People's Pilot, Volume 6, Number 9, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 August 1896 — A SHORT POLITICAL REVIEW. [ARTICLE]

A SHORT POLITICAL REVIEW.

Political Matter* Comldered with Reference to Republican Prospect*. It was in 1884 that the republican party, after an unbroken succession of triumphs for 24 years, met with its first national rebuke. The republican leaders assigned different causes for their defeat, among them being a Belshazzai feast of millionaires at Delmonico’s, in which Mr. Blaine took an active part Just a few days before the election, and Burchard’s penchant for alliteration when he declared that Rum, Romanism and Rebellion were all allied against republicanism. The true cause of the overthrow of the party, however, was found in the fact that the country was overrun with tramps and that, while farmers were selling their wheat for 65 cents per bushel, destitution and starvation had made their appearance with ihe apparent intention of remaining. In 1888 the republicans were again restored to power because the democrats were no more inclined to give the people relief than those who controlled the republican party were. Full con irol of the government passed into republican hands March 4, 1889. Tha congress whioh convened the following December elected Reed speaker ol the House and he made McKinley chairman of the Ways and Means committee. Mr. McKinley introduced hU famous bill and it became the law during the following summer. The people evidently thought more of the "free sugar” than they did of the tin plate and other protective features of the McKinley law, since they repudiated the republican policy in the ensuing congressional elections and gave the democrats control of the House by nearly 140 majority. Times waxed harder and harder, babies starved to death at Braid wood, 111., because theii soal-minlng parents could not provldi them with food; Dakota farmers were humbly begging for help and a statement of their deplorable condition wai given to the public over the signature of the republican governor of theii state. Strikes, riots, lockouts and trouble generally prevailed and all thit time the policy inaugurated by the republican party was unchanged. The troubles culminated in 189£ when the McKinley law had been In undisputed control for two years, In mining riots in Arizona and East Tennessee, where laborers were shot to death by troops. In railway riots in New York where the New York National Guard disgraced humanity by shooting a boy to death and brutally stabbing him with a bayonet after he was dead and in the awful Homestead murder, where the Pinkertons massacred workmen and were paid |5 per day for their bloody work.

The people were In a desperate hurry for relief and as the democrats had not had full control of the government since the war they turned to them foi help and gave them complete power In all departments. And now the republican party, chuckling with delight over the distracted and disheartened condition of the people, which it brazenly charges to democratic legislation, when It really is the result of denfocratic treachery or Incompetency, believes that its way to restored power Is open. Banking upon the Ignorance oi forgetfulness of the people It has nominated as its standard bearer the very man whose tariff policy had been In full force two years when the Homestead murder occurred and which the people repudiated, If they repudiated anything, In the most emphatic manner In 1892.

The signs are rapidly accumulating that the republicans have counted Without their host, and that while the disturbed and divided condition of the opposition may result in a republican victory, a large majority will vote against the return of their party to power and It will never again be able to crystallize Its distinct views into law.

i'aper money bottomed on taxes ts the safest and most convenient money for the people. The trouble with the democrats la that they are better reformers out of office than In office. The democratic party has attracted r'-entlon to itself chiefly by the blund r* it has committed.