The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1894-03-27
A SENATORIAL INCENDIARY.

Senator Stewards letter to Commonweal
Coxey Is very discreditable to the writer.
1t reads more like the diatribe of walk
ing delegate or the mouthings Of a sandlot
from a member of the United States SEN
ate. The prevailing tone of the letter is
distinctly mischievous. and, altogether the
writer makes an ostentatious tender of good
advice to Coxey in recommending the bal
lot-box as a cure for all the evils of the
times. He accompanies this advice with
50 many infammatory statements and in
cendiary suggestions as to more than coun-
terbalance the effect of the other. Under
the thin pretense of praising the ballot as
a remedy for social and political evils Sem
not only the ballot but republican govern
ment is failure. There was time" he
says, when the ballot placed the control
of the government in the hands of Wash
ingtons. Jeffersons, Jacksons and Lincolns.
There have been no Washingtons. Jeffer-
sons, Jacksons or Lincolns elected Presi-
dent of the United States during the last
two decades" From this he argues, in
ferentially, that the ballot has ceased to be
a guaranty Of good government. If there
has been a descent In the character of mod
ern Presidents there has been much
greater one in that of the body of which
Mr.. Stewart is a member. To paraphrase
his statement, there was a time when Leg
islatures elected a Webster, a Clay. a
Sumner and a Seward to the United States
Senate, but there have been no Websters,
Clays, Summers or Stewards elected in re-
cert years. There was a time when rot
ten borough representation in the Senate
did not exist, and when man of Senator
Stewards caliber could not have made his
way thither even from such d State as
Goes not follow from this that Republican
government is a failure.
The burden of the letter is an attack on
the money power and an appeal to the I'M
einpIOySQ 10 Hldho war luEOuBIl the DdIlOl-
box upon capital Its spirit appears In such
sentences as these:
A soulless despot Of alien origin is mon
arch OF the commercial world His name
is money. His instruments of oppression
are banks and bonds. His servants are adj
ministrative and legislative bodies.
The sufferings of the people are the result
Of electing the men to office who , DO the he
legislation and administration, have de-
stroyed more than one-half of the metallic
money of the world and cornered the other
half. Twenty years of uninterrupted rule
of banks and bondholders has concentrated
the wealth of the world in the hands Of the
few and enabled them to seize the tele-
graph the press and nearly every other
avenue through which the people can OBJ
tain information of the cunning devices by
which the parasites absorb what the masses
The Constitution of the United States is
our charter Of liberty. 1t has been sub
Traitors to human rights have usurped
machinery of the party and the arts of the
demagogues. Hurl them from power.
This is incendiary talk and could not
have been intended for any other purpose
than to infiame the minds of the unem-
ployed against capital and against the gov
eminent. The public has learned to expect
such talk from orators Of the Mary K.
Lease school and from Popullst candidates
for office in the wild and woolly West, but
1t seems strangely out Of place coming
from the United States Senate chamber.
Senator Stewart has evidently reached
point where he Is impervious to reason
and common sense. and careless whether he
speaks the truth or not. He is not noted
for his wide information. but he certainly
knows that majorities rule in this country.
and that bankers and bondholders are very
far from having a majority. When he
says that the Constitution of the United
States has been "subverted by an oligarchy
of concentrated wealth." and that the mon
ey power controls the telegraph and the
press Of the country. he makes himself an
object of contempt for every honest and
intelligent person
THE CARNEGIE ARMOR FRAUDS.