Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1892-07-28
MIR. CLEvELAND'S SPEECH.

|
last week. He responded as follows
Mr.. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN :
The message you deliver from the
National Democracy arouses in me
emotions which would be well nigh
overwhelming if / did not recognize
here assembled the representatives OF
great party who must share with
me the responsibility your mission
invites. find much relief in the
reflection that | have been selected
merely to stand for the principles
and purposes for which my party
stands and for the enforcement of
the supremacy of which all who have
any right 10 claim Democratic fellow
ship must constantly and persistently
labor. Our party responsibility is
indeed great. We assume moment
Gus obligation to our countrymen
when in return for their trust and
confidence we promise them rectiti-
cation of their wrongs and better
realization of the advantages which
are due to them under our free and
benefcent institutions. But if our
responsibility is great, our party is
strong. 1t is strong in its sympathy
with the needs of the people, in It's
insistance upon the exercise of gov
ernmental powers strictly within the
constitutional permission the people
have granted and in its will
ineness to risk its life and hope upon
the peoples intelligence and patriot
ism. Never has great party, intent
upon the promotion of right and
Justice, had a better incentive for
effort than is low presented to us.
Turning our eyes to the plain peo-
pie of the land we see them burdened
as consumers with a tariff system
that unjustly and relentlessly de-
mands from them in the purchase
of the necessaries and comforts of
life an amount scarcely met by the
wages of hard and steady toll, while
the exactions thus wrung from them
build up and increase the fortunes of
those for whose benefit this injustice
is perpetuated. We see the farmer
listening to delusive story that fills
his mind with visions of advance
while his pocket is robbed by the
stealthy hand OF high protection
Our working men are still told tho
Ia tale, CIT repeated in spite of It's dem
ons:rated falsity, that excessive pro
tective tariff is boon to them, and
that under its benefcent operation
wages must increase, while as they
listen, scenes are enacted in every
abiding place of high protection that
mocks the honest toll and tender
mercy of working men from those
made selfish and sordid by unjust
governmental favoritism. We oppose
earnestly and stubbornly the theory
upon which our opponents seek to
Justify and uphold the existing tariff
laws. We need not base our attack
on questions of constitutional per-
mission or Legislative powers. We
denounce this theory on the highest
possible grounds, when we contend
that in the present conditions it is
oppressive and unjust and that laws
enacted in accordance with it are
inequitable and unfair.
Ours is not a destructive party.
We are not at enmity with the rights
of any of our citizens. All are our
countrymen. We are not recklessly
needless of any American interests
nor will we abandon our interests,
nor will we abandon our regard for
them, but invoking the love of fair
ness and justice which belongs to
true Americanism and upon which
our constitution rests, we insist that
no plan of tariff legislation shall be
tolerated which has for its object and
purpose a forced contribution from
the earnings and income of the mass
of our citizens to swell directly the
accumulations Of a favored few, nor
will we permit the pretended solici-
tude for American labor or any other
specious pretext of benevolent care
for others to blind the eyes of the
people to the selfish schemes of those
who seek through the aid of an une-
quail tariff law to gain unearncd and
unreasonable advantages at the ex-
peuse of their fellows. We have
also assumed in our covenant with
those whose support we invite the
duty of opposing to the death ano-
ther avowed scheme of our adverse
ries, which, under the guise Of pro-
tecting suffrage, covers but does not
conceal a design to perpetuate the
power Of the party afraid to trust
it's continuance to the untrammeled
and intelligent votes of intelligent
people. We are pledged TO resist
Legislation intended to complete this
scheme because we have not for
gotten the saturnalia of theft and
brutal control which followed ano-
ther Federal revolution of State suf-
frages, because we know that the
managers of the party which did not
scruple to rob the people of a Presi-