Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1894-08-16

Industrial masses of our people that would diseredit the sordid overall of the most hustlen plutocrat who ever lfattened upon tine sweat and blood of the poor. They eonsumated their scheme of plunder by the demonitf- zation of silver. By that act they destroyed the harmony of our con stitutional, fiscal system that had blessed the country for more than a century. They destroyed the parity of the two metals. They enhanced the value of gold and depreciated the value of silver, and this chasm has grown wider from that day to this. They increased the value of money and demoralized and decreased the price nf all the products of toll along with all the property of the country until for years past honest labor has been deprived of its just rewards and the products of our farms will not realize the cost Of production when | placed upon the market of the coun- try. By this wanton act they gave to the country Black Friday with its long train of horrors that swept over the land like a simeon leaving want, misery and ruin in it's path way, from the humblest home Of the poor to the gilded halls of the rich; and these laws, having run their wanton conrse for twenty years, ripened into the dreadful panic of 1893, with all it's evils and from which the country has not yet re- covered
 In the midst of these evils, sur rounded by these environments, with the money of the country in the hands oi the feW-with the benefici- aries of these laws controlling the financies of the nation, with monopoly trusts and plutocraey deeply entrenched upon every hand while labor was unemployed and agriculture was prostrate and bleed- l ing at every pore-lock-outs and strikes were prevalent all over the land.
 IH the midst of this demOralization the Democratic party was entrusted with the reins of Government and with the sacred and delicate duty of reforming these abuses. The first great achievement of the Democratic party was the repeal of the oppres- sive cleo tion laws and thereby secur- ing to every citizen the right to cast an honest ballot unawed by Federal bayunetts or the threats of Federal courts, and thus restoring to the people that right upon which the i future of our institutions depend-the right of local self-g f-government
 They then began the work of tariff reform. The battle has been long and fierce. Protected plutocracy, rich, powerful and unyielding, backed by the Republican party, aided in many instances by the votes of Popolite Senator's, has contested every inch Of ground. Some of our friends are disheartened and dis mayed. They seem not to appreci- ate the desperation of the conflict. To all such let me say, be of good cheer The party in this great bat 1 le for commercial freedom may have in it's ranks the Benedict Arnold. 1t may be encamped at Valley Forge, surrounded by all the disappoint- ments that threatened the success of our patriotic fathers in the battle for human liberty. But now, as then, Israel's God Is with the right. Day by day and hour by hour the fight goes on. The light is breaking and we can already hear the shouts of triumphant Democracy as each redoubt is taken on their determined march to Yorktown. It took our aneesto seven long years to throw of the yoke aud establish freedom. Of no less moment is the present con- fict. frightened with the cause of commercial freedom, ohe cause of equal justice, the cause of defenseless millions who are slaves to protected monopoly, and yet our people are discouraged in the first few months of the conflict. Take courage, take new heart, give voice to your cause, pour red-hot shot into the camp of the unfaithful representatives of the people, drive them from their trenching and now with the passage of the Wilson bill with the Senate amendments has marked the turning point in American legislation, and l while it is not what we wanted, will ] give us freer commerce and relieve agriculture of. many of its burdens and demand of the wealthy a contri- button from their incomes for the support of the Government. This battle shall never cease until agricul- tur4 and the industries ot the coun- try are freed from the burdens o1 McKinleyism and the unladen wings a of. Ameriealr -eonlmerce is bid to con- test in the markets of the world for the mastery of the seas.