Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1886-10-29
IN IN THE FIELD.
HON. EUSTA GIBSON OF ". VA
AND LT-GOVERNOR MASSEY
ADDRESS The PEOPLE.

The Courthouse presented an unusual
appearance last Monday; the floor and gal
leries were filed with white men. The
occasion was call for meeting OF the
people of the county to hear addresses by
Hon. Eustace Gibson of West Va. and 1t.
Governor Massey. Charles Grattan, ESQ.,,
of Waynesboro, introduced Mr.. Gibson to
the audience and alluded to the fact that
though now citizen of the daughter State
he was native Of. and commenced public
life in, the old mother State of Virginia.
REMARKS OF MR.. GIBSON.
Mr.. Gibson expressed his pleasure at
meeting Virginia audience again and
especially an audience composed of the
citizens of the staunch Democratic county
of Augusta. He alluded to the fact that
from 1866 to 1871 be had been in public
life in this State, and in that time had
never failed to lift his voice for the cause
of Democracy. He had now travelled here
from his home on the Ohio to give what
aid he could in the great fight they were
waging in behalf of that same Democracy,
and to aid In the election of member of
i. the 50th congress, who he knew would
serve his c0d,i issy WELL (Applause.)
WHERE THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY
STANDS NOW.
In this campaign the questions areS Oil
national and not local. He was not here
to denonnce anybody nor to speak of the
part any had taken in local issues of the
past; but to speak to them in behalf of a
fair consideration of the public questions
at issue and to ask their vote upon them.
After twenty years of struggle, against
one hundred thousand Federal Office hold
ers, and the Federal administrations them
selves, the Democracy had succeeded, and
now for the first time the banner of the
party floats over the country and Dem
GRAFT sits in the Presidential chair. ZAP
plause.) Once more, at last, the Ameri-
can people are united in fact. (Applause.)
We have the Executive and the lower
House of Congress, but unfortunately
there remains Republican Senate to
block us IN our measures for reform. Vir-
ginia voters cannot by their votes at this
election affect the Senate, but they can by
the result of their votes give encourage
ment to those in other States who will
have the choice of Senators. In West
Virginia, his own State, they would at
this election choose a legislature which
will elect Senator and they proposed to
elect Democratic legislature and also
sweep the congressional field clean by get
ting solid Democratic delegation. Zap
plause.
THE CHANGE IN THE REPUBLICAN
PARTY.
It was needless to tell his hearers, he
said. that they were not now fighting the
Republican party that first took control of
the Nation. Its leaders like Sumner,
Lincoln, Doolittle, Trumbull and the
other great men of its history. were in
their graves and many of it's other great
men have gone into the Democratic ranks.
At the National Convention of that party
which nominated Lincoln they adopted
platform for honest government, the re-
duction of taxation, and the preservation
public domain. How that platform
'een departed from, history tells
y ent in Republicans hands
2: the taxes collected
sen fabulous in
a.. domain has been
vots - corporations by
the M, The land intended
for the selves, and to give
cheap hoL the country should
become THU . -ss led. has been voted to
rapacious railroad corporations. Both
great political parties pledged themselve
in 1884, at Chicago, to recover this public
land which Is now wrongfully held from
the people, and yet when Democratic
House of Representatives passed bills
eonfiscating one hundred millions of it,,
which the railroads held, the Republican
Senate shelved the bills which coniscated
sixty-five millions Of it, and would only
let about fifty millions be retu rned to the
people.
WHERE THE REPUBLICANS HAVE LEFT
THE LABoRING MEN.
The Republican party has boosted Of
what it has done for the laboring men.
Well, here is what it has done! After
twenty years of Republican rule the labor
ing men Of the country had to put their
hands in their pocket and take out $4,000
to pay the expenses of the convention of
knights of Labor at Richmond last week
"a convention they were forced to call to
- devise means to get such wages as would
Keep starvation from their doors. And
this is the result of twenty years of Re-
publican rule! Was there ever any such
thing heard of in America IS tramp be-
power; was it ever known under Demo-
cratic government that an honest work
ingman had to take TO the road and tramp
in order to obtain the work he was will
ing to do, but could not get to dol ZAP
plause
POLITICAL NAVY.
When the civil war ended, the go vern-
ment had six hundred war vessels of all
kinds afoat. To-day there are seventeen
European powers that have better navies
than the United States. Even the China.
men with one of their two great war ships
can come up to within ten miles of New
York and anchor there and lombard the
town, and there is no navy to prevent
them. The American navy has been used
as an election machine for paying Repub-
lican election expenses. When Malone
was king in Virginia, vessel was sent to
Norfolk for repairs. 1t took eight
years and seven months and 100000 ex-
penditure to repair her. (Applause.) An
other ship was sent to California to repair
and it took twelve years and seven months
to finish the job at an expenditure OF