Rensselaer Republican, Volume 20, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 August 1888 — FACTS FOR THE PEOPLE. [ARTICLE]

FACTS FOR THE PEOPLE.

Mr. lUaine’* Second New York Speech. Mr. Chairman: It would be censurable egotism in me to take this magnificent demonstration as personal altogether to myself.! It rather signifies the great popular interest in the question which I am supposed at least to hat'e a consistent record and an earnest zeal. And vou have before you a contest in which that great issue is to be settled by the American people for perhaps an in-* definite period, the one way or the other. v rhe year 1887 was prosperous, and the President at its close proposed a radical change in the industrial system which had produced that prosperity; and since that day there has been a reversal and confusion in the commerce and manufactures of the United States. The question before the American »people is whether he and his Administration shall be sustained in that movement. Against him the Republicans, having the best cause, nominated the best <»I tickets. Ttiey iiave.given you for President a man of civil experience, a man of marked record in the war, a man of great purity of character, a man of great firmness, who can give to this country an administration worthy of its best days. And you have associated with him a man of whom to New York-

ers I need give no other description than to sav that jag name is Levi I*. Morton, a man of most generous character; a man of intelligent comprehension of affairs, and of the widest and most statesmanlike views on all questions pending before the Amcr can people. Against these vou have two gentlemen of whom i would not speak in terms other than of entire personal respect. I would say nothing of the President other than that, and of the candidate for Vice-President I would sav that in him I have a friend of many years’ standing, and I am a personal admirer of Judge Thurman., But I beg you to Observe that at a critical period country, the Vice-President, George M. Dallas, by liis casting vote in a tied Senate destroyed the protective tariff of 1842, and gave us the free trade tariff of 184fi. The Senate of the United States, when on the 4th of March next it. convenes, will have thirty-two Senators from the solid South. It will have six Democratic Senators, unless we can change some of them in thejmeanfime, from the North. That gives them precisely the half, i\nd Air. Thurman, if chosen Vice-President, will be in a position to reenact the role of George AI. Dallas forty-two years ago. Therefore, however amiable a man lie may be, and however able he may be, the more amiable and able lie is, the worse will be his influence on the American people. Now, gentlemen. I know that it is often said that in discussing the protective tariff we are always pointing out what England is doing. Well, I have lately been in England for some months, and I have found in English public opinion a very great difference upon almost all questions under the sun. They are about divided in two on what you call the Irish question. They are about divided as to the foreign policy of .Gladstone or Salisbury. They are divided even upon the continuance of the House of Lords and they are not absolutely unanimous in the support of the monarchy. But there is one question from Land’s End to John O’Groat’s, from the Irish Channel to the English, in every paper from one end of the kingdom-to the other—on which there is one unanimous accord pn the part of Tories and Whigs, of Liberals, of Conservatives, and of Radicals, and that is that the Hon. Grover Cleveland, President of the United States; embodied in his message' the exact form of revenue a.nd free trade for the United States, which they like. Now,l have no objection to their right of opinion, and if 1 had it would amount to nothing Nor do I intend to speak with disrespect of the English, for I have received atrtheir hands very -graceful and grateful hospitalities which I would be a churl not to acknowledge before an American audience'. 'But that does not change the essential condition, that the American people find their interest in one policy, and that the English people want to change that policy, so as better to conform tohheir interest.

And that, gentlemen, is the prime question before yon in next November’s election. lam glad that this meeting is called in the name of the laboring people, because this question, from first to last, from beginning to end, from skin to core, and from core back to skin again, is a question of labor. If you wifi agree to live in as poor houses, and eat as poor food, and receive as low wages as the operatives in England receive, we. can produce just as cheap goods as a Democratic Administration wants to see. But if you prefer, with the pride and the freedom •of vour condition, to Better the condition of your children and your children’s children after you, you want the industrial system of protected interests that prevails in this country now to be maintained. Why, gentlemen, in regard to the wage workers of Great Britain afid Ireland, of England, Scotland and Ireland, as I said to-day to some Massachusetts gentlemen who did me the honor to call, the entire savings to-day that they can draw upon in the hour of need in that great kingdom is not as great as lie td-night in the savings banks of Massachusetts to the credit of the wage workers of that small State. And if you will turn the administration of this republic to-day into free trade channels you can exhaust those savings, and put our laboring men throughout the country into competition with the laboring men of Great Britain, and, in the course of five or ten years, you can make them as poor on this side as they are on the other. Now, I will not, in this campaign, stop to arguethis question on auv other basis. I have no personalities to indulge in. I have no sores to heal. I would rather have your cordial, and heartfelt, and magnificent w elcome than any office you could bestow upon me. But in this canvass in which I shall take greater or less part, I shall hold this question from the beginning to the end, a question that interests every man, woman and child that depends upon daily labor for daily bread. There is no need of making any laws to protect capital. -Capital always takes care of itself and gets a full share. But there are laws that can alleviate the condition of the laboring man, and there are laws that can degrade him, and the Republican'party has stood for twenty-five years, and it will stand, I believe, by the blessingußjOhad and the will of American people, tvren-

ty-five years more, upholding and maintaining that the Government which takes care of the bone and sinew and working muscle of the/land is taking care of the men that create the wealth of the country and are entitled to the patronage and protection of the Government. Now, gentlemen, you represent a critical State. You represent the. State of New York.-, lour fetes are tq tell on that one issue. Your votes can be decisive on that one issue. Do not be diverted ..from that one question bv side Igjgierc Do not be misled by pell v’ bles or this or that small issue. Do not be deceived by personal questions of views on the one hand or the "other, but, give your votes as independent laboring, men; givodhem for Uie interests of vour home and your own Preside, and thereby for the great interest, of the great republic. And I aver, Air. Chairman, I never thought of that republic as I do to-night". I have seen the other aide; I have devoted something of the" last" fourteen months to seeing the condition of labor and laboring men in the other hemisphere; and I Say without fear of contradiction that in no country of Europe in no part of Europe or a part of any country is the condition of labor pomparable to that w h ich lsTn~ the" U nitbcT States Are you willing to give up your position? Or will you maintain it by a strong pull, and a pull all together for Harrison and Alortou. Howtlie T/ rilt Affmt* tlie Itiisin-B*. To the K d tor dfL’he Indianapolis Jounml. “Cash paid for old rags” would he a forgotten cry, in case the Mills bill should pass. There are nearly 75,000 people in New York,State alone engaged in the business of collecting old paper, rags, scrap-iron, etc. It is a dirty business, but t here’s millions in it. An old pile of rubbish, when sorted out, and cleaned and marketed, is valuable. The rags go to paper-mills and clothing factories, ti*e metal is eagerly taken .-by the smelter. Nothing is lost, hut for all there is a readv market. That is, when English junk is kept out. The English have a great deal of this commodity. Some of it comes in free, some is held back by a protective tariff, or else imported and found profitable even with the duty on it. These English shipments are gathered all over Europe. England is, the rag-bag' of the continent. Now the Alills hill has a clause that takes the duty off woolen rags, which is now 12c ; .per'pound, and by putting it on the free list practically ruins the business. Rags pass through a number of bands before the manufacturer receives them — the picker, the dealer, the wholesaler and the factory. There are some 800 dealers in New and scores of wholesalers. Indianapolis has a few of the latter. These men, pickers and merchants alike, are affected by the free-trade craze. There is now no duty on cotton rags or paper stock, but there is a small tariff on jute butts. ■When a peddler takes the old rags that have accumulated in your house and gives you one cent a pound, he looks keenly for the Woolen part of his purchase. This is money for him, that is, with a duty of 12 cents a pound oh European woolen rags. Take that off, as the Democratic party proposes to do, and the rag pickers would cease to buy your rags. You suffer, the dealer suffers, and the whole industry, in which millions of dollars are invested, is crippled. Naturally, the rag men are mad. It is just so with scrap iron, which is also bought by the peddlers. The Democratic party hits that branch of the business too, proposing to put wool and iron on the free list, which will practically destroy it. Benjamin Barnard.

A FOREIGN ESTIMATE. London, .June 27. The Morning Post says: “President Cleveland’s conduct in his high office has fully justified those who placed him there, if reelected, he will hold power such as no President has held since the great war.” Te E Jitor ol'tbwTnaiaDapolis JaurDßl. ~ The above clipping, taken from the Sentinel of the 29th inst., furnishes serious matter for Irish Americans to reflect upon iff tluAgreat natioual struggle upon which we lire just entering. Noone acquainted with the history of England, no one conversant with the fact that England’s prosperity has ever been, in a great measure, founded upon the misery of the hapless victims of her Capacious policy, noone who knows her cowardly and treacherous course toward the people of the North during the four years of civil war, will for a moment believe that the above fulsome notice of President Cleveland, from a leading English paper, is the result of an honest regard either for Americans or American institutions. President Cleveland’s pernicious free-trade tendencies, his avowed desire of exposing the 'manufacturing institutions of our country to the blighting touch of England’s pauper labor, is the open sesame to this i nglisli admiration for the. Democratic champion of free.trade.. It is a significant fact that noue of our public men who have advocated a policy of protection to American industries, none w r ho have advocated a firm and dignified policy in our international affairs, have ever found favor With English statesmen. It is equally significant that since the control of our national affairs was intrusted to Democratic hands, English statesmen and the English press have vied with each other in subjecting our Democratic taskmasters to the “slobbering” process. The Sentinel may consider the estimate by a London paper of Grover Cleveland an accurate guide for Irish in America, but those who have tasted British vengeance in the old land, and their descendants in America, will record a different verdict by their ballots in November; ■