Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 22, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 October 1900 — EX-PRESIDENT HARRISON SUSTAINING M’KINLEY. [ARTICLE]

EX-PRESIDENT HARRISON SUSTAINING M’KINLEY.

Issues Are Now Just the Same as They Were Four Years Ago. WHY HE WILL BE UNABLE TB MAKE ANY SPEECHES. Bryanites Get No Consolation from the Former President, Whom They Claimed Was Lukewarm in the Campaign.

Gen. Benjamin Harrison is emphatically for the re-election of President McKinley. He silenced all statements to the contrary by making his views known through the medium of an interview. “Is it true, general, that you have consented, to make some speeches in the campaign?” he was asked. Campaigning Days Over “No, that statement has not been authorized by me,” was his answer. “I have said to everyone Vho has spoken or written to me on the subject that I could not do any more campaign work. I began to make Republican speeches the year I began to vote, and have had a laborious,H~ubimportant, partin every campaign. State and national, since until 1898. “In 1896 1' submitted myself to very hard usage, and then made up my mind and so said to my friends that I would do no more campaigning. Following this conclusion I declined to take a speaking part in the campaign of 1898. My retirement. dates from that year, not from this. His Work for Party. “Few men have made more speeches for their party than I have, an<J no exPresident, I- am sure, has made more. Since I left Washington my retirement from all participation in party management has been complete. All that I have left to others, and I think they have very generally and kindly accepted iny sense of the proprieties of the ease—atleast between campaigns. “In a word, I have vacated the choir loft and taken a seat in the pews—with a deep sense of gratitude to my forbearing fellow countrymen.” “But, general, it is said that you are not altogether in accord with your party.” As to Porto Rico. “Well, I have heard that my silence was imputed by some to that cause. Now, the only public utterance 1' have made in criticism of the policies of the party was contained in the interview, consisting of one rather short sentence, that 1 gave to the newspapers while the Porto Rico bill was pending. “It was, in substance, that I regarded the bill as a grave departure from right principles. I still think so. I do not believe that the legislative power of Congress in the territories is absolute, and I do l>elieve that the revenue clause relating to duties and imposts applies to Porto Rico. Is a Legal Question. “These views. I know, are not held by many able lawyers. It is a legal ques-tion-one that the political departments

of the government cannot folly adjudge. The final and controlling word upon this question is with the Supreme Conrt of the United States. Cases involving the question are, I understand, pending, and a decision in which we all must acquiesce cannot be much deferred. “I think, therefore, that voters ought to vote with a view to the right decision of those questions that are directly and finally in the control of the President and Congress. Firm Against Bryan. “The general reasons I gave in my Carnegie Hall speech in 1896 why Mr. Bryan should not be elected still hold good with me. His election would, f think, throw governmental and business affairs into confusion. “We should not aid the election of • President who would, admittedly, if he could, destroy the gold standard and other things that we value even more, upon the deceptive suggestion that he has been bound and that the Republican party will, after defeat, still have strength enough to save the temple. “It will be much better not to allow tha man with destructive tendencies so mneb as to lean against the pillars. Quotes from the Past. “Perhaps it will save you much troubltf if I give you, and underwrite as of this date, this extract from my Carnegie Hall speech: “ ‘When we have a President who believes that it is neither his right nor his duty to see that the mail trains are not obstructed, and that interstate commerce has its free way, irrespective of State lines, and courts that fear to use their ancient and familiar writs to restrain and’punish lawbreakers, free trade and free* silver will be appropriate accompaniments of such an administration and cannot add appreciably to the national distress or the national dishonor.’ Prosperity Is Cited. “The economic policies of the Republican party have been vindicated by thei remarkable and general prosperity that 1 has developed during Mr. McKinley’s ad-' ministration—succeeding a period of great' depression. A change of administration this fall would almost certainly renew conditions from which we have so happily escaped. “This full dinner bucket is not a sordid emblem. It hiyi a spiritual significance for the spiritually minded. It means more comfort for the wife and family, more schooling and less work for the children and a margin of savings for sickness and old age.”