River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1880-10-28
SECRETARY SHERMAN.
His Able and Exhaustive
Speech at Milwaukee.
The Putrid Democratic Party
Stripped of Its False Pre-
lenses.
A Clear and Concise Statement Of
the Difference Between the
Two Parties
The Pernicious Doctrine of State
Rights The Resumption OF
Specie Payments.

delivered by Secretary John Sherman to
an immense audience gathered at Schlitz
Park. Milwaukee. October 18th:
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN-Eirst of all
allow me to return to you and through
you to your fellow citizens in Wisconsin
my heartfelt and grateful acknowledgment
for day of unusual happiness to me, for
the cordial and hearty greeting of friends
though strangers to me all. 1t seemed as
| entered the state of Wisconsin and visit
ed the beautiful town of Racine, that the
people around me were not like strangers,
that | was not in a strange land, but in the
midst of cordial and hearty friends And
as | came to this great and beautiful city
of Milwaukee, with its 10000 people,
when saw the greetings in the streets and
the great crowds that are filling the streets,
along with the vast procession, and when /
come here and meet this vast audience, /
feel that | am not in a strange land but at
home here among you. l know that this
cordial and hearty greeting does not come
from any personal cause. 1 am to you
stranger. NV face is unknown to you, but
the bond of sympathy that rests between
us is that both alike are in favor Of honest
plenty of both. IGreat applause As
Gov. Smith has said, you early took your
position that the only way to pay debt
was to pay it. Applause. The only
way to bring about the resumption of
specie payment was to prepare for it, and
when the time came, to make the dollar
of paper money in the laborer's
hand equal to the dollar OF gold coin, and
that every means should be adopted to
strengthen the public credit. to lower the
rate of interest and to decrease the public
debt. In other words, honesty among ma
tions as well as among individuals was the
best policy. Great applause. Now
know that the best return | can make to
you for your cordial greetings, is by a
plain and simple statement of the condi-
ton of political affairs in this country, and
of some of the public measures that have
brought our present state of prosperity.
lou know that / am a republican, belong
ing to the greet republican party of the
United States. | know that there has
been and that there isa division Of opin-
ion not only here in Milwaukee, but
throughout the country, among the Amer
lean people who have divided themselves
into two great political parties | admit in
the outset that the great mass of these par
ties, the great mass of the men, women
and children who compose them-honest
women and children-are very apt to fol-
low their brothers, fathers and sweet
hearts. | admit that the great body are
honest, good people, DESTROYS of promot-
ing common good and general welfare.
No party can set itself up above the other
in morality or national feeling. Both are
honest, but these two parties are
SEPARATE WIDE FROM EACH OTHER.
The American people are divided into
these two parties. We must ascertain, If
we can, the reason of this division and see
what measures or what condition of affairs
separate them. and come, if we can, at
the real groundwork Of this difference of
opinion. | intend to spend few mo-
ments in pointing out to you the broad dl-
viding line between these two national
parties and to make ii 50 plain that you
can see my meaning, to show there Is a
governing issue that divides them, not de-
pending upon passing questions of the day
that will disappear with this election, but
issues that commenced at the beginning
of the government and will continue as
long as this government lasts. WHAT is
that difference? 1t is an honest difference
of opinion as to the nature and frame
work of the national government. The
republicans of the United States believe
this is a national government with power
to make laws vested in congress, with
power to construe laws vested in courts,
with power to execute laws vested in the
president of the United States. We
believe that this government is supreme
in all the great essential powers of Il ma
tional government to commit to it by the
people of the United States. We believe
it reaches It's broad hand to every citizen of
the United States without regard to state
lines and that is the duty of the national
government to protect every man, woman
and child, however poor, whether poor or
rich, however humble or lowly, in all the
rights of American citizenship. Great
applause We believe there is no man
too rich or too lofty in this country to
annul the national authority. All must
obey it. Great applause.
There is no man so humble or lowly,
but what the national authority must re-
spect his rights and see that they are pre-
served. [Great applause.
The tendency Of the republican ideas is
to elevate our nation, to advance our coun-
try higher and higher among the score of
nations, to make this powerful great re-
public of fifty millions of free people,
soon to become one hundred millions,
now already the most powerful nation Ill
the world; rich in boundless resources,
rich in liberty, rich in independence, rich
in free thought, every man equal 70 each
other, and each the master of himelf, hav-
ing the right to cast one vote and no more.
Great applause.
The tendency of republican measures is
to strengthen this national government.
In the last twenty years our government
has advanced from the feeble confederacy
existing before the war to a
GREAT AND POWERFUL NATION.
with an army and navy, small II Is true,
but with country and a people strong
enough behind that little army and navy
to make all the world respect us. Great
applause On the other hand, the ideas
and tendency of the democratic party is to
belittle TO degrade, to cripple the patton
al government, to subordinate the nation
al government to the power of states. In
other words, the idea is that the state of
South Carolina is bigger man than Uncle
Sam; that feeble state may by public
action, by fraud by violt ice or law con-
troll and imperil and tie up the power of
this government of ours. Their effort is
to belittle the national government, TO re-
duce it to the ablect condition 1t was In
during the time Of James Buchanan,
when that poor old man, at the beginning
| of the war, said. Secession was all wrong,
but there is no power in the government to
put it down" Laughter That was
| his idea. Now, my countrymen, what
was the origin of this? This difference OF
| opinion does not fairly grow out of ques-
| tion of the construction of the constitution
| but grows out of what is sometimes called
| in politics the resolutions of Kentucky
and virginia in 1898 At that time there
was great political dispute between
parties that have Eow no existence. The
| democratic party. or rather il was called
the republican party in those days, by the
| Kentucky resolutions or the Virginia res
| olutions resolved that this government
| this national government, was compact
between states, each equal to each other
| and that the constitution was nothing but
the form OF government agreed upon by
| the states-as states created this govern
ment so states might DESTROY it. In other
| words their idea was the idea of the reso
! lutions of l79S, that this was a new con
/ fedsracv Of states. an agreement made be
| tween states permitting the government
/ and when one OF the states disregarded the
/ terms Of this agreement, that it alone had
/ the power to iudge-that is as the state
| joined in making this government 1t could
! join in destroying it. So thus this govern
ment was government of states. We on
I the other hand believed with Chief JUS
/ tiee Marshall, one Of the most exalted
names in history, that this was a govern
ment Of the people, made by the people
supreme among the people, that would
disregard stale lines or 70 use the more
| homelv language of Abraham Lincoln, q
name that will live a. long n the name Oi