The Russellville Democrat., 1876-08-17

and wastes the fruits Of labor; it promotes fraud. fosters snug gling, enricbes dishonest officials, and brnkrupts honest merchants. We demand. that all Custom House taxation shall be only for recehue. Reform is necessary in the scale of public expense-Fed- eral, State and Municipal. Our Federal taxation has swollen from SG0,000,000 gold in 1860 to | $450, ,G00O00 in currency in 1870: our aggregate taxation from xlo4,- 0o0,000 gold in 1860 to $730,000 GOO currency in lS10-all in ore decade from less than x5 per head to more than SIS per head. Since the peace, the people have paid to their tax-gatherers more than thrice the sum for the Federal Government alone. We demand rigorous frugality in every de- partment and from every officer of the Government.
 Reform is necessary to put a stop to the protiigate waste 0, pub lie lands and their diversion from actual settlers by the party in power, which has squandered two hundred millions of acres upon railroads alone, and out of more than thrice that aggregate mas dis posed of less than a sixth directly to the tillers of the soil.
 Reform is necessary to correct the omissions of Republican Congress and the errors of our treaties and our diplomacy, which has stripped our fellow citizens of foreign birth and kindred race re- erasing the Atlantic from the shield of citizenship, and has ex- posed our brethren of the Pacific coast to the incursions of race not sprung from the same great parent stock, and, in fact, now by law denied citizenship through naturalization as being to the tra- ditions of a progressive civiliza- tion, one exercised in liberty un der equal laws; and we denounce the policy which thus discards the liberty-loving German and toierates the revival of the Coolie trade in Mongolian women, i'm ported fo. immoral purposes, and Mongolian men held to perform seryile labor contract.
 Reform is necessary and never can be effected but by making it the controlling issue of the cleo
 tion and lifting it above the two false issues with which the office
 holding classes and the party in power seek to smother it.
 l. The false issue with which this would enkindle sectarian strife ln respect to the public schools of which the establish ment and support belong exclu- sively to the several States, and
 which the Democratic party has
 cherished from their foundation and is resolved to maintain with
 out partiality or preference for
 any class, sect or creed. and with out contributions from the treas
 ury to any.
 ,, The false issue by which
 they seek to light anew the dying
 embcrs of sectional hate between
 kindred people once unnaturally
 estranged. but now reunited in
 one indivisable republic and a
 common destiny.
 1 All these abuses, wrongs and
 crimes, the product of sixteen
 years ascendency of the Republi
 can party, create q necessity fol
 reform, confessed by Republicans [ themselves; but their rcformers
 arc voted down in convention and
 displaced from the Cabinet. The , party's mass of honest voters is ipowcrless to resist the eighty thousand office holders, its lead , CTS and it's guides. Reform car only be had by peaceful civic
 revolution. We demand change of system, a change of Admins
 tration, a change of party, tha
 we may have change of hcas ures and of men.
 , Resolved, That this Convention f representing the Democratic par
 ty of the States, do cordially en dorse the acton of the prcsen , House of Representatives for re , ducing and curtailing the expen s ses of the Federal GOvernu ent, il f cutting down on"rous salaries, ex
 travagant appropriations, and II
 abolishing useless offices an' l places not required by the public necessities, and we shall trust t' the firmness of the Democratic members of the House that m p committee oi conference and m 3 nisinterpretation of rules will b allowed to defeat these whole , some measures of economy de manled by the country.
 , Resolved, That the soldiers an' sailors of the republic, and tn T widows and orphans of those win 2 have fallen in battle, have q jus r claim upon the care, protection - and gratitude of their fellow citl ,. zcns.
 | Reform is necessary in the civi f, scrvice. Experience proves tha C efficient and economical conduc