The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1889-07-31
SOME UNPUBLISHED GEMS.

Senator Voorhees, Bloomfield speech,
as geographically reported for and
printed exclusively in the Journal, is at
tracing general attention by reason of
its incendiary teachings and its wild and
reckless statements concerning the tariff.
Probably no man in public life has ever
gone so far in an open attempt to array
class against class and to intiame popu-
lar passions against law and order as
Mr.. Voorhees, did in this speech. Many
other Democratic speakers and free
trade orators have followed the same
line OF argument and suggested the same
ideas, but few, if any, have ever ex-
pressed them as boldly. The same is
true of the reckless misstatements con-
corning the operation and effect of the
tariff. This part of the TRADE was in
tended to fit in with the other, and in
order to do so it had to be very extreme.
In this regard, however, it differed only
in degree from the stock arguments and
assertions of free-traders. They all at
tempt to deceive and mislead the peo-
pie; the only difference is that Mr.. Voor-
hees out-Heroded Herod
The published portion of the Bloom
field speech did not present all it's strik-
ing points. After the short hand re-
pOrter's notes were written out the
speech was found to be incOnven-
iently long for the Journal to print in
full, and in order to bring it within
4
pages thus left out, and still in posses
sion of the Journal, contain a good many
gems in the way of argument and illus
tration quite equal to those printed. OF
course they do not appear in the Senti-
neFs pretended report of the speech.
Some of these are worth preserving.
Mr.. Voorhees, had a great deal to say
about plutOcracy. At the beginning
of his remarks on this subject, not
printed before, he said:
Unless the people rise and take this uues-
tion in their own hands. and strangle and
crush out the spirit of plutocracy, the day
is not far distant when you will work for
masters under different name. A plu-
tOcracy means a government by the naked
power of money; where a government Is
run and controlled by the earls, and
dukes, and lords of millions. while you
creep around between their colossal legs for
ignoble graves in which to be buried
AS definition of plutOcracy, that is
rather mixed, but probably the speaker
thought it was good enough for Greene
county. Possibly some of Mr.. Voor-
hees's listeners, more intelligent or In
quisitive than the rest, might have Won
dered whether the earls, and dukes,
and lords of millions included the
Paynes, Whitneys, SCOTS, Brices, and
other millionaire leaders Of the Demo-
cratic party, but nobody interrupted the
speaker, and be went on. Explaining
the operation of the tariff, he said:
You escape tax on what you dig out of
the ground. but when you go to the store,
for everything you buy there, whether
made in this country or abroad, you have
TO pay tariff tax that is charged into the
price of the goods. / say that that tariff
tax made that coat on your back or one
like it. cost you twice as much as it would
have done twenty-five years ago. or before
the war broke out.
Asanattempt to enforce the stock argu-
ment of free traders that ''the tariff is a
tax" this overshot the mark, for there was
not q man OF WODldu OIL age In the
audience who did not know that good
suit of clothes, or the material for it, for
either sex, can be purchased very much
cheaper now than before the war. And
what is more, good ready-made, all
wool suit of clothes can be bought in
this country to-day cheaper than in any
other country in the world. Coming
back to the plutocratic idea, the speaker
said:
One of the surcst signs, as given by Mr.
Froude, in his great sketch of Julius Ce-
sar of the overthrow and downfall of
Rome, was when il was found that the pa
trcians. the bondholders, the rich. the aris-
tocracy owned the lands, had mortgages on
them and bought them in, and the people
became tenants instead of owners in fee
simple. There is where you are drifting to-
day; drifting. drifting. and unless You, be-
fore il is too late. apply the majesty and
power of an Impoverished public will your
children will rise up when you are dead and
gone and reproach your memories
This was a gloomy picture to place be-
fore Greene county farmers. 1t is to be