The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-10-25
DEMocRACY's COMING DEFEAT.
why Cleveland Is Likely to Fail in Every
Northern State.

Northern state.
Nav y ork 50 Double -leaded Leader.)
1t will now be admitted by every candid Id and
close observer that the re&t'.sss election in Ohio
turned chiefly upon the question of protection
versus free trade, that issue having been pro-
iected with peculiar emphasis by the defeat of
Mr.. Hurd in a district which is wont to be over
whelmingly Democratic. No evasion of this pri-
mary and vital point in controversy between the
two great parties will henceforth be possible.
The great manufacturing industries, and the
millions of workingmen who depend on them
for their livelihood, are fully awakened to the
gravity of the impending crisis, and cannot be
cheated into using the ballot against their in
terests But if the great mass of artisans have
set their faces against changes which would in
evtably abrupt disocation of our in
dustrial system and a distressing fall of wages,
it will be impossible for Clevland to carry sim
gle Northern State.
The only Northern States in which the Demo
cratic party, weighted with a stoid gross, and
offensive candidate and discredited by the ag
gressive tiprotectionist attitude of its major
ity in Congress, has now any chance at all of
winning, are, of course. Indiana, New York,
New Jersey, and Connecticut Admitting for
the sake of argument that Cleveland will gain
the solid South, he must, to be elected, carry
the first two the last three of the four States
mentioned, Now, there is no reason to suppose
that the instinct OF self preservation VIII be q
whit less operative upon the large manufactur-
ing interests of Indiana than it proved the other
day in Ohio; while in Connecticut, New Jersey.
and New York, that instinct must, from the
nature of the case. be more intensely stimulated
and more decisively potent In every one of
these three States the industries that have been
fostered and shielded Oy the policy
of protection of American labor against
crushing competition by the greedy cap
ital and starving proletarat of Europe,
stand for a far larger fraction of the productive
energies and resources of the Commonwealth.
Such a change of our fiscal policy as the friends
of Mr. Morrison openly favored though they did
not think it feasible to eXtort compliance with
their full demands from Congress-such trans
formation of our tariff as Mr.. Hurd has been so
rudely disciplined by his constituents for advo
cating-would grievously disrupt and cripple
even States mainly agricultural like Ohio and
Indiana. and would even there drive tens of
thousands out of employment But in New
York wherea much larger proportion of the pop
ulation looks to factories and workshops for its
daily bread, the effect of repeal of the protect
i've tariff or of measures directly tending to the
dsavowal of its principle, would be vastly more
calamitous, while it would blast and paralyze
States distinctively manufacturing like New
Jersey and Connecticut
The conviction that the continuance and price
of the work whereby they live are at stake in
this election has naturally become fast-rooted
among the working masses in our manufacturing
States since the unwse course pursued ty the
majority of Democratic members in the last
Congress leveled deadly blow at all protected
industries No sooner indeed, was it made clear
to Connecticut artisans that the contest now
pending involves not merely preference for one
candidate over another, but the incomparahy
more momentous issue of upholding the emou-
ments and safeguards of American labor than
the shrewder Democratic managers ceased to
count seriously upon the adhesion of that State
Their organs have very little to say about Con-
nectcut We believe, however, that New Jer-
sey, in which they evince greater show of CON
fidenee, is almost as certain to disappoint them,
Even four years ago-in the last month
of HancOcks canvass-although up to that
time the free trade exhortations of
Frank Hurd had fallen on a Democratic caucus
like the voice of one crying in the wilderness a
vague foreboding seized the workshops of New
jersey, and the result was that HancOck's ma
ioritv was cut down to about 2 900 How then,
can any thoughtful man assign that State to
Cleveland, now that the faint misgivings of 1880
have been so grimly justified by the avowed in
tentions and unabasned endeavors of Mr. Nor
rison's co-workers in the House of Representa-
tivesl
1t is equally preposterous to assume that the
mighty manufacturing industries which have
peOpled aud enriched so many inland towns and
cities in the great State of New York can be for
Il moment blinded to the real issue in this can
vass. The skilled wOrkmen of our factories were
never so perfectly alive to their fundamental in
terests and nobody can gull them into commit
ting suicide Their votes will never pave the
way for foreign competition. And this means
that Cleveland will come down to Harlem Bridge
buried by men who will brook no tamperng with
the earnings and security of American labor un-
der an adverse majority so huge that no efforts,
however desperate, in the cities of New Yorz
and Brooklyn will avail to disinter the corpse