The Leavenworth weekly times., 1876-06-29
Convention Adjourned Till Eleven
O'clock this Morning.
Speeches by Dan Voorhees, and Others
After Adjournment.
NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION.

NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION.
ST. LOUIS, June 27.-The convention as
sembled in a large, beautiful hall in the
Chamber of Commerce at st. Louis, which
was decorated with garlands of leaves,
State coats of arms, flowers, etc.
The weather is very warm and sultry,
betokening thunder storms.
The delegates were promptly in their
tion was called to order by Hon. Augustus
Schell, Chairman Of the National Demo-
cratic Convention.
Meantime the Military Band, seated in
the rear of the Chairmans desk, kept the
assemblage interested by the rendering Of
various lively airs.
The chairman, in calling the meeting to
order, submitted a few brief remarks upon
the purposes of this convention, which was
to nominate candidates whose election shall
change the government and overthrow cor
ruption in the administration. Reform is
demanded BY the American people. Ap-
plause The corruption now ex-
isting In the government must be
purified and stimulated. This duty must
be contided to hands not of those who now
hold the government, but to the Democratic
party. The thing to be refromcd can't be
reformed by itself, and the people are so in
telligent and sagacious that they under
stand their rights, and will not again con-
fide their interests to the Republican party.
lie referred to the Democratic party
as the hard money party from
the beginning, and said 1t was trick to
try to saddle upon it the existing policy in
consistant with the hard money principles.
All the acts authorizing the paper money as
legal tender, and the opinion OF the
Supreme Court sustaining its con-
s,itutionality, all were done dur
ing the Republican administration. He
referred briefly to the evil results. The
remedy il not in the rapid con-
traction or the increase OF the cur
rency, but the one remedy at this
time is the repeal of the resumption
act, [applausel Go that and give the Dem
ocraiIc party the reins OF the government
and their policy OF economy and sound
finance will bring specie resumption speed
lily and safely. Applausel. In this centenni-
al year of National INDEPENDENCE
We have met to adopt the means
to restore the country to its ancient
prosperity. May We not hope
now, after the sixteen years OF Republican
ism, that the Democratic party may assume
its rightiul supremacy in the government.
The rules that will govern the convention
will insure good nominations, and he ex-
hor,ed to wisdom in making the platform.
At the conclusion OF his remarks he NOM
mated Henry Waterson Of Kentucky, as
temporary Chairman. [Applause. Unan-
imously agreed to.
Hon. Mr.. Barnum, Of Connecticut, and
Mr.. Ransom OF North Carolina, were ap-
pointed committee for the purpose Of con-
ducting Mr.. Waterson TO the chair.
MIR. Waterson upon being presented, was
received with applause, and said:
We are called together to determine by
our wisdom whether honest government ad-
ministered by honest men shall be
restored to the American people, or to de-
eide by our folly that it is the destiny OF
this country to pursue an endless and ever
revolving circle of partisan passion and
corruption, until, with the loss Of our ma
teriaI we'll peing, we loose the poor mans
best hope, civil liberty itself. Every citi-
zen of the republic will be of the one party
or the other, and it feels and it has felt for
many a day the depressing influence of
what We called hard times. When We
louk about US we see neglected fields
and vacant houses; the factory is closed
and the furnace door Is shut,
and there are myriads Of idle
hands but the happy activity Of prosperous
life is no where to be found; loyalists fatien
whilst honest men starve; empty the mart
and shipless the bay. What is it? What
has wrought so great a change in land
that under the rule of an intelligent, pro-
gressive and constitutional party, advanced
within half century from the condition Of
huddle of petty and squalled provincial
sovereignties TO foremost place among the
nations of the earth? The reason OF men
must answer partisan misrule and sectional
misdirection? The Republicans, my
friends, are not alone responsible; with
them rests the disgrace, with us the
faIlaeies. These twin-agents OF national
mischance working under the misrule
of the country, have kept the people Of the
North and South assunder, and have sup
piled sus;enance to corruption. They have
disturbed statutes they have unsettled the
prices they bave made our whole finan-
cial system . cheat and snare they have
driven the best element of political society
into exile, and have organized Charlatanism
into sort of public policy, enabling the
rouge 10 get a cheap advantage of his
dupe, and sacrificing every popular interest
to the lust of that oligarchy which has be-
came 30 encrusted with power as to be-
lieye itself entitled to rule by
the sheer force of its own wrong doing. So
much let us set down to the convenient pre-
text of war-so much to the long account
of damages between the North and the
South. 1t is for you to decide whether the
same conflict, with consequences multiplied
and magni6ed, shall, by any act Of yours,
be inausurated between the East and West.
l shall undertake, on an occasion OF this
kind, and in presence 20 imposing, to en-
force the familiar lesson 3of mutual for
make battle among ourselves. l entreat
you to direct your energies against the
common enemy. l ask your indulgence
only on my own behalf. lou have
called me to a place not merely
of distinction, but Of great difficulty
to place which requires the best training
of better man than am. In taking 1t l
trust to your confidence and good nature,
ana 70 ne1It iuCap3oic VI AZ unuaity vi
unfair act The work before US shouldre-
late to ideas rather than to individuals. l
is the issue, not the man, that should en-
gage US. We have come here to make the
peoples, not our fight for free, no less
than honest, government, for the reform of
the public service and the regeneration of
the public morals, for administrative re-
lief from administrative nihilism,
embraced in the simple creed
of home rule, reduced taxes, and .
living chance, for the South as we'll a. the
North, for both the Eaat and the West.
II anything comes OF our proceedings it
must spring from the spirit of aspiration
and fellowship which moved the follow
sn of Andrew jackson and Silas Wright,
Of Henry Clay and Daniel Webster, whose
political descendants meet together on .
common ground as Las, to vrese the gov
eminent from the clutch Of rings and rob
bem-Federal, State and nuniGpal-and