Rensselaer Republican, Volume 25, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 June 1893 — WHERE RESPONSIBILITY RESTS. [ARTICLE]

WHERE RESPONSIBILITY RESTS.

In discussing the financial situation the New York Tribune charges the Cleveland administration with being mainly responsible for th€ unsettled and uneasy condition of affairs in this country at the present time. It says. Three months ago when President Cleveland came in, business was large in volume and highly prosperous. The outgo of gold, which had begun the very month he was elected, both indicated and created some apprehension, but the business world was disposed to extend to him generous confidence and support. Banks loaned several millions of gold to the treasury for legal tenders, and net exports of gold fell off to $1,500,000 in March. Everybody knows that there has been a great change. Gold exports raised to $18,000,000 in April and last week alone were $6,500,000. Business is no linger as large or as satisfactory. Failures have multiplied and assumed serious importance. A great many works have stopped, many others are preparing to close. Wheat and Corn have dropped about three cents each* and cotton nearly a cent, in spite of official indications of a short crop. Bail-' road stocks have fallen an average of $lO per share and trust stocks $23.50 per share in two months.

Happy is the Democrat who can persuade himself that the change of national administration had nothing to do with this trying change in business. But no statement of the situation is faithful or candid which does not attribute to the administration itself a large proportion of the evils now experienced. Some censure its policy, and some its want of policy, but the trouble goes deeper. The president has erred in much that he has left undone, but the root of the matter is that he has been sacrificing the public welfare to the exigencies of partisanship. He and his friends often say that the Sherman silver law is the cause of all trouble. It is not true; but if it were, why has that law not been repealed? The president has a congress controlled in both branches by his own party. He could have brought congress together before the end of March. He refused to do so, and took upon himself the responsibility which he ought to have placed promptly and squarely upon the representatives of the people. His reason all know. He felt that his party in congress would break into warring factions, one of which he would be forced to lead, and that he and the party would then be powerless to pass measures without the assent and aid of Republicans. In return it would be impossible to avoid concessions to Republican opinions and interests. The president preferred to let the country suffer.