Mississippi leader. (Jackson, Miss.) 1892-1895, 1894-10-02
NATIONAL PLATFORM
OF the Prohibition Party, Adopted ut Gin
cinnati, Ohio. June 80, 1892.

Almighty God as the source of all true
government, and His law as the stand
ard to which human enactments must
conform to secure the blessings of
peace and prosperity, presents the fol
lowing declaration of principles:
(D The liquor traffic is foe to civil
iZation, the arch enemy of popular
government and public nuisance. 1t
is the citadel of the forces that corrupt
politics, promote poverty and crime,
degrade the Nations home life, thwart
the will of the people and deliver our
country into the hands of rapacious
class interests. All laws that, under
the guise of regulation, legalize and
protect this traffic, or make the Gov
ernment share in its ill-gotten gains,
are 'vicious in principle and powerless
as remedy" We declare anew for
the entire suppression of the manufac-
ture, sale, importation, expectation and
transportation of alcoholic liquors as a
beverage by Federal and State legisla-
ton. The full powers of Government
should be exerted to secure this result.
No party that fails to recognize the
dominant nature of this issue in Amer
lean politics deserves the support of
the people.
(2) No citizen should be denied the
right to vote on account of sex, and
equal labor should receive equal wages
without regard to sex.
(3) The money of the country should
consist of gold, silver, and paper, and
be issued by the general Government
only, and in sufficient quantity to meet
the demands of business and give full
opportunity for the employment of la
Dor. To this end an increase in the
volume of money is demanded, No
individual or corporation should be al
lowed to make any profit through its is
sue. 1t should be made legal tender
for the payment of all debts, public
and private. It's volume should be fix
ed at definite sum per capita, and
made to increase with our increase in
population.
a. Tariff should be levied only as a
, defense against foreign governments
which levy tariff upon, or bar out our
products from their markets, revenue
being incidental. The residue of means
necessary to an economical admins
tration of the Government should be
raised by levying the burden on wha;
the people possess, instead of upon what
they consume.
(3) Railroad, telegraph, and other
public corporations should be controll-
ed by the Government in the interest
of the people, and no higher charges
allowed than necessary to give fair ill
terest on the capital actually invested
(G) Foreign immigration has become
burden upon industry, one of the fac
| tors in depressing wages and causing
discomfort; therefore. our immigration
laws should be revised and strictly en-
| forced. The time of residence for nat
uralization should be extended, and nc
naturalized person should be allowed
to vote until one year after he becomes
citizen.
(O Nonresident aliens should not
be allowed to acquire land in this coun-
try. and we favor the limitation of in-
dividual and corporate ownership of
land. All unearned grants of lands to
railroad companies or other corpora
tions shoald be reclaimed.
(S) Years of inactiOn and treachery
on the part of the Republican and
Democratic parties have resulted in
the present reign of mob law, and we
demand that every citizen be protect
ed in the right of trial by constitution
al tribunals.
(9)All men should be protected by
: law in their right to one day of rest in
seven.
1O) Arbitration is the wisest and most
economical and humane method of set
Ting national differences.
1D Speculations in margins, the
cornering of grain. money and prod
ucts, and the formation of pools, trusts,
and combinations for the arbitrary ad
vancement of prices should be sup
pressed.
(12) We pledge that the Prohibition
Party, if elected to power, will ever
grant Just pensions to disabled veter-
ans of the Union army and navy, their
widows and orphans.
13) We stand unequivocally for the
American public school and opposed
to any appropriation of public moneys
for sectarian schools. We declare that
only by united support of such COM
mon schools, taught in the English Ian
guage. can we hope to become and re-
main a homogeneous and harmonious
people.
tl4) We arraign the Republican and
Democratic parties as false to the stand
ards reared by their founders; as faith
less to the principles of the illustrious
leaders of the past to whom they do
homage with the lips, as recreant to
the higher law, which is as intleXible in
political affairs as in personal life; and
as no longer embodying the aspirations
of the American people, or inviting the
confidence of enlightened, progressive
patriotism. Their protest against the
admission of ''moral issues" into poll
tics is confession of their own moral
degeneracy. The declaration OF an en-
inent authority that municipal misrule
is .the one conspicuous failure OF
American politics." follows as a natur-
al consequence of such degeneracy,
and is true alike of cities under Re-
publican and Democratic control. Each
accuses the other of extravaganza in
Congressional appropriations, and both
are alike guilty. Each protests, when
out of power, against iufractions of the
civil service laws, and each when in
power violates those laws in letter and
i'm spirit. Each processes fealty to the
interests of the toiling masses, but both
covertly truckle to the money power III
their administration of public affairs.
Even the tariff issue, as represented in
the Democratic Mills bill and the Re-
publican Mckinley bill, is no longer
treated by them as an issue between
great and divergent principles of gov
erument, but is mere catering to diff
fereut sectional and class interests.