The daily morning Astorian. [volume] (Astoria, Oregon) 1883-1899, 1888-09-13

should not be allowed to use the rear OF
momentary stringency thus produced
to coerce public sentiment upon the
other questions. Closely connected with
the subject of the tariff is that of the
importation of foreign laborers under
contracts of service to be performed here.
The law now in force prohibiting such
contracts received my cordial support In
the senate. Such amendment as may be
found necessary to effectively deliver
our workingmen and women from this
inequitable form of competition will
have my sincere advocacy.
In the earlier years of our history pub
lie agencies to promote immigration
were common. The pioneer wanted a
neighbor with more friendly instincts
than the Indian, labor was scarce and
fully employed, but the day of the immi-
grafton bureau has gone by. While our
doors will continue open to proper imrli-
grafton, we do not need to issue special
invitations to inhabitants of other coun-
| tries to come over to our shores and
share our citizenship. Indeed the neces-
sity of some inspection and limitation is
| obvious. We should resolutely refuse to
| permit foreign governments to send
their paupers and criminals to our ports.
| We are also clearly under duty to defend
our civilization by excluding alien races
whose ultimate assimilation with our
people is neither possible or desirable. 4
The family has been the nucleus of our
best immigration, and the home the most
potent assimilation force in our ciyiliZa-
ton. The objections to Chinese immi-
grafton is now so generally accepted as
such that the question has passed entire
ly beyond the stage of argument. The
laws relating to this subject would,
l,l II l. Ak,aSr
ment, be faithfully executed. Such
amendments or further legislation as
may be necessary and proper to prevent
evaslons of the law and stop further
Chinese immigration would also meet my
approval.
Our civil compact i5 a government by
majorities, and the law loses its sanction
and magistrates our respect when this
compact in broken. Evil results of cleo
ton frauds do not expend themselves
upon voters who are robbed of their
rightful influence in public affairs. The
individual, or community, or party that
practices or connives at election frauds
has suffered irreparable injury, and will
sooner or later realize that an exchange
of the American system of majority rule
for minority control is not only unlawful
and unpatriotic but very unsafe for those
|
ment of single legal elector by fraud or
intimidation is crime too grave to be
regarded lightly. The right of every
qualified elector to cast free ballot, and
to have it honestly counted, must not be
questioned. Every constitutional power
should be used to make this right secure
to punish fraud upon the ballot. Our
colored people do not ask special legisla-
ton in their favor, but only to be made
secure in the common right of American
citizenship. They will, however, natu-
rally mistrust the sincerity of those par
ty leaders who appeal to their race for
support only in those localities where
suffrage is free and the election results
doubtful, and compass their disfranchise-
ment where their votes would be controll-
ing and their choice cannot be indorsed.
The nation not less than the states is
dependent for prosperity and security
upon the intelligence and morality of
the people. This common interest very
early suggested national aid in the estab-
lishment and endowment of schools and
colleges in the new states. There are, l
believe, present exigencies that cali for
still more liberal and direct appropria-
tiOns in aid of common school education
in the states, The territorial form of
government is temporary expedient,
not an experiment of civil condition. 1t
is adapted to the eXigency that is sug-
gested, but becomes inadequate and even
oppressive when applied to fixed and pop
ulous communities. Several territories
are well able to bear the burden and dis
charge the duties of free commonwealths
in the American union. To exclude them
is to deny the just rights of their people.
and may well excite their indignant pro-
| Nn of
ence of the people of a territory should
close against them the hospitable door
which has opened to two-thirds of the ex-
isting states, but admission should be
resolutely refused to any territory, q ma
jority of whose people cherish institQ-
tions that are repugnant to our ciyiliZa-
ton or inconstant to a republican form
of government.
A declaration against all combinations
of capital organized in trusts or other
wise, to control arbitrarily the condition
of trade among our citizens is in harmo-
nv with the views entertained and pub
licly expressed by me long before the as
sembling of the convention. Ordinarily
capital shares the losses of idleness with
labor, but under the operation of the
trust in some of the forms, the wage
worker alone suffers loss, while idle capi-
tai receives dividends and forms trust
fund. Producers who refuse to Join the
combination are destroyed and competi-
tion as the element of prices is elimina-
ted. 1t cannot be doubted that legisla-
five authority can and should find method
of dealing fairly and effectively with
these and other abuses connected with
this subject.
It can hardly be necessary for me to
say that / am heartily in sympathy with
the declaration of the convention on the
subject of pensions to our soldiers and
sailors. What they gave and what they
had suffered 1 had some opportunity to
observe and in a small measure to eYpe-
rience. They gave unhesitatingly. 1t
was not trade but an offering. The
measure was heaped up and running
over. What they achieved only distant
generations can adequately tell without
attempting to discuss particular por-
tions. / may add that a measure in be-
half of surviving veterans of war and of
the families of their dead comrades
should be conceived and executed in a
spirit of Justice and of the most grateful
liberaiity, and that.in the competition
, for civil appointment honorable military
/, service should have appropriate recog-
milton. The law regulating app1int-
ments to the classified civil service re-
ceived my support in the senate III the
belief that it opened way to much
, needed reform. l still think SO, and
/. therefore cordially approve the clear and
forcible expression of the convention Oh
, the subject.