The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1894-09-26

wage-earning hosts anxious for employ
ment-hard times for ali these industri-
Gus multitudes Is now a living, burning
issue darkening their homes with bag
gard care. and often with tears Of
/ guish. The hard times of the last
eighteen months, so ruthless and I'M
| sparing on labor and the fruits of labor,
were Of a piece with al the other and
similar periods Of distress in the past
| and were produced by the same causes
and the same policy and machinery
| which have 50 often heretofore wrought
calamity 10 the toiling millions and to
| the best interests of this country, under
| the malignant auspices of the republican
| party. The fact that the amount of
money in actual existence is less than
| the active business interests of the coun-
| try demand is a most oppressive evil.
| but the power Of money centers and of
money organizations 70 contract the cur
rency without limit or restraint, to viz
| tualy strip the country of the money 1t
| so much needs, and TO hoard 1t away for
| purposes of usury and speculation. is
| perhaps the blacklist and most perni-
| cious crime provided for in the whole
! body of republican financial legislation.
! This vicious machination Of republican
| Lawmakers. suwendering every interest
| of the people to the control Of financial
! corporations, authorizing them TO con-
| tract the currency and TO deprive the
country Of its circulating medium when
| ever the hardened viilainy of avarice
| desires TO make huge profits. may be
| properly styled the giant national curse
| of the age in which we live. No deep,
dark, rotten, masmatic fen or swamp
was ever more certain TO propagate
| death-dealing malaria than Is the power
| of money contraction. lodged in the
hands of private greed. to blight and
| destroy the general welfare Of the cOun-
| try The idea here presented is an APP
palling one. No other government with
In hon H. Of. ofxr Ito I'm rs "a
as can learn. has ever committed to
private parties the power to make money
| plenty or 10 make money scarce; times
| easy or times hard: create business pros
| perity or business bankruptcy; the power.
| in fact, to circulate the governments
| own currency, or TO withhold II from cir
cu.ation. at such times and under such
| circumstances. and in such amounts,
| viii inure TO the benefit Of private
| speculation and personal gain rather
| than to the pubic interest. Yet such is
| exactly the terrible power wherewith the
republican party has endowed the great
| money corporations Of the country, and
! such is the fatal power they have so
/ often called into disastrous action.
! short time ago a claim was put forth by
certain worthy gentlemen that they
/ could cause the clouds to gather in the
J sky and the rain 20 fall at their own viii
! and pleasure. They were sef-styled
| rain-makers, but their calm has been
| dlscTedited by the civilized world, and
we still look to Him who causes the
| rain to fall on the just and the unjust,
! and according 70 times and seasons set
| by divine wisdom No such doubt or
! discredit however. will ever be cast upon
! the open calm made by organized capt.
| tai, in the contro, of banks and other
corporations, that within the space Of
| thirty days 1t can p9ra,yZe the business
| of the country. drive labor out OF en-
! ployment, and in the midst of prosperity
| create a destructive panic. Nor VIII any
| one familiar with the record ever call
in question the weE-earned title of the
| republican party as the only great and
| prolific panic-breeder Of the latter ha.f
| of the nineteenth century. The leaders
| Of that p.utocratic party are now
vehement in charging the responsibility
Of the panic of the last year and a half
| 10 their political adversarles. The panic
| of 1873 created by the destruction of
! silver and the enormous contraction of
the currency in circulation, and which
| during the five years il lasted destroyed
more of the accumulated values of prop
| erty and more OF the values of productive
| labor than all the cyclones, earthquakes
| and volcanoes OF the earth put together
| in the same length OF time, might as well
be charged to the democratic party as the
| panic Of 1898. The truth is, as impartial
| history will record, that for the last
/ thirty years every species Of financial
| oppression, every instance of business
| trouble, every period OF pecuniary dis
| tress, every active influence for evil and
| unnatural disturbances In the channels
| of trade every discrimination against
| honest industry, and in favor of idle,
| boarded, intereSt-eating capital, every
| huge. imp.acable trust. whether in sugar
| whisky. coal, lumber or salt. every grind
ing monopoly Of whatever kind or de-
scription, every corrupt, gigantic corpora
| ton. combination, syndicate or pool
| known to consolidated wealth and edu-
Gated villainy, every cruel, dishonest re-
| duction Of wages, every malignant denial
| of justice to organized labor. every strike
| thrust upon ,aboring men and women TO
| be put down by force in the interest of
| corporation wealth, every life lost in
| such conflicts, and every tear and sob
| and groan in the humble homes of en-
| shaved toll. throughout all the states of
the American union. are as directly
| chargeable and traceable TO the bad laws
| fastened on the American people by the
| republican party as the bitter waters Of
| polluted spring are to the poisonous
| fountains from which they flow.
| No other answer can oe given. Those
| to whom all power has been granted
| must stand responsible for all that has
| happened If at this point some faith
| full republican, still believing in his
| party from prejudice, not from reason,
| should point to the progress and appar-
| ent prosperity of the country under the
auspices of the republican party, my
answer to him Is ready, and is two
| fold in character. In the first place,
whatever of progress, development and
| power has been displayed in the past
| generation by the American people has
! bean in spite of the hindrance of bad
| laws and not because of the assistance
| Of good ones. We have sprung forward
| like a giant in the great race of nations,
not by reason Of wise policies, or just
| and upright legislation, but rather from
| the fact that we belong to the strong
| est and most dominating branch Of the
| human family, that the Anglo-Saxon
| blood in our veins never stays in the
| rear, but always goes to the front, how
| ever adverse the circumstances may be.
| In the second place, however, 1 explic-
| lilly deny that a true condition of
healthy, natural, general prosperity ex-
lists at all in this country at the pres
ent time, or that 1t Is possible for such
a condition ever to exist under finan-
| cial policy which brides and saddles
| the masses, the laboring multitudes, in
| order that they may be ridden with
spur and whip by the privileged few.
| There are. indeed, enormous sccumula-
| tions of wealth now in this country,
! vast consultations of capital, mountain
ranges of riches, quickly piled up as it
] We're by some unnatural magic. or some
| incarnation of the black art, but bound
| less wealth, however great, when con-
| tracted into a few narrow circles, and
( reduced to the possession of a few very
limited, exclusive and favored classes,
| while the great body of the people are
| shut out from any part in its owner