The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1894-09-11
The Supreme Test.


Gently adopted state platform the DEM
ocrats of Wisconsin, under the lead of
Senator Villas, President Cleveland's
most consummate apologist and de-
fender, placed this declaration: "The
present financial distress under which
the country has suffered and is still
suffering, is the logical and necessary
conseque nee of Republican class legis.
lation and mismanagement." At a
monster mass meeting of Democrats,
held last Friday night in Allan ia,
Speaker Crisp prefaced the oratory of
the evening with this bid for SYM
pathy: "When the Fifty-third con
gress met in August of last year it was
confronted with difficulties which
seemed almost insurmountable. Trade
was paralyzed, manufacturing had al
most ceased, labor was idle and con-
fidence-the life and soul of commerce
was utterly destroyed. Insofar as
this deplorable condition was attrib-
utable to legislation, the Republican
party was responsible"
tits evident, therefore, as General
Hastings predicted at Harrisburg, that
the Democratic managers, having moth
ing but failure, panic and widespread
ruin to show as the visible accompani-
ments of Democratic restoration, will
perforce acknowledge the fact, but dis
claim the responsibility. The device
is an old one. 1t has been the resort
ofpoltroons ever since Adam, in the
Garden of Eden, sought to shirk the
burden of his disobedience by saying:
"The woman, she did tempt me-"
There has not been a time in the his.
tory Of Democracy in this country
when it was not ready and willing to
blame the evil of its own laundering
upon somebody else.
We are willing, however, for the
sake of the argument, to let the Dem
ocrats have the benefit of all their false
claims. We will concede, for example,
that there was misery, trade paralysis
and lack of confidence when the
Democracy came into control; and that
this condition, instead of being due to
popular fear of the new administra-
ton, was legacy of Republican "mis-
management" We will admit, if it
will sweeten Speaker Crisp's potion,
that the remarkable prosperity which
for thirty years had no fault to find
with the kind of control vouchsafed it
by the Republican majority, had been
Systematically deceived and that it
only awakened to this deception at
about the time Democracy took hold;
how does this affect the present case?
In what essentials have the people
been benefited by the change? To
what degree are they satisfied with
the comparison of results?
"The Republican party" as Warner
Miller aptly said at a Republican
convention in Herkimer county, N. Y,
the other day, does not build upon
disasters; it does. not build upon mis-
representations; it appeals to the great
intelligence of the people, and it will
ask of them whether they are not bet
ter satisfied with the results which
were attained in this country during
the rule of the Republican party than
they have been during the rule of the
Democratic party" That is the su-
preme test, the central and overshad-
owing issue. Or, as General Hastings
has well voiced the same thought:
" Let the thoughtful men of the State
and the country who have in view the
great problems and the perilous periods
which were so bravely met and mas
tered by the Republican party during
the past thirty years. consider the va
cillating and disastrous efforts of the
party now in power to cope with the
public questions of the last eighteen
months, and answer whether the Dem
ocratic party has proved its capacity
for safe Independent action in this or
any other serious period in our coun-
try's recent history, and whether their
proper place in government is not that
of an objecting minority. If the peo-
pie are satisfied with the years work
at Washington they will vote for q
continuation of that kind of govern
mental policy. If they are not, they
will abide the time until they can
make an effective appeal to the free
mans tribunal, the American ballot
box.n
The SUGAR growing industry repre-
sents an investment Of hundreds of
millions of dollars. Its inter state
commerce alone is worth more than