to the present American Congress that has about it the directness and force of a Kentucky rifle and the executive ability of a dynamite cartridge. [Applause and laughter.] In lawyer parlance, it had about it the energy of a capias pro fine and the force and effect of a replevin bond. Now, gentlemen, this is the one instance in the history of American politics where we had a man who furnished in his own person a first-class candidate and a thoroughly Democratic platform. [Applause.] He has done his duty. Let us do ours. [Applause.] I want every Democrat, male and female [laughter], within the body of this most magnificent deliberative hall in the world [applause], concentrated to the holiest purpose outside of the Christian religion [applause]—l want every one to go home after we shall close these exercises [laughter] with the Democratic benediction, and if it shall please God to provide that in addition to Grover Cleveland one of the guidons along the clear line of the Democracy in its march to victory shall be a red bandana. [Applause.] In conclusion, Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I move to suspend the rules and make the nomination of Grover Cleveland for President of the United States absolutely unanimous. [Applause.]

Judge Twiggs, of Georgia. Mr. President and gentlemen of the convention, the great State of Georgia, which I have tho honor in part to represent on this occasion, is proud to second tho nomination of Grover Cleveland; a State which has been conspicuous in its fidelity to the great principles of Democracy and economical government which are under our national system, and which have found their highest expression in his splendid and magnificent administration. [Applause.] Monopoly has said to the people of the South, “You are poor; build up your factories, diversify your industries. Protection has made us it will make you so likewise.” The State of Georgia, already vocal with the music of a million spindles, has given back her reply, lifting aloft her proud and untarnished shield, on which is inscribed hermotto, "Wisdom, justice, and moderation.” She has said to this artful bribe, “ We may be so, but we are unwilling to grow rich by the levying of tribute uj>on the people.” [Applause.] Gentlemen of the convention, the twenty-four delegates from Georgia have come to this convention bearing with them but a single commission, and that commission is to cast the vote of the State for that matchless leader whom our late convention in it s platform of principles characterized us uniting the wisdom of Jefferson with the firmness of Jackson and the patriotism of Washington. [Cheers.] What is true of Georgia is true of every other Democratic State here represented, and it might be truthfully stated, gentlemen, that this vast and grand assemblage of patriots and Democrats may be called but a formal convocation assembled together to ratify the action of the sovereignties which have already spoken. [Cheers.] The great Democratic masses of the country, with elbows touching, have marched in solid and unbroken phalanx to this great city by the Father of Waters. Upon each flowing banner is inscribed but a solitary name, and that name has been their pillar of cloud by day and their pillar of fire by night; that name has been Grover Cleveland. [Cheers.] With a mighty shout, yes, I say, with a mighty shout, ho will be proclaimed our next standardbearer in the coming conflict. [Cheers.] The people at home are becoming rapidly educated and we can not be much longer kept in ignorance of the truths and principles of which he is the splendid exponent. They will ratify that nomination at the polls, for us sure as the ides of November come the Republican party of the United States will have received its death-wound and final overthrow. [Applause.] Gentlemen of the convention, in 1884 the public career of Grover Cleveland was confined to the limits of the great State which proudly claimed him as her son. To-day, in 1888, his name, and fame, and career is only bounded by the horizon of every civilized country upon the face of God’s earth. [Loud applause.] He was pledged to the people of «the United States in 1884 by those who knew his courage, his ability, and his patriotism, and he has redeemed that pledge. Thunk God, no further pledge is necessary to insure the continuance of that heroic devotion to duty which has been exemplified by a matchless, unsullied, and splendid administration. [Applause.] He- has not only won the applause of his countrymen but the plaudits of the civilized world of “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” Fellow-Democrats, hear me for a moment longer. Whence conies the fact that from every State, from Maine to California and from the Atlantic to the Pacific, there is among the people composing this convention of over 800 delegates but one name upon their lips and but one name enshrined in their hearts ? I will tell you why. Hear mb a moment. It is because he has pursued honest methods; it is because he is the stem enemy of robbery, of jobbery, and monopoly [cheers]—a Horatius at the bridge. He is a lion in the path of corruption. He has laid the foundation of good government, of honesty and reform so wide and deep that the principles underlying the Government of our country, and the permanency of our institutions, and the spread of the true principles underlying our Federal system have found their highest, and grandest, and best exponent under his matchless leadership. And last, but not least, hear me a moment longer ; it is because of his old and his fearless opposition to the abuses of the existing tariff. [Cheers.] When he found —and now lam nearly through—when he found that the people of the United States were being mercilessly robbed and plundered by the rapacity of monopolies under the specious guise of protection, and when ho found that the great agricultural industry of the country, which is the source of all true wealth, was bound hand and foot like Prometheus upon the rock, when the air was dark with vultures and kites which had settled in devouring flocks upon its bosom, tearing with their merciless beaks the vitals of this prostrate giant, it was then that Grover Cleveland, matchless man that he is, assumed the robes of power, turned his back upon the blandishments and expedients of office. With a whoop like a royal eagle, he came to the rescue of the suffering people. [Applause.] I say, gentlemen, rescued, because though, the bill now pending, known as the Mills bill, may be mutilated and emasculated, though it may suffer the fate of all great reforms in the beginning—because you know it is said that even the mills of the gods grind slowly, but they grind awfully fine—[cheers]—Gro v« Cleveland has

planted seed which has taken deep root, and M sure as God defends the right the country will be redeemed and the people sooner or later disenthralled. [Cheers], Mr. President and gentlemen, in behalf of the great State of Georgia, I repeat I am glad to be able to second the nomination of Grover Cleveland as President of the United States. [Great applause.] Hon. Byron Stout, of Michigan. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the National Convention, I am happy to meet you here to-day in liehalf of the noble State of Michigan to second in her behalf the name of Grover Cleveland for candidate for President. [Applause.] I recognize the fact that March 4 next will end the first century of this republic under the Constitution. March 4 next —what more fitting beginning of the new century than the inauguration of Grover Cleveland? [Apiilause.] I greet here to-day the representatives of thirty-eight States. We point with pride to noble Massachusetts, of which a great orator once said: “There she stands. She needs no encomium from me.” I remember her Otises. And we come to the gallant State of New York, who has made here in behalf of its delegation the nomination of Grover Cleveland. I see here the representatives of the State of William Penn. We see here the representatives of that gallant old mother of States, Virginia. And the reason why I love old Virginia is that I am her son, in that she gave us the territory which makes the five great States of Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin. [Applause.] I love her that she is to-day the mother of States and of Presidents. I pass along down and I see here the representatives of the gallant old State of North Carolina, the gallant representatives of the State of South Carolina, whose sons stood with Adams in maintaining the Declaration of Independence and established that Constitution which enables us to be here to-day. I see here the representatives of the gallant State of Georgia, and in one of her princely cities in an avenue two miles long and 200 feet wide she has reared a monument to the memory of her signers of the Declaration of Independence. I have not time to detain you in enumerating all the States of this Republic, but if there be one which I pre-eminenently love it is that Lone Star State which was acquired under Polk’s administration in 1847. There are two great inscriptions on the monuments of our country’ that will go down through all coming time —the one is inscribed upon that rock to the memory of the noble inert of the country. The State of Texas remembers her sons who perished at San Jacinto. She remembers her sons who perished at Lu Bahia. She has now reared a noble monument to her sons who perished at the Alamo. Thermopylae has survivors to chronicle her glory’. La Bahia has none. Is it any wonder then, my friends, the great march of commercial progress which we witness to-day? The reason is the Puritan and the Cavalier have joined hands in the work to-day and they will go on to viotory. Delegate Lightfoot, of Texas. On the part of the Democratic party of the great State of Texas, which has rolled up the grandest Democratic majority of any State in this Union, we claim the right to second the nomination of Grover Cleveland. [Applause.] We of Texas love the gallant chieftain who, in the most remarkable campaign known to history, had the firmness to ring out as the keynote of his campaign the motto: “Tell the truth.” [Applause.] We admire, Mr. Chairman, the noble statesman who had the firmness to ascribe on his banner the motto: “A public office is a public trust.” [Applause.] We admire the Jacksonian firmness which penned a message to Congress throwing the entire weight of the administration upon the side of a practical tariff for revenue only. [Applause.] In 1884 the State of Texas rolled up the grand majority for the national ticket of 134,000 [applause]; and, sir,,with a united and invincible party it hopes to roll up in November for the national ticket 100,000 majority. [Applause.]