The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1896-06-06
THE FREE SILVER DEMOCRATIC
SWEEP.

Every indication now points to the prob
ability of the nomination of free silver
candidate for the Presidency by the Demo-
Gratis at Chicago, and makes the nomination
of sound money candidate upon an I'M
equivocal platform, the imperative duty OF
the Republican National Convention.
Whatever hope the sound money element
of the Democracy may have INDUCED, that
they would be able to dictate the platform
at Chicago has been set at naught by the
overwhelming victory the silver Democrats
have won in Kentucky, where Mr.. John G..
Carlisle, now the most distinguished sound
money Democrat in the county, next to
Grover Cleveland, has been Enthusiastically
repudiated, the silver men even proposing
to further humiliate him by presenting
Joe" Blackb as Kentucky's candidate
for President.
The result in Kentucky indicates that
pretty much the entire South, so far as the
Democracy is concerned, has gone for free
silver and it leaves little room for doubt
that the free coiners will have an absolute
majority in the Chicago convention. In
every Southern State the efforts of the adj
ministration under the direction of Secre
taries Carlisle and Hoke Smith and the
subordinate Office holders to create formid
able sound money sentiment have been
| frtI T,, tl,n Io, thn
failure except in Michigan. where Don NJ.
Dickinson strategy enabled him and the adj
ministration to carry the day. and Wiscon-
sin, Minnesota, and South Dakot will he
the only other Western States in which sound
money is not likely to be in the minority.
In Illinois the sound money men acknowl
edge defeat in advance Indiana is almost
certain to 90 in the same direction, and most
of the district conventions in Ohio have
confirmed Calvin S. Brice's recent admis-
sion that it is almost useless to carry on an
uphill fight against the Buckeye silyeites
Of course the New England States, the
Middle States, and probably Maryland, will
be solid for sound money, but their entire
strength in the National Convention, to-
gether with the most generous allowance
that now can he made for the election of
sound money delegates in the West, will
not aggregate more than 400 votes. The
prospect that the free silver men will count
800 votes in the Chicago Convention is now
about as well assured as Mckinley's chance
of counting more than that number at st.
Louis; and the probability of a change in
the interval is about equally remote.
There is no feature of national politics
more marked to-day than the almost COM
plete failure of the Cleveland administra
ton and its followers to make stand
against the free coiners in States which
Were thought to be doubtful on the issue
Hoke Smith could not succeed in the task
in Georgia: Iowa went solidly into the free
silver column under the leadership of flor-
ace BoiCs: Kentucky, which it was supposed
might check the tide, has been swept into
it like a chip, and if Ohio shall go that way,
as is probable, the Democracy will be hop
lessly divided between a solid East on one
side and solid South and an almost solid
West on the other. There is no ground for
doubt that nearly, if not quite, two thirds
of the Democratic party and its leaders are
radically in favor of free silver, and like
wise little doubt that their fight at Chicago
will be conducted uncompromisingly for a
16 to platform and Is to | President.
1t would be far more cheering to point
out the likelihood of an infusion of COM
mon sense into the Democracy and thus a
cessation of all financial imbecility during
the coming campaign; but there is no indi-
cation now at hand of such prospect. No
fair and truthful estimate of the Democratic
situation can be made without reaching the
conclusion that the Chicago Convention will
be under the control of the silverites, and
that they mean to make, and will make,
the issue between the silver standard and
the gold standard so clear that he who runs
NAV read