The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1895-09-26
Flowers Speech.

Flowers Speech.
1 count myself out of active politics
but 1 am too earnest a Democrat to re-
fuse the call of my party if it needs my
service on such an occasion as this, and
feel proud at being asked to preside
over the deliberations of a convention
! whose action will, as I believe, reflect
| the Judgment and opinions of a ma
Jorlty of voters in the Empire state
! at the next election.
In victory or defeat, there is always
| one sure and lasting satisfaction in
being a Democrat, and that is the con-
/ sciousness of belonging to a party
which is, whatever else may be said
/ OF it, the party of the plain people, and
! the party which instinctively and ma
turally abhors political hypocrisy and
! false pretense. Democrats may make
/ mistakes in policy or in conduct but
/ there is that rough honesty about them
which makes them Shrink from polit-
| zeal professions that are not genuine,
/ but are made only to deceive voters
until after election day. Thank heaven
! the Democratic party is not a party
! of cant and hypocrisy.
The memory of the people of New
/ York is not short enough to forget en-
! tirely the promises with which the Re-
! publican party assumed complete pow
er on Jan. I, backed by an unusual ex-
| preston of popular confidence, nor can
| it forget the melancholy, humiliating
and disgraceful failure to redeem those
I promises, or the miserable fiasco which
/ has followed every pretension of re-
I form. No party within recent years
assumed the powers Of government in
our state with larger measure of
public confidence or with a greater op-
/ portunity OF gratifying public expecta-
/ q ~ e
sufficient to expose the false pretense
! by which power had been obtained and
! to reveal professed reformerS in their
true light as political pirates.
The lofty professions of morality and
public duty before the assumption of
power degenerated afterward into a
/ party feud for political spoils, the per-
version Of legislative power to per-
sonal cupidity and the betrayal of
every genuine reform.
1 do not stand here in the perfume
J tory manner of the partisan on such oc-
! casion as this, to denounce the other
party and to praise my own. I am
| merely stating what every intelligent
voter in the state knows to be true and
what every Independent voter and
every Independent newspaper will tell
you, namely: that the people who last
! November, under the impulse of an
earnest moral sentiment, whether just
ly or unjustly aroused, placed the Re
publican party in power to accomplish
desired reforms-have been woefully
disappointed and shamefully betrayed
And while such a political betrayal
is always to be deplored, whether it
| brings advantages to party adversaries
or not, it is, [ am sure, source of sat
isfaction to Democrats who felt the
! injustice of the position which a COM
| bination of circumstances had placed
its party in last fall, to realize that
J their partisan opponents who misled
| and deceived public opinion for their
own selfish purposes are now com
pletely unmasked.
| After giving details of what Mr..
Flower called "the contrast between
Republican promises and Republican
performances the speaker expressed
himself on national issues as follows:
Il have alluded as yet only to mat
ters of state concern, for in the coming
election those are the questions of
I paramount interest. But federal issues
cannot and will not be ignored. For
tunately for the Democratic party. the
tide is with 1t here also. Every week
Improvement in industry and commerce
is a vindication of that Democratic
craftsmanship which placed the finan-
| ces of the country on a sound basis by
repeating the Sherman law, and revived
waning industries by the enactment of
the Wilson bill. To those two benef-
cial measures, every recent increase of
wages, every recent advance in bust
ness, every recent sale of American Sc
! curities in Europe. every recent open
ing Of mills is distinctly due. The
hard times which followed the fright
caused by the Sherman law are ran
idly disappearing under favoring con
/ ditions and for recovery from bord
ship and depression credit must he
given to the party which had the sa-
gacity to remove the. causes of finap-
cial and industrial disaster and pro-
vide sound legislation, under which
business and manufactures can legiti-
mately prosper. Danger of a deprecia-
ted currency now is gone and tariff
duties are no longer so high as to re-
strict foreign commerce and over slim
ulate few democratic industries at
i the expense Of the many The best