The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1876-07-01


| Reform is necessary IN the form and mode
| OF federal taxation, and TO the end that capl-
| tai may be set free from distrusi and labor
| lightly burdened, we denounce the present
tariff levied upon nearly 1000 articles as a
masterpiece OF injustice, inequality and false
practice 1t yields dwindling, not yearly
rising revenue 1t has impoverished MANY
industries to subsidize few. 1t prohibits
imports that might purchase the products Of
American labor. 1t has degraded American
commerce from the first to an inferior rank
upon the high seas 1t has cut down the sales
of American manufactures at home and abroad,
and depleted the returns of American agri.
culture, an industry followed by half our PEG.
pie 1t costs people five times more than il
produces to the treasury, obstructs the pro-
cess Of production, and wastes the fruits of
labor. 1t promotes fraud, fosters smuggling,
enrlches dishonest officials and bankrupts
honest merchants We demand that all Gus.
tomhouse taxation shall be only for revenue.
PUBLIC EXPENSE.
Reform is necessary in the scale of public
expense, federal, state, and municipal. Our
federal taxation has swollen from 100000 900
in gold, in 1850, to $4500O0,000 in currency,
in 1870 our aggregate taxation from $l54-
100000 in gold in 1860, to $4,000 600 cur.
rency in 1870, or, in one decade from less
than So per head to more than $1S per head.
Since the peace the people have paid to their
tax. gatherers more than thrice the sum of the
national debt and more than twice that sum
for the federal government alone We de-
mand a rigorous irugality in every depart
ment and from every officer Of the govern.
ment
PRoFLIGACY OF LAND.
Reform is necessary to put a stop to the
protlgate waste of public lands and their dl.
| fro oil cottl hut bn
power, which has squandered 100000 900 of
acres upon railroads alone, and out of more
than thrice that aggregate has disposed of
less than sixth directly to tillers of the SOIL
RADICAL OMISSIONS AND THE CHINESE.
Reform is necessary to correct the omission
Of republican congress and the errors of
our treaties and our diplomacy, which have
stripped our fellow citizens of foreign birth
and kindred race, recrossing the Atlantic, of
the shield of American citizenship and have
exposed our brethren OF the Pacific coast to |
the incursions of race not sprung from the |
same great parent stock and In fact now late. .
ly denied citizenship by naturalization as
being neither accustomed to the traditions of |
a progressive civilization nor exercised in (
liberty under equal laws. We denounce the |
policy which thus discards the libertyloving
German and tOlerates the revival of the coolie .
trade in Mongolian women imported for I'M
moral purposes, and Monaghan men held to
perform servile labor contracts and demand .
such modification of the treaty with the Chi .
nese empire, or such legislation by congress
within constitutional Limitation as shall
prevent the further importation or lmmigra.
! ton of the Mongolian race.
FALSE pRETENsEs.
| Reform is necessary and can only be effect.
ed by making it the controlling Issue of the /
election and lifting 1t above the two false
issues with which the officeholding class and
the party in power seek to smother 1.-THE
false issue with which they would enkindle
sectarlan strife in respect to the public schools,
of which the establishment and support be-
long to the several states and which the
democratic party has cherished from their
foundation, and is resolved to maintain with
out partiallty or preference of any class sect,
or creed and without contributions from the
treasury to any; and the false issue by which
they seek to light anew the dying embers of .
sectional hate between kindred people once
unnaturally estranged, but now reunited on
one indivisble republic and common des-
tiny.
THE CIVIL SERVICE.
Reform is necessary IN the civil service.
Experience proves that an efficient, economi-
cal conduct of the government business is not
possible if its civil service be subject to
change at every election, be a prize fought
for at the ballot,box, be brief reward par
ty zeal, instead of posts of honor assigned for
proved competence, and held tor fidelity in
the public employ; that the dispensing of
patronage should neither be tax upon the
time of all our public men nor the instru-
ment of their ambition. Here again profess
IONS falsified in the performance, show that
the party IN power can work out no practical
and salutary reform.
GENERAL DEvILTRY DENOUNCED.
Reform is necessary even more IN the high
est grades of public vice,-president vice
president, judges, senators, representatives,
cabinet oficers,-these and all Others in au-
thorty are the peoples servants Their ofi-
ces are not private perQusite. They are
public trust. When the annals OF this repub-
lie show the disgrace and censure Of vice
president, a late speaker of the house OF rep
resentatves marketing his rulings as pre-
siding officer, three senators protitlng secretly
by their votes as lawmakers, five chajrmen
of the leading committees of the late house OF
representatives exposed in jobbery, late
secretary of the treasury forcing balances in
the public accounts, late attorney general
misappropriatlng public funds, secretary OF
the navy enriched or enrichng friends by
percentages levied off the profits OF contract
ors with his department, an ambassador TO
England censured in dishonorable specula-
tIon, the presidents private secretary barely
escaping conviction upon trial for guilty
completely IN frauds upon the revenue, a sec,
rotary of war impeacheG for high crimes ana
confessed msdemeanors, the demonstration
Is complete that the first step in reform must
he the peoples choice of honest men from
another party, lest the disease of one politl,
cal organization iniest the body polite, ana
lest by making no change of, men and party
we can get no change of measures and no re-
form. All these abuses wrongs and crimes,
the product of 16 years OF the ascendency OF
the republican party, create necessity Tor
reform confessed by republicans themselves;
but their reformers are voted down in conVeh-
ton and dlplaced from the cabinet, and the
partv's mass of honest voters are powerless to
resist its so 900 officers, its leaders and guides.