People's voice. [volume] (Wellington, Sumner County, Kansas) 1890-1917, 1892-07-08

pldUlOIul MdS duOpltu'
Fourteen hundred delegates and
5000 other persons shouted till they
were dizzy,
What they shouted for was:
The union Of labor forces.
Wealth for him who creates it!
A national currency as a tender for
debts public and priyate-and no
manipulation Of it by banking cor
pOratiOnS.
a free and unlimited coinage of sill
yer.
Fifty dollars per capita as a money
supply
A graduated income tax.
Economic administration!
Postal savings bank
Prohibition Of the alien ownership
of land.
Government control of railroads.
telegraph and telephone systems.
The destruction of sectional lines.
And it was an hour before Chair
man LOuckS, of South Dakota, got
even a Semblance of order.
1t happened at three o'clock or
about that time. The delegates were
tired of waiting for the return
of the committee on resolutions.
The audience was noisy. Some one
wanted to nominate a president, but
it was evident that a candidate for
the presidency would not be nOmi-
mated until there was a platform fer
him to stand on. The glec clubs
sang. The people kept crowdi. = in.
The hammer of the chairman Nas NJ
more needed than the rumble of the
cable cars without. The sergeant-at-
arms tried in vain to clear the aisleS.
1t was insuiferably hot and the sun
Streamed in the windows on the taw-
dry bunting and the earnest faces of
the delegates.
At length a sudden vigor came to
the lungs of the chairman.
THE committee on resolutions are
ready to report" he bawled.
The men heard. There was a hush.
In moment the vast hall was still.
The committee on resolutions stood
behind the chairman.
Caydor, Of California, read the pre-
amble. At every familiar and reso-
nant sentence of that notable dOcu-
ment the cheers that attested to its
Endorsement came forth from that
multitude of Threats. And when the
sentence equal rights to all persons.
whether men or women" broke upon
the convention, a storm of applause
showed that the Peoples party was
not unmindful of the fact that half
the brains and more than half the el-
oQuence was with their women. Mrs.
Lease and the other leaders of that
determined SiSterhoOd of the Alliance
waved their handkerchiefs from the
platform, and the delegates, standing
on their chairs, sent out a cheer that
other women, hoeing in Nebraska DO
tatoe fields, miles away, might almost
have heard.
There were few slight variations
in the preamble, but it was only in
phraseOlOgy, not in idea. And the
platform itself stood as it was built
in st. Louis.
But the women, who had heard
equality before the law mentioned as
a part of the principle of the party.
found no plank for suffrage put in il,
This did nOtdaunt their ardor. They
were patriots before they were suf.
fragists. They helped to swell the
cheer that rose, and ebbed and rose
again. Spontaneous, electrifying. al.
most menacing, deep from the lungs
1t came. 1t had none of the qualities
that mark the enthusiasm of the old
parties. 1t did not even have the
ring of triumph. 1t was the shout Of
desperate men who were marching n
battle, and who, though uncertain of
the outcome, We're prepared to fight
and fall by what they considered
right. No hired claQue was there "a
stretch the sinking applause out to a
desirable length. Irresistible as the
shrleK OF pain that follows long and
silent torture was this terrible cheer
OF the men who were in that conyep.
tlon for an idea. 1t was the spirit Of
16. These men were not concerned
with office. They were interested in
ethics. They were not shouting be.
cause they hoped for spoils. They
were crying for liberty to work and tc
win the natural results of toll. They
were asking for right to live. New.
er before in the history of this coun.
TRY have so many men stood side BY