The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1896-03-14

Duty of the Macon convention.
II is clear 10 every democrat OF the
state who is anxious Tor The welfare OF
the state democracy that the convention
| that is 10 meet ia Macon in June. in adopt
ing a platform. should conane itself 10
/ state matters and leave national ques-
tons 10 be dealt with by the national dem
/ ocratic convention. which viii meet two
weeks later. We are confident. however.
/ that If the faction that dictated the poll
/ cy OF the state executive committee in
the matter Of calling only one convention
/ Succeeds in getting control Of the Macon
convention IL Will make a declaration on
the silver question that viii put the state
| democracy I'm opposition to the national
democracy. 1t viii adopt a declaration
in favor Of the free coinage Of silver at
the ratio Of 16 to T. and ii is about as GER
tain as anything can be that is not yet
determined. that the national democratic
party viii put a sound money plank in the
national platform. Il is mere waste Of
time. therefore. TO talk about what the
Macon convention ought 10 or ought not
to do. The silver faction has mapped out
alton in favor Of free silver coinage. In
our opinion Il would make such "a declar-
alton If it were certain that the success
of the national democratic ticket depend
ed upon Georgia. and that the democratic
party would lose Georgia If it made such
declaration.
We do not Of course know all that took
place i'm the state committee at it's recent
meeting. but we should not be surprised
if the true reason for the calling of only
one convention was made known there.
We are quite certain that If it was not
it is stnl secret with the leaders of the
| silver faction.
The sound money democrats Of the state
make a mistake If they think the Macon
convention, II controlled by the silver fac
tion. will forego making a declaration in
favor of free silver coinage in order TO Sc
cure party harmony. 1t will make that
| declaration at any cost.
Already it is planning for It. Its organs
are declaring that there is practically no
sound money sentiment in the state. The
Atlanta Constitution in it's Thursdays is
whelming majority Of the democratic vot-
ers Of the state are opposed to the single
gold standard, and we think the fact will
be shown during the approaching cam
palgn that if all who favor the single gold
standard were to flock by themselves, as
they are threatening to do in Kentucky.
and some other states, the party would be
as large or even larger after they retired
as it was before, for. with this element
| ont of the way, thousands of democratic
voters who have been acting with the
\ populists would return to their allie
glance"
| Where the Constitution gets its author
ity for saying the silverites are over
whelmingly in the majority in the demo-
cratic party of this state we do not know.
We do not hesitate to say there is no au-
thority for such a statement. Even the
city of Atlanta, in which the Constitution
| is published, is Overwhelmingly against
the free coinage of silver Who is there
who does not remember the Griffin free
| silver coinage convention? What a ri
diculous showing it made for free silver
coinage! And in what platform has the
| democrats of Georgia ever declared for
free silver coinage at the ratio of 16 to
1? 1t seems to US there is an entire want
of any ground for saying that the MAORI
ty of the democrats of the state are free
silverites. The situation, we believe, is
this: The majority of the free silverites
have left the democratic party and are
now populists. The majority of the dem
ocrats are in favor of sound money.
What the sound money men should do
is this: They should get to work making
converts to their views. They should see
! to it that only sound money men are NOM
| mated for delegates to the Macon conven-
ton and as candidates for the legislature
| The politicians as a rule are against them
but that need not discourage them. If
they carry on an earnest and intelligent
campaign they can easily control the Ma
con convention and the next legislature.
But they must not neglect their opportu-
nifty TO win the victory. They must make
the most of it. The free silverites have
already begun their campaign. They are
spreading free Silver literature broad
cast over the state The sound money
men must get to work at once