People's party paper. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1891-1898, 1895-12-27

was the natural result of several
weeks Of reflection and discussion.
The state executive committee of
Georgia, at IS meeting several weeks
ago, had seen fit to recommend a
modification of our platform to the
people. The changes proposed were
not departures from principle. In
no sense were they surrender to
our opponents. They simply made
our original position clear, put our
actual creed where it could not be
misrepresented, and re-stated our
case in the simplest manner possible.
The original agreement between
the Knights of Labor and the Farm
ers' Alliance at ST. Louis in 1889
did not contemplate an overthrow of
cur present form Of government.
Neither dill the Ocala platform
contemplate any such resolution.
Neither did the Cincinnati conven-
ton Of 1891 declare war upon the
government az it stan is.
Yet these platforms were the foun-
dations upon which the Peoples
Party was built. The Ocala plat
form, especially, was accepted as the
true exposition of the purposes of
the reform movement;-its intention
being to remedy the abuses in the
present government, aud restore it
to its original purity and vigor as a
Democratic republic.
Along these lines we were meeting
astounding success. We were ap-
pealing TO the reason, self interest,
patriotism, and sentiment Of a ma
jority of the people when we de
cIared against un-d democratic and un-
republican abuses of governmental
power, and in favor of the equal and
exact justice which once shaped our
policies and moulded our laws.
Along these lines the Farmers
Alliance dominated both parties in
1890.
Nothing kept it from being the
monarch Of all it surveyed, but the
fact that half of the Alliance was
Democratic while the other half was
Republican.
And between them lay the "bloody
chasn" Of secession and civil war
a ohasm which the professional poll
ticians Of both parties took good
care should ever remain open and
ever remain bloody.
How to fuse the Alliance strength,
how to get Democratic reformers
! and, Republican Feformers,=to act IN
concert was the problem.
That o new party was necessary
to afford common ground upon which
cid foes could meet as friends was
obvious.
That the leaders would have a
delicate task in making this change
was equally clear.
That any change in programme,
during this period of change, would
be desperately dangerous, ought to
have been plain, yet at St. Louis and
Omaha the wording Of one plank
was altered SO as to make it capable
of being construed into an attack on
the private ownership Of land.
These few words, slipped in per-
haps without special notice, cost us
thousands Of votes. They have been
sword in our side ever since.
1t has been said that we received
more votes under tho Omaha plat
form than we had ever cast befor!
1t isn't the truth. The reform move
ment polled more votes in 1890 than
it has ever done einoe--or ever will
do again, unless we cut loose from
Socialism,
What votes we got in 1892 and
1891 we're given to us IN spite of the
Objectionable feature of the o naha
platform, Thousands Of citizens
voted our ucket, nos because they
endorsed everything in the Omaha
platform, but because there was abso-
lntely nothing they could endorse in
either Of the old partjes.
Then again, almost every Populist
in the South voted with US, believing
that cur platform had not been al,
tered at Omaha, but meant just what
it meant at the beginning.
SO said we, and so SAP we no y.
A, <b, c,root o7p,po;r,7 IF 1909 ~