The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1899-05-25
AN ABLE DOCUMENT
Address of the President of the Ma
tiOnal Reform Press Association,
Delivered at Kansas City, Mo-, May
10th, 1899.

Brethren and Sisters of the N. R. P.
A.-Another year has come and gone,
and again we are assembled in annual
meeting to renew pleasant acquaintance,
to exchange fraternal greeting to re-
hearse the labors of the past in behalf of
righteous cause, to congratulate each
other on the successes that have attend
ed honest efforts for the alienation of the
oppressed, to carefully note our mistakes
that they may henceforth be avoided,
and to devise ways and means to pro-
mote the interest of the industrial and
wealth producing classes of this coun-
try, in their irrepressible conflict against
the insOlent aggressions and grievous
wrongs sought to be heaped upon them
by the plutocracy.
In such a glorious cause the reform
press long since enlisted, and though
trials and tribulations have beset us on
every hand, and failure has often at
tended our labors, there is to be no re-
taxation of efforts and surrender until
decisive triumph for the people shall
have been won.
1t is not arrogance to claim that no
class in this country have been more
patient, more earnest, and more self
sacrificing in their devotion to the cause
of right and justice than the reform
press, and if ours is to be again a gov
ernment for the benefit of the governed;
if the right to life, liberty and the pur-
suit of happiness is to be restored to the
people; if our beloved country is to be in
fact as in name "the land of the free
and the home of the brave" to the re-
form press should be ascribed the praise
accorded to the faithful sentinel on the
watch tower, who bravely guarded the
gates of the city, noted the insidious ap-
proach of the enemy, and gave timely
warning to the sleeping inmates within
the citadel, that they might rally to the
defense of the republic purchased by the
blood of the patriot fathers and trans
mitted by them to posterity as sacred
heritage
HOW THE PEOPLES PARTY WAS
FORMED.
Years ago the destructive policy of the
Republican party and the deceit and
treachery of the Democracy, who, pre-
tending to oppose Republicanism before
the election, always betrayed the trust
reposed in them afterwards, created the
necessity for new political organiza-
ton, which should take the constitution
as it's guide, equal rights to all and
special privileges to none" as it's slogan
and devote it's energies to the restora-
tion of the Union as it was, and the peo-
pie of all the states to that prosperity,
which their interchangeable industry and
the blessings of God on their labors mer-
tied and received before the two old
parties had succumbed to the corrupt
and corrupting influence of plutocracy.
Many of the purest and best men in
the old parties had noted the trend of
events for many years, but hoping to be
instrumental in purifying the party of
their fathers, spent their early manhood
in the work of reformation inside the
party, but finding all their efforts futile,
they were reluctantly impelled to aban-
don old affiliations, and lend their ener-
gies and abilities to the organization of
a new party, which would honestly con-
tend for the true interests of the masses
Moved by the most unselfish and patri-
otic motives, believing implicitly in the
correctness of their principles, firmly re-
lying in the justice of their cause and
trusting to God for a favorable result
these men met at Omaha July 4, 1892,
and organized the Peoples Party.
If the necessity for organizing such
party existed in 1892, the necessity for
its perpetuation exists now. If the
principles avowed at Omaha were cor
rect in 1892, they are correct today. If
the evils Of which we complained in,