The Labor enquirer., 1884-08-23
DENVER, COLO, AUGUST %, 1884.

rule, which required mans vote to be cast
against his conscience and Judgment, in
spite of his protest by others, and days in
trying to settle the internal dssensions of
the machine politics Of a single state, but it
could give thirty minutes only to the dis
cussion of principle for the government Of
the nation. | therefore could substantially
present but one plank, the most important
of all, the protection of the American laborer
and producer, without which, in my judg-
nent, there can be Is t8s
NO PROSPERITY TO THIS COUNTRY.
And this was voted down in the conven-
ton by q vote Of 712 to 81.
i felt it but right to warn the convention,
however nnimportant such warning might
SEEM Of the course of my duty If such vote
was passed against the werkingmen and
women ofthe country, for whose welfare it
was well known had stood from my earli-
est manhood. The notice was in this emf
phatic language: 'sIfyou refuse to stand
by the wsrkingmen, God help you, / can
not" In this there was no mistake. Mr..
Watterson of Kentucky, who followed me,
took warning, saying the party would look
to God for help, but the scripture saith, "the
prayer of the wicked availeth not" It was
due to myself not to adopt the course which
certain pure-minded, and upright, and
highly moral politicians deem it proper to
pursue, take part in the proceedings of q
convention to its end, and then, without
giving any notice to anybody and without
protesting, refuse to support its doings.
have thus given asuccinct, as it must be,
but a faithful account of my connection
with the Chicago convention and its action
on the matters which was charged to pre-
sent to it by the National Greenback labor
party, the Anti Monopoly organization, and
the Democracy of. Massachusetts,. n
Twill not omit the fact that in the plat
form adopted there were certain sweet
zen. There were certain honeyed words,
over and over repeated, in order that their
repetition might seem like earnest advocacy
put in favor of labor, and upon some of the
topics of our platform. But do claim, and
submit to the Just judgment of the people,
that comparing the two platforms and TAX
ing the action of the convention, every
claim of the anti-monopolist, and Of the
National Greenback and Labor men, was so
contemptuously rejected or so thoroughly
smothered by platitudes which would per-
init any financial theorist or any monopo-
list to subscribe to, the majority platform,
that it is most apparent on the face of the
resolutions that they were simply resolu-
tions of expediency to catch votes by indi-
rection, deception, and allusion, not declar-
atoms of those high principles which should
form the basis Of the united action of
....,. GREAT PARTY OF THE PEOPLE.
The country has had no experience for
nearly quarter of a century of what the
Democracy would do ifthey had the power,
so that the people are obliged to require the
most explicit pledges from them of intended
action before we can put the government in
their hands But the farmer and the labor
ing man do know that a Democratic house
of Representatives has just appropriated
more money raised by taxation than any
other house of representatives has ever ap-
propriated in time of peace. We also know
that the Democratic majority would have
made a>free- trade tariff, containing all the
odious features of the present war tariff, SO
far as regards its monstrous inequalities, by
horizontal reduction Of the tariff to break
down very many rising and struggling in
dustries, and destruction of the homes OF
our workingrnen and the home markets OF
the American producers.
Who does not know that the very fear oi
the actiou of the Democracy in congress has
so paralyzed American enterprise and bust
ness that mills are everywhere closing, mines
shut up, furnaces blown out, and every kind
of employment SO curtailed that the ne
chanic and workingmen are not earning
enough to support life in comfort, so that
the farmer even, deprived of home mar
ket, and crushed down by discriminating
rates of transportation, finds his corn, wheat
and wool lower than it has been within the
present generation. Can the people there
fore trust the machine Democracy with
power, upon a shifting, evasive and decep-
tive platform
WE KNOW THE REPUBLICANS.
Tie country has had experience in Re-
publican party rule for twenty-five years,
and know its results. Wetherefore have no
need to look at its platform, for "by their
fruits ye shall know them"
The Republican party in its inception was
emphatically the party of the people. 1t
had in it substantially neither monopolist
nor capitalist. 1t was as poor as was the
convention Of delegates who framed the
Declaration of Independence. Taking out five
men, the rest could hardly pay their board bills
The Republican party was formed upon a
grand and noble idea, to do for enc class Of
Workingmen what the Democratic party
even under Jefferson and Jackson, had
failed to do. Their Democracy. dealt only
with the white man. The Democracy OF
the Republican party dealt with the black
man, and aimed to give him freedom and
equal rights. For that purpose and that
alone, was that party formed. 1t was the
radical party, and so radical party of the
people, that the iaristocratic part of the
Whig party, the old adversaries of Democ'
racy of the days of Jackson, merged them,
| selves in the Democracy without drop o.
| Democratic blood, as they hoped, in theil
| veins, or thought for the people, except as
| the lower classes in their party, and such o.
them as quarter of century has spared
are found with the Democracy of to-day
largely guiding its councils in the manner
/ we have seen. - t#'- 80 - =,
The necessity of money to carry on the
i war drew all the bankers and capitalists
i into the Republican party. The immense
/ fortunes, almost necessarily growing out q
| the vast expenditures Of the war, fell into
the hands Of men who attached themselves
to the party that fed them as the iron i!
| attracted to the magnet, and monopollzec
| industries and enterprises
The necessity to bind together the Eastern
| and Western shores of the republic by
methods of quick transportation, giving
| reason for great subsidies, granted to make
three systems of railroads across the con
I tinent with all their branches and feeders
| ..ootod ,.,ooIth in corpOratiOns and lndlYld