The Globe-republican. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1889-1910, 1891-01-21
MIR. INGALLS, SPEECH.
The Kansas Senator's Great Speech
For Free Coinage.
The Tyranny of Combined. Constituencies
and Incorporated Capital-Free Coinage
One Remedy-A Crisis That May Be-
come q Catastrophe.

In the Senate of the United States on
the 14th, pending consideration of the
financial bill, the question being upon
Senator Stewards free silver coinage
amendment, Senator Ingalls,, of Kansas,
addressed the Senate in favor of free
coinage. He spoke as follows:
Mr. President: Two portentous perils
threaten the safety, if they do not endanger
the existence, of the Republic The first OF
these is ignorant debased, degraded, spuri-
Gus and sophisticated suffrage; suffrage con-
tamnated by the sewage of decaying ma
tions; suffrage intimidated and suppressed
in the South; suffrage impure and corrupt,
apathetic and Indifferent, in the great cities
OF the North; so that it is doubtful whether
there has been for half century Presi-
Dental election in this country that ex-
pressed the deliberate and intelligent judg-
ment of the whole body of the American
people.
In newspaper interview a few months
ago in which / commented upon these con-
ditions, and alluded to the efforts of the ba-
Gill doctors of politics, the bacteriOlogists of
our system who endeavor to cure the ills un-
der which we suffer by their hypodermic in
jections of the lymph of Independent non
partisanship and the Brown Sequard elixir
OF civil service reform, said that "the puri-
fication of politics by such methods as this
was an irIdescent dream" Remembering
the cipher dispatches of 1877, and the at
tempted purchase of the electoral votes of
many Southern States in that campaign; the
forgery of the Morey letter in 1871, by which
Garfield lost the votes of three States in the
North, and the characterization and por-
traiture of Blaine and Cleveland and Har-
rson by their political adversaries, added
that "the golden rule and the decalogue had
no place in American political campaigns"
1t seems superfuous to explain, Mr.. Presi-
dent, that in those utterances was not in
culcating a doctrine, but describing condi-
tion. My statement was statement of facts
as understood them and not the announce
ment of an article of faith But many reyer-
end and eminent divines, many disintereSted
editors, many ingenious orators, perverted
those utterances into personal advocacy of
impurity in politics.
lido not complain, Mr.. President. 1t was,
as the world goes. legitimate political war
fare; but it was an illustration of the truth
that there ought to be publication in our
politics, and that the golden rule and the
decalOgue ought to have place in political
campaigns. "DO unto others as We would
that others should do unto you'' is the SUI
preme Injunction obligatory upon all. ''If
thine enemy smte thee upon one cheek turn
him the other" is Il sublime and lofty pre-
cept. But take this occasion to observe
that until it is more generally regarded than
it has been or appears likely to be in the
Immediate future, if my political enemy
smites me upon one cheek, instead of turn
ing to him the other I shall smite him under
the butt end of his left ear if can. Laugh
teri. If this be political immortality, am to
be included among the unregenerated.
FRAUD WORSE THAN VIOLENCE.
The election bill that was under consider
alton a few days ago was intended to deal
with one part of the great evil to which l
have alluded, but it was an imperfect,
partial and an incomplete remedy. ViO-
lence is bad, but fraud is no better, and it
is more dangerous, because it is more insd-
iOus. Burke said in one of those immortal
Orations that emptied the House of Com
mons, but which will be read with admira-
ton so long as the English tongue shall
endure, that when the laws OF Great Britain
were not strong enough to protect the hum
blest Hindoo upon the shores of the Ganges,
the nobleman was not safe in his castle upon
the banks of the Thames. Sir, that lofty
sentence is pregnant with admonition for
us. There can be no repOse, there can be no
stable and permanent peace in this country
and under this Government until it is just as
safe for a black Republican to vote in Mis-
siSsippi as if he were white Democrat in
Kansas.
THE TYRANNY OF COMBINED CAPITAL.
The evil, Mr.. President, the second to which
] adverted as threatening the safety if it
does not endanger the existence of the Re-
public, is the tyranny of combined, concen-
trated. centralized and Incorporated capital.
And the people are considering this great
problem now. The conscience of the Nation
is shocked 1t the injustice of modern society.
The moral sentiment of mankind has ID. en-
aroused at the unequal distribution of
wealth, at the unequal diffusion of burdens,
the benefits and the privileges of society. At
Al
American people have become profoundly
conscious that the ballot is not the panacea
for all the evils that afflict humanity, that it
has not abolished poverty nor prevented in
Justice. They have discovered that political
equality does net result in social fraternity;
that under 4 democracy the concentration
OF greater political power in fewer hands,
the accumulation and aggregation of greater
amounts of wealth in individuals is more
possible than under monarchy, and that
there Is tyranny which is more fatal than
the tyranny of kings
General Washington, the first President of
the Republic. at the close of his life in 1893
had the largest private fortune in the United
states of America. Much of this came by in
heritance, but the Father of his Country, in
addition to his other virtues, shining and il
lustrious, was a very prudent, saeaciouS,
thrifty and forehanded man. He knew
good thing when he saw it, great way off
He had keen eye for the main chance. As
surveyor in his youth he obtained knowl-
edge that enabled him to know exceedingly
well the value put upon the public domain.
The establishment of the National capital in
the immediate vicinity of his patrimonial
possessions did not diminish their value
He was a just debtor, but he was an exact, if
not eXactng, creditor. And SO it came to
pass that when he died he was. TO use the
expressive phraseology of the day the richest
man in the country.
GREAT CONTRAST
At this time, ninety years afterward, it is
not without interest to know that the entire
aggregate and sum of his earthly possessions
his estate, personal and Mixed Mount Yer
non and his lands along the Kanawha and
the Ohio, slaves, securities, all of his belong
ings-reached the sum total of between $780,
coo or 50 1900. This was less than century
ago. and it is within bounds to say that at
this time there are many scores of men, of
estates and of corporations in this country
whose annual income exceeds. and there has
been one man whose monthly revenue since
that pericf exceeded the entire accumula-
tions of tho wealthiest citizen of the United
States at the end of the last century. At that
period the social condition of the United
States was one of practical equality. The
statistics of the census of 1900 are incomplete
and partial, but the pOpulat ion of the Union