Rensselaer Republican, Volume 20, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 December 1887 — THE PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE. [ARTICLE]

THE PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE.

Opinions Of Various Congressmen and Others of the Document: Senator Call—A very able document. Senator Reagan—l like and indorse it. genatof Eustis—lt is an admirable message, and suits us. _ Senator Beller—lt’s a remarkable message, and very weak. Senator Paddock, (Rep.)—Jt is a big card for the Repnblicaus. Representative Millssaid: “Good, elegant; it could not bq better.” Mr. Randall, of Pennsylvania (Dem.)— Well, he forces the issue upon us. Representative Fuller,of lowa(Rep„) We ean stand such stuff as that. Senator Spooner—lt is a rehash of old stump speeches, poorly put together. Representative Cox (Dem.) —Didn’t hear it all, bnt it is on the right lines. Senator Blackburn-ls there’s anything I don’t want to be quoted on, its the message. Representative MeComas, of Maryland (Rep.)—It is the great error of the administration. Representative White, of Indiana f (Rep.)—A rehash and a misstatement of figures and facte. Senator Aldrich —The President presents an issue which the Republicans will be very glad to meet. Mr. Reed, of Maine—lt has come like a great blessing to us. Now we can see what is in our front. Mr. Randolph Tucker—lt is evident that our people will not relish the suggestions about the tobacco tax. Mr. Burrows, of Michigan—lt is the twaddel gathered up froin the weakest free-trade stump speeches he could find. Senator Hiscock—We can carry New York by the biggest majority it was ever carried if they will give us that platform. Representative Bland said: “It’s the best we- have ever had. I have not heard its equal since I have been in Congress.” Senator Gray—Strong, original, and characteristic of the man. Mr. Cleveland is the strongest President since Jackson. Representative Springer said: “That is a good one. He hits the nail on the head every time. We have our platform.” Representative Hooker, of Mississippi (Dem.)—lt is a strong, unique, and the grounds are well taken. The party will indorse it. Representative McKinley, of Ohio (Rep.)—The issue is made. It is free trade against protection, and will give us strength.

Senator Manderson said: “It was a sirongmessage for free trade, but what a|complete ignoring there was of everything else.” Mr. Hiestand, of Pennsylvania—On that platform Pennsylvania is good for one hundred thousand Republican majority next year. Senator Allison—ls the President paeans free trade—and i take it that he does—it will be a good enough document for the Republicans. J. G. Cannon, of Illinois—He only sees the five millions gathered froth wool, and there are forty millions from suuar. Why, no one need ask. Senator Platt said he didn’t know whether he wanted to express an opinion or not for publication. If he did, it might not be complimentary. Senator Stauford —I wasn’t abl a to hear it very well, but what I did hear of it struck me as being something in the way of free-trade argument. Senator Frye, of Maine—lt is exactly the message which we want d. It sharply defines the issues, and leaves the Republicans the issue they desired.

Representative Townsend said: “Elegant, elegantl It beats them all. It could not be better. We are going to stand by him, and we are going to win.” ° Senater Chandler—l only fear the Democratic party will not indorse it, and will go back on it. The Republicans want nothing better with which to sweep the country. Senator Cullom said: «f‘lt is a good free-trade message, and to that extent it is of use to us. We are entirely willing to have the Democratic party come out for free-trade.” Representative Bingham, of Pennsylvania (Rep.) - It weakens the President, and is the most extreme Democratic sentiment I ever heard uttered on the floor of this House. Dunham, of Chicago—The-message is simply a few more pages cut from the encyclopedia, and should be bound up with the rest of the encyclopedia speeches of the tour. Senator Hawley w*s disgusted with the message. He described it as weak and trashy; fall of exploded ideas. He had heard schoolboys do better, there was nqnew idea or feature in it, and there was not one practical suggestion in it Representative Gibson (Dem )—The strongest and boldest expression ever made by any one the subject I heartily approve every word of it ' It is the line we must hew to. is Wm. Walter Phelps, Of New Jersey— He comes-out Bquaro ly as against protec--tionto American labor, so that every man can see just where he is, and on that issue we can carry the country. Representative Bayne, of Pennsylvania, (Rep.)—With a balance of tradd. against us amounting to $60,000,000 annually, a man capable of single-entry

, ■ - book-keeping out to know such talk is absurd. Representative Hovey, of Indiana, (Rep.)—lt creates an emergency and ignores the real issue before the country —that of distributing the. surplus. It will harm the Democratic party, and in ignoring the soldiers bring them solidly over to us. Mr. Wilson, of West Virginia, Democrat, who has several times made a successful fight against protect top in-his State, says: “ Just such a clear and authoritative statement from the execu tive was needed. It makes the tariff the leading and inevitable issue between the two political parties in Congress and in the next presidential campaign.”

Mr. Ermentrout, of Pennsylvania, a Democrat, thinks the President has increased the difficulties of the situation in Congress in respect to the tariff,-in-stead of submitting suggestions likely to bring about unity of action by the party. Representative Glover (Rep.)—lheard only portions of it, but I have talked with many of the Ohio delegation, and they are against the message because of the argument against tariff on wool. Without Ohio in accord I fear but little can be accomplished. Mr. Brumrn, of Pennsylvania—lt is a counterpartof Hancock’s statement that the tariff is a local issue. He wants to get rid of five millions of duty on wool," and keep the fifty millions on sugar, because the first benefits the yeomanry of the North, while the sugar is raised only in the South. Representative Owen, of Indiana, (Rep.)—lt is a characteristic message, written, as usual, on the line of a stump speech. The demand for free wool and the silence on sugar, when there are a million wool-growers and less than seventeen thousand sugar-producers, will not quite meet the better judgment of the people. - Mr. McKinley: Speaking as a Republican, lam glad the President has so clearly fixed upon the, attention of the: countrv this great issue and has so Burely committed his party to the British policy of free trade. The voters of the Union will now have an opportunity to pass upon this question fairly and without avoidance or evasion, A. M. Garland, assistant secretary of the American Protective Tariff League, and formerly a member of the Tariff Gommissioa, said: “When oncß the people find out that filling our markets withforeign goods means work atloreign wages for those who can find anything to do, they will effectually wipe out the whole free trade scheme arid the men -wha&re behind. it*— Ex-Congressman Frank Hurd, of Toledo, who is known as one of the most strenuous advocates of absolute free trade in this country, said: “The President’s message will serve to bring on the direct tariff issue. That is what I want. We shall now have political discussion of a great principle instead of disreputable wrangles and personalities. On this tariff issue the Democratic party camcarry the Northwest. Such States as Michigan, lowa,Nebraska, Wisconsin and Minnesota are with us on this question. There will be only eight or ten States left to the Republicans. As for breaking up the South, you can not do that.”

Judge Kelley, of Pennsylvania: To execute the objects indicated by the President without destroying many of the leading industries of the country is an utter impossibility. It is said that Mr. Cleveland publicly admitted that he had not known how large the country was until he took his hasty trip around the circle, which had not anything like the diameter of that around which Andy Johnson swung Mr. Sew ard.

Ben Butterworth: The Democratic m«if ority tnkn not to revise, but to destroy. They oppose the system in toto and hence there is the strongest probability that what they would call revision would be no more and no less than the kind of pruning of which Mr. Dorsheiraer spoke when said: “We propose to cut, to cut deep, to cut to the quick, in revising the tariff.” It was simply a declaration of war upon the,protective system. We understand that the socalled revision by the Democratic majority means a studied assault upon the system. And that we are bound by our faith to prevent. * * * If we have to delay that revision in order to preserve the system, the people will sustain us, and elect a Congress whic . will promptly and properly revise and yet not destroy the tariff. Mr. Randall said: “There will be reduction of taxation at this session to the extent of Iff),000,000 or more, but not on the exact line of the President’s suggestions. The internal taxes will be reduced in part, or in a large degree removed, which the President does not seem to favor, and some redactions will not be made in the rates of duties op imports.” It is clear, from what Mr. Randall said, that he and his followers will insist that the greater part of the reductions to be made m the revennes shall be made in internal taxation, and they inIt will be a bill to abolish the tobacce taxes, and will contain only so mnch relating to tariff as may be supposed to be needed to make it palatable to the “free-traders. Mr. McAdoo, of New Jersey, who is Mr. Randall’s lieutenant, said: “So far

as I am concerned, the recommendations of the President will have dne weight and consideration. He is , edly honest arid sincere, and his anxiety abont the snrplqp is shared by nearly every member of the House, so far as I know.” He frankly admitted, however, that the differed from the President aa to tljie principles which underlie federal taxation, and did not concur in his sug-. geßtions as to the remedy for the excessive income of the government.

The following editorials from some of the leading journals in the South are of interest as showing how that section views the President’s plan for reducing the revenue: The Charleston, S. G., News and Courier says: “The President exposes with cruel courtesy every fallacy of the protective argument. Indeed a stronger or more comprehensive exposition of the weakness and inherent inequality of the protective system has not been given to the public. Through it all, moreover, there runs a vein of kind sympathy and patriotic consideration. The manufacturer or the working man who roads this message must be callous and suspicious indeed, if he is not impressed by it with the abiding conviction that a readjustment of the tar ff, which should be committed to the President if that were practicable, would leave the workingman in better position than that which he now holds, would inerease the general prosperity of manufacturers and the persons whom they employ in opening to Americana the markets of the world, and would at the same time by deminishing the burdens and restraints upon them augment the comfort of every man, woman and child in the land.”

The New Orleans Times-Democrat says: “The message sent yesterday by the President to Congres is unique. It is, first of all, the shortest Presidential message ever sent, and is confined wholly to a single subject—the tariff. The President declares himself, in no uncertain terms, a revenue reformer and opposed to protection pure and simple. He would have Congress leave the internal revenue alone and concentrate itself on the work of reducing the tariff. We do not agree with the President in regard to the non-reduction «f the tobacco tax. It is true that tobace* is not a necessity, but the tax is troublesome and burdensome to the agricultural producer, and the cost of its collection is considerable.”

The Atlanta Constitution says: “The message of the President concerns itself solely with the tariff question, and he discusses it almost exclusively from the standpoint of Bre’r Bill Morrison, of Illinois, who was left at home by hie esteemed constituents on account of his extreme views. At the same time the President does not go as far as Bre’r Bill Morrison. He pauses in the lesson which he gives to Congress to refer to the fact that the Democratic platform suggests protection for American industries and American labor. There is one fact, however, to which Mr. Cleveland fails to call attention —namely, that the promises of the Democratic platform can be carried out by the repeal of the internal revenue law, which was framed to suit an emergency long since passed, and which, in its operation, is odious and unjust. The repeal of this law would so effectually do away with the surplus that Congress would be compelled to revise the tariff with such protection as the Chicago platform calls for, but the free traders are opposed to this repeal for the reason that while the revenue tax is levied any attempt to reduce the tariff will merely result in increasing the surplus, and they will, therefore, have an excuse for putting their free trade notions into effect t« some extent. That a man of practical common sense like Cleveland" should walk into such a trap is surprising, bmt he has not walked in without a protest, as his reference to the Chicago platform shows.”