, 1888-09-06
STRAIGHT TALK.
Col. Villas Opens the Campaign
in Wisconsin
And Addresses a Monster
Audience in Milwaukee.
A Few Pointers on Republican
Jobbery.

MILWAUKEE, Sept. 5.-Col. VIM. f.
Villas, secretary Of the interior, opened
the Democratic campaign in Wisconsin
tonight with a speech at West Side
Turner hall. The Juneau, Jefferson and
Jackson clubs. representing the political
organizations of three divisions of the
city, escorted him to the hall where there
was al audience of about 1,5CO people.
He spoke as follows:
After referring to the duty of voters
and challenging criticism of President
Clevelands administration, he said: II
invite you to contrast the conditions, prin-
ciples and professions ofthe opposing par
ties in this contest, and the promise of
the future afforded by them respectively.
What is the Republican party of to day,
and wherein is it better or more worthy Of
confidence than it was in 1884? 1t was
in the beginning more of a popular upris-
ing than a political party. 1t found its
origin and quickening power in the high
appealof Justice and tenderness for human
brethren in oppression and in the honest
zeal of deep conviction its following was
well nigh fanatical. 1t was a crusade
against a great national sin and it fell
upon a time appointed of heaven for the
publication OF republicanism by fire. Like
a whirlwind it swept its course of de-
struction, though the wholesome violence
within the decade of evil which had en-
gendered its being was more than de-
stroyed and the land was strewn with a
mighty wreck where In fantastic chaos lay
states, constitutions and the people amid
| Tho wtla- Aunu havoc Of Tbot ,r,,
the logical period of the party's exist
ence.
1t stood upon, or possessed, no doc
trlne OF government; no principles for the
guidance of Institutions of freedom in
the repose of peace. 1t was not national,
but sectional-a party Tor civil war, not
for national fraternity. But the heart of
the victorious people was in its grasp and
the rage of war was long unspent 1t
was the opportunity of opportunities TOR
the political freebooter, and never for
one moment did they suspend their efforts,
nor even spare the exhausted people.
Upon one pretext and another, from al
most he earliest grasp of Republican
dominion, corruption began its work, and
schemes for the dishonest enrichment of
the few to prevail. 1t was in 1862, that
pursuing the sentiment that national de-
tense required a lranscontlnental highway,
the Pacific railroad legislation begun, and
in 1864 with unrelenting ingenuity it was
so amended to diabolical perfection that
the government really built the roads and
gave them, with land enough for an EN-
| pire to the successful corporations.
| Then also at the earliest time, acts
for levying taxes were passed, and after
ward with a greed that heightened with
each new gluttony, every revenue measure
was perverted and distorted by ingenious
touches, imperceptable to any but a prac-
ticed eve, by which private tribute was
extorted from the people five times
greater than the tax that went to the
treasury. Then 1t was that that mon
strous vampire hidden in the tariff which
seductively fans with wings of protection
the laborer whose hearts blood it sucks,
was begotten in sin to rob the toiliug pro-
ducers in the fields and forests of the
wealth they create, and when the war had
ceased a great people with its Golfers I'm
locked and its exposed lay before
the spoiler, while in the exhaustion of the
struggle and heat of rage the national
guardianship was gone. Their followed
such a scene of national wealth by various
devices so rapacious, so gigantic, so ingen-
ious in the methods by which the grasp
was laid os has never been exhibited in
history.
Nothing is comparable to it but India
under Warren Hastings. Other nations
have been despoiled by c~onquerersi in
open force of unlicensed conquest. This
people was robbed by the devilish manip-
~ulation of its own legislation and the
emergencies of the administration in the
hands of its unnoSo friends.
Secretary Villas then referred to the
corruption In public contracts, touching
upon the partnership of Grant & Ward,
to the custom house scandals under the
valuations on imports, the navy Jobs, and
star route contracts, and declared that
these and other things of like character
had driven the best men In the Republ-
can party out of it. Sumner, Chase,
Trumbull and Beecher. He declared that
the only policy of the only branch Of the
government remaining Republican since
1884 the senate-was comprised in two
words, obstruction and misrepresentation,
as to everything for the general good, and
he instanced the tardy confirmation of
Chief Justice Fuller, the rejection of the
fisheries treaty and the delay in passing
the restriction bill asked for by President
Cleveland.
Returning to the Democratic party the
| speaker said: In the department of state
you find everywhere the national dignity
has been maintained. the national rights
protected aud the republic in peace and
good will with all the powers of the earth
save only rs Republican obstruction leaves
us. If you take the treasury, its guard
iansbip of our financial interests com
mands respect on every hand. The col
~lections of internal revenue Cor the fiscal
year 1885 (the last Republican year, were
$ll2,0 900, 900; for 1886 (Cleveland's first