Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1894-06-06

just ndt We lelt Whtn hepuDucanlsm re-
signed the control of our great government
on the 4th of March, 1898. 1t was a won.
derful story that the last Republican Presi-
dent was enabled to tell to the coun-
try and to the world, when about resigning
the muniments of Office and handing
over for the first time, since the Republi-
can party first marched to victory, the abso-
lutte and unqualified control of our aft airs
to the Democratic party. We had heard
during all the period of our ascendency the
lamentations and complaints of the democ-
racy, of the ruin that was being worked to
the public interests and of the rapid declin-
alton of the prosperity of our country under
Republican rule. And now, in the light of
these complaints, in the light of these ar
rsignments, it is we'll, perhaps, for US to
recur to the absolute facts set forth in the
history of the country and written so indel-
IDLY that even the interposition of one ad-
ministration of the Democratic party can
not erase them.
From 1860, with the exception of one
Democratic administration, which fortu-
nately was rendered powerless by Repub-
lican Senate the Republican party has been
responsible for the administration of our
public affairs, and the record as set forth
by President Harrison in 1898 in his mes
sage to Congress, gathered from the latest
and official returns of the census of the
United States shows that from wealth of
SIG, l59, 100000 representing the entire
wealth of the county in 1860, Republican
misrule had succeeded in changing those
figures in 30 years. to a national wealth
represented by more than $65 200, 900, 900.
During that period our railway mileage
had increased for 80 ,G26 to l67, 700 in 1890,
an increase of 44S per cent. In 70 of the
leading cities of the United States, the llth
census shows that the capital invested in
manufacturing in IsGO amounted to ST.
232 900, and had increased in the decade to
$29 100000. The number of employees in
1880 was l, ,301 1888. and increased in the
10 years to 2,251,l34. The wages earned
tell a still more emphatic story, showing
again $50l ,9G5 in 1880, no less than ST.
221, 40 in 1890. The value of the products
of manufacture increased from S2,71l 900
in 1880 to 81 100000 in 1890. In the first
six months of 1892 after the passage of the
famous Mckinley bill which was received
with so much clamor and opposition by our
Democratic brethren, in the first six months
Of 1892 we had the record of building 40
new cotton mills, As knitting mills, 26
woolen mills, Is silk mills, plush mills, 2
linen mills and vast number of other in
dustries, giving increased employment to
the American people.
In 1892 there were nearly 900 more
cotton spindles in operation than in 1891,
and 1SS 900 mote bales of cotton we're con-
sumed in this country than the year before.
The consumption of cotton in the previous
20 years by our manufactures had increased
in this country twice as much as in Europe.
And this was not altogether prosperity
confined to our home production. We had
large export business as well, for the fig
ures show that the total value of our for
tign trade for the year ending July |. 1892,
exports and imports, was increased by ST.
2S2 1886 ,004 over the previous fiscal year,
which itself was over S400 ,0O0,0 900 in ex-
cess of the annual average for the previous
10 years, and the increase under the opera
ton of the Mckinley bill was principally in
our exports to foreign countries.
In 1892, notwithstanding the claim that
we were surrendering the markets of the
world and building Chinese wall which
would shut us out from all access to foreign
markets, our export trade was the largest
in the history of our country, reaching the
enormous figures of $l,030 ,278, l4S, ex-
ceeding the imports by S202,S75 ,000 and
exceeding the average imports of the pre-
vious ten years by $l45, ,797,33S
Now these are figures, and figures are
said to be dry, but there is a great thirst
among the American people, today, for just
such figures as these again. They are
Republican figures. and in this time of de-
pra sion ou1 tropb1o md ranorso II Ia wall
for us occasionally to build up little oasis
of Republican recollectious to remind us
who went astray and to inspire those who
were faithful to greater exertions for the
future. Our imports, free of duty in that
year, and that was the year when they said
that we were shutting out foreign trade by
a high tariff, our imports, free of duty, were
S457 1899 900, the largest in the history of
the country. They amounted to 55 per
cent. of the total imports, coming through
ur,custom houses without let or hindrance,
absolutely free, and large portion of
these imports went untaxed directly to the
breakfast tables of the poor people of this
country. And right there, true to its tradi-
tions, is where the Democratic party is en-
deav voring to strike its most serious blow
today, by reimposing the duty upon that
prime necessary of life-sugar-which
goes into every household, and which the
Republican party made free because it was
to the interest of the people that it should
be made free, and the freeing of it inter-
posed no obstacle between any workingman
of the United States and continuous and
well-paid occupation.
Our coastwise trade and internal COM
merce reached dimensions of prosperity un-
known before. The tonnsge passing
through the Detroit river in 1890 was
greater than the entire foreign and British
tonnage in the foreign and coastwise trade
that entered at the custom houses of London
and Liverpool during the same year. Our
internal fic,-that unfailing register of
the transactions of our people-shows the
great volume of our business and prosperity
In 1890 our railroads transported 69I, ,S44,-
Az tons. In 1891 we had increased it to
704, ,39S, 900 tons, an increase of over 10
millions of tons between 1890 and 1891.
And when we turn to the direct interests
of the wage earning class of the country
we find the figures still more gratifying and
conspicuous. These figures given by Mr..
Porter, the superintendent of the census.
show how rapidly our manufacturing inter
ests were built up. The increase from
1860 in the capital invested was from
one million to more than $500 600 of