Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 July 1888 — THE CAMPAIGN. [ARTICLE]

THE CAMPAIGN.

It Is Opened in lively Fashion in the National House of Representatives. Chairman Mills Attacks and Mr. Kellej Defends the Republican Platform. [Associated Press Report] The House was in committee of the whole on the tariff bill on Thursday, and was discussing a motion to strike from the free list alt vegetables not otherwise provided for. The motion was favored by Messrs. Brewer (Mich.), Brown (Ya.), and Farquhar (N. Y.y, who contended that the admission of vegetables duty free would enable Canadians to undersell American farmers on the border. Mr. Mills (Tex.) called attention to the fact that potatoes were specifically Provided for in another part of the bill. 'he clause, he contended was in the interest of the consuming classes, and he queried where the Republicans would be willing to reduce taxation. Mr. Brumm (Pa.) suggested that they were ready to reduce internal taxes, and Mr. Mills replied: “Yes. you want free whisky. You do not say in your platform that you want to reduce the duties on sugar and rice. The convention has overruled what you have contended for. Your party commands you to go for free whisky. We go with you to the oountry on that question. We demand a reduction on the things which enter into consumption as necessaries, and demand that taxes shall remain on whisky as they are to-day.”

Mr. J. D. Taylor, of Ohio, challenged the statement thut the Republican party was in favor of free whisky. All classes of the Republican party were in favor of abolishing internal taxes beeguso they believed it to be unwise as a system. Under the circumstances, a man who would coldly and with his judgment in his hand assert that the Republican party was in favor of free whisky might be developed, according to the Darwinian theory, four countless cycles of time, without mounting intellectually to the position of a brevet ass. . [Laughter and applause on the Republican side.] Mr. Mills said he was not astonished at the tenderness of the gentlemen on this question. It was well known that the majority of the Republican party was opposed to the extreme position which the Republicans had taken at Chicago. It was well known that the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Kelley) represented a minority, and when the convention at Chicago was lashed and scourged to take a position for free whisky no one sooner than the gentleman from Pennsylvania sent congratulations to the convention for coming to the heroic stand which he had occupied. For the first time at Chicago had the Republican party come boldly and taken the position before the American people in favor of keeping the taxes on the necessities of life, and demanding that the Treasury should be emptied by taking the tax off whisky. That was the position that party had taken before the American people, and no amount of disclaiming would convince the people that that party, if in power, would not take the tax off whisky and leave it on every article of necessity. [Applause on Democratic side.] Mr. Kelley (Pa.) denied that he was in favor of free whisky. He advocated the repeal of the war taxes Avhich Jefferson had denounced as an infernal system. Ho had demanded that the Democrats carry out their platform of 1884, which promised an abolition of the internal taxes. The gentleman from Texas (Mills) could not deny that it was the Democratic promise in 1884 to the tobacco growers, the fruit growers, and the distillers of the South that they should be relieved from national surveilanoe and supervision. He had asked that this great source of revenue be remitted to the people of the States, and under State law, to the municipalities of the State; and those governments which bore the burden of crime and vice and insanity should have whatever revenue might be justly derived from a source so fruitful of crime and misery as the whisky business. Air. Spinola (N. Y.) said a party should be judged by its acts; and it was stated in a newspaper that 81,260 extra barrels of beer had been consumed in Chicago during the sessions of the convention. [Laughter.] That was a pretty strong piece of prima facie evidence that the Republicans were in favor of free rum.

Mr. Owen (Ind.) suggested that the beer was intended for visiting Democrats, but Mr. Spinola denied that Democrats went to such places. Mr. Beed (Me.) thought that the gentleman from Texas did not mean to be belived when he said that the Republican party was for freo whisky, because the gentleman knew that there would not be enough Democrats left to make up an electoral ticket in half the States of the Union if they had confidence in his statement. [Laughter.] The gentleman knew that the position of the Republican party on this subjeot was too simple to be turned in this way; but if the Democratic party should ever commence a campaign without a false statement its own friends would not know it. What the convention had said was that after having triod every other method of reducing taxes consistent with the maintenance of the system of protection, if the Republicans had to choose between internal taxes and the protective system, they would stand by tho system of protection for American industries. The Legislature of Virginia, which was two-thirds Democratic, had adopted a resolution declaring it to be the duty of Congress to secure the repeal of the internal revenue system. Was the Democratic Legislature of Virginia in favor of free Avhisky ? No Democrat had been elected in Tennessee who was not pledged to use his best efforts to secure the repeal of internal taxes. Was the Demooratio party of Tennessee in favor of free whisky? Mr. Weaver (Iowa) criticised the internsalrevenue plank of the Chicago platform, and declared that tho issue could not be shirked and that there could bo no shuffling. “I am a Democrat,” interrupted Mr. Wise (Va.), “and I am in favor of the repeal of the tobacco tax.” [Applause on the Republican side.] Mr. Weaver—“ This bill provides for a reduction of that tax; but I say to the gentleman from Virginia that his position in favor of the repeal of the internal-revenue taxes is not the position of this bill.” Mr. Wise—“My position is the position of the National Democratic party in 1884, and the platform of 1888 indorses the platform of 1884." Mr. Cannon (Ill.) said he was willing to stand by the Chicago platform as a whole, but he was not willing to stand upon a sentence picked out here and .there and construed by the enemy. The platform demanded appropriations for the rebuilding ol the navy, for the construction of sea-coast and other defenses, for freo schools, and for the payment of pensions. It then declared for free alcohol used in tho arts, and the repeal of duty on articles not produced in this country. When all this was done, if further reduction was still needed and a choice had to be made between the protective system and the internal System, then, and then alone, the Republican party placed itself on record as favoring the further removal ol internal taxes rather than to interfere with the wages of labor and the diversity of industries pf the country. _