Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1896-05-22
TWO CANDIDATES ONLY -FOUR
WEARS APART,

It is conceded in all quarters IF the coun-
trv that the matter OF financefs the most
important in the approaching Presidential
campaign. 1t would seem t bat there could
be nothing simpler OF more practical than
for the candidates for thd nomination of
both parties to speak ou5 plainly. 1t would
naturally appear be something the people
had right to know. Mckinley, the can
didate who has as good as got the Repub-
lican nomination is exhibiting a reticence
that poorly BELTS an aspirant for the Presi-
dency. And his friends are no more cour-
ageous than he IS. They counsel silence
and take any effort to make him speak out,
as an evidence of ill will to him and as part
of a conspiracy towards his undolng. One
I of the raost prominent Of his managers
naively says: "Why Mckinley would be
a focd to speak out The demand OF Re
publican journals that he shall speak is met
| with as contemptuous response as if il
| came from Democrats, and they are
promptly charged with being in conspira-
CIV to ''cheat" Mckinley out Of the nomi
I nation. Think of it; d man seeking the
greatest trust the Nation has to bestow,
demands that it shall be given in the ''pie
in a poke" style. refuses to say how he
will execute it if it is given him, and his
friends think it treachery to question him.
His answer to all questions on silver
! is 81 have nothing to say,''a policy quite
in line with the straddle adopted by his
| Ohio friends who put him in the field in
this wise:
| "We contend for honest money, for a cur
reney of gold, silver and paper, with which
| to measure our exchanges that shall be as
sound as the government and as untarnished
as its honor; and to that end we favor bimet-
allism and demand the use of both gold and
silver as standard money, either in accordance
with ratio to be fixed by an international
agreement Gf that can be obtained) or under
such restrictions and such provisions to be
determined by legislation as will secure the
maintenance of the parities of values of the
two metals, so that the purchasing and debt
paying power of the dollar. whether of silver
gold or paper. shall be at all times equal"
How different is all this from the way
that Cleveland 8 friends in New York ii
1892, put him before the National conven
| ton:
"We approve the use Of both gold ano
silver as money, and we demand that all dol
lars, whether gold or silver, shall be equa
| in value to each other in fact, as we'll as by
declaration of law. We are opposed to thu
free coinage of silver by the United State:
alone at the existing rate of sixteen to one
because we believe that free coinage at thai
| ratio will result in the immediate disappear
ance of gold from the business of this coun
try, the use of silver with certain loss to every
wage-earner and every savings bank deposi
tor, with impairment Of credit and disastrous
disturbance of business of every kind W.
demand the repeal of the Sherman silver Law
of 1890, as an obstruction of international hi
metallism, and because it is rapidly bringing
this country to silver monometalism will
all its attending evils
The policies of the friends of the tw'
men, Mckinley and Cleveland, took thei
!, color from the men themselves. The frs
timid trimmer for success; the second
bold, frank, honest man about whom on ;
public question no man has doubt as t.
where he stands.