Birmingham state herald., 1896-11-06

boards of trade and the bankers and
 bondholders had the ear of the man whom
 the democratic party had put forth as Its
 candidate upon a platform of principles
 for which the people had voted. and con-
 gress was summoned to gather in extra
 ordinary session.
 The people, though in the throes of
 wreck and ruin, brought about by de- lay, gathered new hope, and while shops
 and factories. closed down on every hand,
 almost every day and each recurring Sat
 urday night found still other thousands of men willing and anxious to work
 turned out to steal, starve or beg. the people still had hope that when congress met, which had then been called, the infamous" Mckinley law should be stricken from the statute books by the substitution of a democratic tariff law, and immediately following that action would come an expansion of the al- ready fast contracting currency by the
 passage of free coinage law to take the
 place of the "cowardly makeshift."
 In this condition and state of mind the
 assembling of the congress in extraordi-
 nary session to receive the message Of
 the President found the people. To at
 tempt to describe by pen or tongue the
 indignation and disappointment Of the
 people at the contents of that message
 would be to undertake to perform some- thing impossible. To consume space and time in the effort would be waste Of time and space in attempting to lay be- fore those who read newspapers and Keep abreast of the times description of that | upon which they are well posted, without hope of doing the subject justice.
 In that message the paramount issue upon which Cleveland had been elected was thrust aside and an appeal made to congress to trample under foot the par- | ty pledge to give the country bimetal- lisin and an expansion of the currency and to prepare the way for complete gold monometallism and constant con- traction of the currency. "The people had asked for bread and been given stone" That message proclaimed the re- suits of last Tuesdays election. On that day every ray of hope for democratic success in 1896 disappeared. No party could be expected to recover In TOUT years from such rank treachery on the part of its trusted leader. On that day l the nominee of the democratic party for president in 1896, whoever he might be, was doomed to defeat.
 In the making of it's platform at Chica- go this year, and in the choice of can- didates, the democratic party did the very best that could have been done. It l did better than it had done before since the days of Jackson. It made the grand est platform ever promulgated by po- litical party and named as its standard | bearer the truest, the greatest living American. Notwithstanding the party repudiated the once beloved leader who | had proved traitor and thrust a dagger | into the very vitals of the party that has made him what he is and given him the | highest honor within the reach of mor- tai man, democratic success this year was scarcely within the range of possl- | bilities. Nothing short of four more l years of misrule under the republican party could likely induce the people to again entrust the control of this govern | ment to the party that has folsted Gro yer Cleveland upon the country.
 To expect the people in 1896 to elect to | the presidency of the United States the l candidate of a party to which they gave l in 1892 every branch of the government. l on the pledge that the country should be given the benefits of a tariff for revenue only and bimetaliisn, when at the ex- l piratlon of the term beginning in 1893 l there is to be found upon the statute books a tariff law differing from the Me- 1 Kinley law only in the length of its free 1 list and not a vestage of law looking to the use of Doth gold and silver" freely