Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1894-03-23
WHAT A

WHAT A RECORD!
The New York World, at the close of
the first year of democratic rule, made
an attempt to glorify the democracy for
its accomplishments. It was a difficult
task. The World had very little mate
rial upon which to work, but it succeed
ed in preparing a sort of eulogy. It was
a lamentably half-hearted article, rather
defensive and ~apologetic, and purporting
to set forth the several beneficial results
of democratic rule. The following is an
extract:
The Sherman Silver Purchase act has
been repealed. So miSchieviOus had this
law, passed solely by republican votes, be-
come, that business men of all parties I'M
tied in demanding its repeal. The firm at
titude of the democratic administration Sc
cured an unconditional stoppage of silver
purchases, and for the first time since the
passage OF the Bland act, in 1878, the cur
rency of the country was relieved of the
danger of debasement.
The elections law has been repealed.
With it disappeared the last vestige of
centralized coercion, the fruit of the war.
Elections are hereafter to be free. The
threat of "a bayonet behind every ballot
of the party in power dong, as Speaker
Reed said the republican party intended 10
do, sits own registration, its WI counting
and its own certitication'-is removed.
This achievement alone is enough to have
made the first year of the democratic re-
storation memorable.
A genuine tarlff-reform bill has passed
the House. The Wilson bill is the most
scientific and just tariff measure that has
passed either house of Congress in thirty
years. II enacted into law it will free the
great body of the people from needlessly
burdensome taxes, it will relieve our man
ufacturers from a hindering handicap, it
will enlarge the activities and increase the
rewards of labor. 1t executes the mandate
of the people. 1t fulfls the ~oft-repeated
pledge of the Democratic party.
Our foreign policy has been relieved of
the faint of jingoism and jobbery. Presi-
dent Cleveland, through a mistaken and
Quixotic "sense of duty" Numbered badly
in trying to restore the preposterous mon
archy in Hawaii. But the Democrats in
Congress, to whom the question was refer
red, have not sustained him and the true
and traditional American policy will pre-
vail.
There has been a promising start in pen
sion reform. The greatest source of ex-
%travagance and fraud in the entire Fed
eral system has been bodily and honestly
attacked. The Pension Appropriation bill
reported to the House is nearly SIS, OOO, 900
less than the amount appropriated for the
current fiscal year.
This is a record of which the democratic
rortv hos q riuht IN hn nrpud Gocrita thu
shortcomings and wronggoings in other
directions.
The Worlds ATTEMPTED exaltation is
rather laughable than otherwise. No
sooner does it credit the democracy with
the repeal of the Sherman law, and
accord great praise therefor, than the
same party passes another measure-the
Bland seigniorage bill-a bill without
n redeeming feature, whose only re-
suit can be the further debasing of the
currency, which the World 80 deeply de-
plores. The genuine tariff reform bill,
in which the World so greatly glories, is
neither a revenue measure, a free trade
measure, nor a protective measure, but a
sort of weakened combination of the
three, whose result is the further deple-
ton Of the evenu of the nation-and to
avoid this, or rather to make up this
deficit, an income tax provision has been
tackled to it-a revival of a long extinct
mode of direct taxation, whose resump-
ton by any party at this time was
deemed incredible. While millions are
hungry, and without work, as a result of
democratic tariff tinkering, it is amusing
to see the World point to the repeal of
the federal elections law, as an act for
which, alone, the democracy might we'll
be satisfied with the years work, and
the attempted praise of democracy for
it's stand in the Hawaiian matter is the
most supremely ridiculous part of the
whole article. That the whitewashing of
a president, whose actions the World
admits were foolish and Quixotic at
best, can be praiseworthy, is certainly
something to be wondered at. Verify,
the World has a rather weedy row to
hoe, when it attempts to discover SO
much of benefit which it's party has
accomplished.
HENRY CLEws weekly financial re-
. 1~- <I~.4. 20,