New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1888-06-07
TIE NOMINATION.,


heard in hearty thanks to Grover Cleveland.
| They thank him most sincerely for imposing
mon his party set of convictions. 1t does
not matter here whether he meant to do any
such thing. or whether his motives for what
he did were high or selfish; the fact remains
that he has nailed the free-trade flag to the
mast In order to make his nomination in
eyitable, he sent to Congress a message which
possibly not one of the shrewder leaders Oh
his party would have advised, though nine
tenths of them have gone quite as far IN ap-
proving the Mills bill. They would have
realized, as he probably did not, that the bill
could have been misrepresented much more
easily than the message Going as FAR 1t still
left more room for Sinking and evasion.
Having committed himself to the free-trade
cause enunciating free-trade principles IN the
broadest and truest sense, Mr. Cleveland also
served the country well in making himself the
inevitable candidate Of party which Tor nifty
years has lodged the tariff issue just as lar
as it possibly could while making war on
Protection at every vote. For once thanks to
| MIR. Cleveland, the actual beliefs and purposes
of the Democratic party have become the issue
upon which it must stand or fall.
THE TRIBUNE wastes no time in processing
| to regard Mr.. Cleveland as a weak candidate.
| Morally he is weak. Intellectually he IS weak.
| In executive blunders, in the selection Of bad
men for Office even when he knew them to be
| bad he is weak. In his hypocrtical pro-
| LESSONS of REFORM which his whole course as
| President has contradicted, he is weak. These
things would have made him n weak candidate
if the fanaticishn of free trade were not more
powerful with q large class Of voters than
regard for personal fitness, personal integrity
or genuine reform. In making himself the
champion Of free trade, Mr.. Cleveland has gone
behind the hollow and false professions of So
| called reformers to the purposes which they
have tried to hide and to the convictions which
they have cloaked with phrases about tariff
| reform" He was right. The pretended re-
formers with one accord declare that they
cannot support any Republican however
worthy, against Grover Cleveland, however
false he has been to the cause of Civil Service
Reform. They care nothing for his moral
unfitness, nothing for his proved insincerity,
nothing for his bad appointments, nothing for
his Identification with the basest elements in
his party they care only for the cause of free
trade, of which he has become the
champion.
|
billions and the ignorance of one man have
| been overruled to serve a high and patriotic
| cause, and to lift nation to a nObler life,
" He maketh the wrath of man to praise Him."
The selfish ambition of Southern leaders
brought abolition of slavery, and Mr.. Cleve-
| lands anxieties to cripple all opposition within
| his party, and to force an issue in the presence
| of which his personal unftness and his eXecu-
tive errors should be forgotten or rendered Of
| secondary Importance, have prepared the way
for the final triumph of protection to home
industry. Whether that triumph is 20 come
| after four years of industrial depression, the
result of Democratic victory, or at the next
election, depends upon the intelligence of
voters. But come it will, without crushing
| experience under Democratic government or
| with it, Let it be frankly admitted too, that
| President Cleveland did not know how far he
| was going in his message. Phrases in that re-
markabe paper show that he supposed him
self to be taking new and original ground as
| Protective Free Trader-the great discoverer
| Of the principle that the objects OF protection
could only be secured by legislation on free
trade principles There also, he serves the
country as a schoolmaster. Thousands know
now, who did not six months ago, that free
trade means tariff framed with intent to
protect as little as possible-to remove as far
as possible the barrier against foreign COM
petition.
Mr. Cleveland has kindly added to his
message, first, shameful abuse OF executive
power to bride or force through Congress a
free-trade bill; and second, the selection of
Mr.. Thurman an old-fashioned Democrat OF
the Bourbon Free Trade type, as his associate
on the ticket. With his assent his closest
friends in convention conspired to make the
National platform evasive where the President
himself had been uncompromising Possibly,
with his assent, the Mills bill may be emascu-
lated in caucus, so that the Presidents phrases
may be interpreted in more cvasive sense.
For Oregon serves notice, just in time, that
free wool means loss of 2400 votes on
total OF $4,000, even On the Pacific Coast
The significant victory won by Republicans
in that State, in spite Of Democratic labors and
lavish expenditure Of money, will help to guide
the Republican party to wise decision. But
nothing that the President or his party can do