The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1895-02-15
PLUMBERS OF CLEVELAND.
Di.gracefuI Record of the Democratic
President.


We have had two years of Grover
Cleveland. We are to have two more
before all is done and the record of
one mans laundering incompetency
and perilous conceit shall have been
closed. What will those two years
bring forth2 To what new dangers
shall we be exposed, to what fresh hui
initiation subjected? Is there any limit
tothe calamity within reach Of dull.
self-centered autocrat, surrounded by
servile sycophants2 If so, let us pray
Heaven that IL may have been reached.
II not, let us pray for strength and
courage and wise patience, for surely
we shall need them all.
The salient feature Of Mr.. Cleve-
lands character Is his hmitless con-
fidence in himself and his immeasur-
able contempt for every other factor
in the problem Of the country's destiny.
Wonderful as has been this mans rise
out of social and political obscurity to
the lofty pinnacle he now cumbers and
degrades, it is infinitely less amazing
than his stolid insensibility to every
law, custom or tradition that conflicts
with his scheme of absolute and des-
potic rule. He regards congress In the
light of a futile and impertinent
obstacle. He treats his cabinet
officers as though they were mere
clerks. If he thinks of the people at
ell, he thinks of them as having ex-
hausted their sovereign prerogatives
in calling him to the presidency. His
regime, from the 4th Of March, 1898, up
to the present moment, has been one
of unmitigated selfishness. He began
on the 9th of that month by commits
sioning his man Blount to go to Homo
lulu and make q case against the
American people. He has maintained
that standard ever since. His secret
Vaccinations against the champions
of human liberty In Hawaii; his con-
nivance at sedition by the followers of
the barbarous and corrupt queen; his
scarcely yelled invitation to riot and
anarchy in a neighboring republic,
then petitioning for adoption and for
brotherhood; his insolent refusal to
submit the question to congress until
he had exhausted every means of
establishing his policy of restora-
tion-these and other acts of sinister
deliberation reveal the temper Of the
man in colors that can never fade.
As to Samoa, also, he has disclosed the
same impatience of the limitations
Of his office, the same contempt for the
Obligations of which he is the solemnly
declared trustee. In Samoa he found
the United States bound by treaty
TO a compact Of protection aud advan-
tage. OF the important considerations
involved in that compact it Is not nee
essary to speak. Mr.. Cleveland was
not the Judge Of them, in any event.
The treaty had been sanctioned by the
power authorized in the constitution
/ Do make treaties, and Mr.. Cleveland
was neither asked nor commissioned to
| interfere. His man Gresham made the
suggestion, officially, that the United
States should withdraw from the tri-
part!te agreement with Germany and
England. Then Mr.. Cleveland, in his
message to congress, earnestly recon-
mended the adoption Of Greshath's sug-
gestion. Finally, seeing that congress
studiously ignored the scheme-seeing
/ that he had not an advocate, not even
the humblest cuckoo chirp-he set about
the accomplishment by impudent and
arbitrary indirection of that to which,
as he well enough knew, congress was
unalterably opposed. He ordered his
man Gresham to omit the estimate for
Samoa in his financial budget and thus
defeat the country, defy congress and
dishonor our national obligations for
the qualification of his reckless and ar
rogant caprice.
Through this amazing tumble of fur
tive conspiracy, studious deceit,
brutal insolence and defiant usurpa-
ton has Grover Cleveland brought US
to the halfway point Of his admins
ton. His policy In Hawaii has just
been emphasized by asbloody insured
ton, led by Blount's witnesses and Co
adjutors in the instruction plot and
inspired directly by his own outspoken
sympathy with the degraded and licen-
tious queen. For all the blood that
has been shed, for every peril 70
which civilization has been subjected,
for the shame and sorrow which this
country has been made to feel, and for
any evil consequence that may follow
this last outbreak, Mr.. Cleveland is df
rectly responsible and will be so held
by enlightened public opinion every
where. he closes the first half of his
term with a disgraceful and abhorrent
tragedy of his own making-appropri-
ate elimination Of two long years of
stupid ignoring of the coordinate
branches of the government, Of de-
liberate usurpatiOn Of authority not
conferred upon him by law, and of con-
temptuous defiance of the people, who,
TO their own undoing, have made him
what ne is.
How will he close the second half,
and with what miracles of infamy will
j -.