Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1889-07-13
THE B00LE PATTY.
The Republican Presidential Campaign
Last Year was One of Corruption,
Pure and Confessed.
Mr.. Wanamakers Confession of His Participa-
ton as an Agent for the Collection of
Campaign Funds for Matthew Quay.

The late article in the Forum by Sena-
tor Edmunds is interesting and signifi-
cant, both on account of its substance
and its author. Mr.. Edmunds stands at
the very center whence radIate directly
the powerful influences which obstruct
reform and perpetuate abuses. He is a
member of the United States senate, the
very stronghold of monopoly. He is a
chieftain of the party which champions
monopoly and is sustained by monopoly.
He is also understood to maintain per-
sonal and professional relations with some
of the most powerful corporations in the
country, and thus to enjoy senatorial
law practice, the profits of which are out
of all proportion to the legal salary of
his office If, therefore, any man in
America can be fairly supposed to know
the sources, as well as the extent of po
liticaI corruption, Senator Edmunds is
that one.
But, like all highly informed persons,
he is moderate and modest in his state
ments. The estimate which he makes,
that not less than five mill
ions of dollars were eXpend-
ed by campaign managers in
the last presidential election is certainly
not eXtravagant. Both parties doubtless
raised and used more money than ought
ever to be required in such a contest.
But the So 900 ZOO estimate would not
begin to cover the expenditures of the
monopoly party alone. On that side the
campaign was one of pure and confessed
corruption. 1t was scarcely pretended
that it was anything else. The vast funds
were raised-not by popular subscription,
not from the contributions of citizens of
moderate means, not even from rich men
of various classes and avocations, but
from one class alone, namely, the mil
lionaire monopolists deriving enormous
revenues from so-called protected enter
prises.
Their opportunities for public extortion
having been created and being main
tanned by tariff system in their interest
alone, and against all the country be-
sides, they very prudently and no doubt
very eagerly subscribed q reason
able proportion of their unjust
gains in order to insure continuance of
them in the future as in the past.
And this is exactly the situation of
which we have been warned by every
thoughtful statesman since the founda-
ton of the government-the general de-
bauchery of elections and the wide
spread corruption of the legislature,
which must necessarily and inevitably
arise from an alliance of powerful ma
tional party with favored class of busi-
ness interests. Until that alliance shall
be broken, and that connection
completely severed, every general politi-
cal conflict must be simply a struggle, on
Of hoA nj
to hold the privileges which enrich them,
and, on the other, of the people at large
to recover their rights, their freedom in
business and trade, and to protect their
earnings from the grasp of the plunderer.
The opposition TO that party of monopoly
is, therefore, and must ever be, the
party, and the only party, OF protection
to American labor, or of encouragement
to American industry. 1t was because
the last presidential election was such q
contest, between the protected few and
the taxed many, that the protected few
poured out their money in volumes so
Unprecedented, and it was because it was
such n contest that so much money was
required.
Then this is the simple explanation of
those tremendous combinations of
wealthy monopolists, such as the Amer
lean tariff league, the Home market
club of New England and the Manufac-
turers' club of Philadelphia, to raise
money out of their own pockets, to
extort it from the pockets of others, to
concert measures of intimidation and de-
ception, applied to their own working
men, and to sustain promptly and I'M
scrupuIously the daring managers of
unsavory reputation who had engaged TO
carry the election, if, in the language of
John Wanamaker, they chad the
money -
1t goes without saying that these men,
having entire possession of the Federal
ist-Republican party, knew perfectly
well that they could never get an honest
verdict from theAmerican people in behalf
OF their obnoxious abuses, and that they
could get none at all except by purchase
more or less direct. All their arrange
ments-their open and notorious COM
binations among Observation-Disclosures
their full consciousness of the fact. But
the freedom with which they confessed it
in their correspondence and in their cir
culars, showed that they had not the
slightest fear of the independent spirit of
the American people; that they believed
that money could accomplish anything if
there was only enough of it; and that the
attempt, however plain or however ex-
posed, might be made with impuuity
Their nominee for president was notori-
ously the candidate of the Pacific rail-
road corporations. Their nominee for
vice-president was Levi P. Morton, and
when his name is recorded enough is said
about him. Mr.. ingalls,, in his letter to
member of the convention, stated with
the utmost distinctness his opinion that
neither personal character in the nom
inees, nor any pretense of political prin-
ciples in the platform, would count for
anYthing at all His reliance was ex-