The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1896-12-19
Says Senator Allen Was Mild in
His Statements.
ARE HONEST AS ANY.
Kansas Has Been Helped But
Has Also SuceOred.

PETER also made q speech de1endlIiS
Kansas against the scurrilOus and ma
ncious attacks of the eastern press
His speech as it appears in the Con
gressiOnal Record is as follows
Il assume, Mr.. President, that the
object the senator from Nebraska haa
in view in Offering the resolution was
to express his opinions concerning
the charges which have been recently
made in the newspaper press or the
country and by some men OF enlnence
in law and in politics that some OF the
western states, and especially Nepfas-
ka and Kansas by name, are governed
laWlessly. that they are under the rule
of men whose natural political tenden-
Giles are in harmony, working together
toward anarchy toward the revocation
of contracts, toward the notification or
law The senator has put his case
mildly and decorously, as he always
does. and now that the discussion
seems TO be taking wide range 1 my
self feel called upon to say something
about it.
Some newspapers in New York city
Chicago. and other cities have taken
occasion to go out of their way, out
side of the legitimate course OF Jour
nalism in order to make political capt
tai out of misfOrtunes that have DeIall-
en- the western people, and in doing so
they have undertaken to brand US as
men without honor. men without con
science and that we are undertaking
to rule the community through the
power of revolutionary ideas
SO far as the state of Kansas is con-
CeIneu- MI. ErESlQetll- 1 lIlAh 4 hAAOW
something about that state have
lived there more than a quarter OF a
century. and from the beginning OF
that period until this time I have had
more or less to do with the political
conditions of the state / remember
very Well that during the years 1874
and 1875 we We're visited by a cloud Of
grasshOppers. when many of our wheat
fields We're absolutely denuded, trees
stripped of their Verdure, and whole
farms were left destitute by the raw
ages of the devOuring insects I was a
member of the state senate during the
session of 1875 and 18T6,and took an ac-
tive part in rendering relief to our own
people simply because of those trou-
bles. But the relief took the form of a
bill apprOpriating money out of the
treasury, and at that time we had
surplus of some $4,000. The bill did
not pass. We made UP our minds I'M
ally that we could take care of our
selves, and we did so. But during that
session a bill was proposed to enact
stay law, SO that judgments then ia
force might he stayed and that the
time of the payment Of debts might be
postponed in order that the people
might pass over another year and have
an opportunity to meet their Obliga-
lions without great loss However that
bill was not passed, and so far as I can
recOllect there has never been stay
law passed in our state.
The only legislation of a character
which might by any possible construc-
ton be regarded as interfering with
by the legislature in 1889. 1t was an
act reducing the legal rate of interest
from per cent to 8 per cent. We had
there, as I think they have in most of
the northwestern states, two limits to
the rate of interest. one recognized as
the legal rate. to be enforced when no
stipulation had been made by the par
ties. and the other known as the con-
tract rate where persons may contract
for a particular rate of interest. not to
exceed the one named At that time
any not a ont 17H fn17r
contract rate was II per cent. That
law was repealed and another one en-
acted in it's stead making the legal rate
per cent and the contract rate 10 per
cent That was done under the iuris-
dicti0n of Republican admins tTatiOn.
The Republican majority was over
whelming. lit was before the birth of
the POpulist party There were not to
exceed five or six Democrats in bOth
houses of the legislature. Kansas never
has been regarded as good soil for De
mocracy. and it is not even yet. That
was in 1889
I'm 1890 came what was properly re-
garded as a political revolution ian that
state In the election campaign Of that
year the Popuists elected five mem
bers Of congress out of eight. They
elected an overwhelming majority of
the legislature, and we believed then
and still believe that we elected our
governor. or cast votes enough to elect
him. But a Republican governor was
lnsaugurated- During the session of the
legislature which followed there was
nothing of the character to which these
newspapers allude- There was nothing
revolutionary either proposed or enact
ed There was no stay laws passed.
There were no laws passed affecting the
obligation of contracts in any way ex-
cept it be in what / shall state and [
think lawyers who are listening to me
viii agree with me that there was no
attempt to affect or no effect upon the
obligation OF contracts in that law. Tt
was an act authorizing mortgagors to
redeem their lands when sold under
foreclosure proceedings in court.
THAT remedy was proposed in the
Repu blican state convention held the
August preceding, if I remember cor
rectly the month. A resolution was in
PRODUCED giving it as the sense Of the
Republican party of the state that
redemption law allowing two years
should be passed 1t was finally COM
promised after very full discussion
by able men in that convention by
making ii one year. and as a further
compromise the next legislature passed
an act making the redemption period
is months That is all that was done
in that respect. A question came UP in
the court afterwards whether the act
applied to contracts already existing at
the time the law was passed. The
court held that it did not. Afterwards
the chief Justice resigned. His success
s0r was appointed by the Republican
governor and during the administra-
ton of the chief justice appointed by
the Republican governor a similar case
perhaps the same one) was brought to
the attention of the court again. and
then by a majority of the court it was
held that the law applied to existing
contracts we'll as to those in future
! remember the case came to the SUI
preme court of the United States and
the state court was oVerruled.
with those exceptions. there has
been nothing attempted or enacted in
any way aHecting the relations be-
tween debtor and creditor in the state
of Kansas.