The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-09-24
POPS ARE STILL ALIVE
Chairman Shifelbin Issues a
Manifesto.
PLANS FOR THE CAMPAIGN
6oth OF the Old Parties Arraigned and
the Only Hope of the Masses.
Will Not Consider a
Fusion,

Apparently Chairman Shifelbin of
the populists will not tamely submit to
the proposition made at the labor con-
ference in Helena to start a new party
in place of the old populist party. He
insists that the populist party is still
alive and he has issued the following
manifesto to prove it:
ITO the Peoples Party of Montana
Greeting: In duty to you and tie trust
reposed, we will answer publicly the
numerous inquiries that we have re-
ceived from populists throughout the
state in regard to the policy and plans
of the committee for the coming cam
paign. When, as result of unjust legis-
!ation enacted by both of the old par
ties, the liberties of the people are over
ridden by corporate avarice and their
industrial opportunities are being cur
tailed by trusts and combines: when
the executive, legislative and judicial
departments of the government are I'M
der the absolute control of moneyed
oligarchy that neither in spirit nor in
practice has any regard for the prin-,
ciples that underlie free institutions.
and which, as result of it's pernicious
and corrupt methods has already placed
over rs per cent. of the entire, wealth
OF this nation in the possession of less
! than IA per cent. of its habitants
| who. by their monopoization of the in
dustr1al opportunities and the mainte-
nance OF a special financial system
have undermined the very groundwork
Of political independence, which is
practically impossible under the eco
nomic conditions of to-day. The initi-
alive and referendum, the government
ownership of the public utilities and
revision OF the present financial system
are the only remedies that Will restore
TO the people their rights and solve the
industrial problems that confront them
In the face of these facts for the
party that has advocated these princi-
pies Tor more than seven years and
championed these measures wherever it
has been given an opportunity, both in
congress and in the different state leg
lslatures, to retire from the contest
would not only be treason to it's prin-
ciples, but sacrifice of personal honor
to which no member of it who believes
IN equity, justice and the ultimate
triumph of the truth can subscribe In
the late national contest corruption and
coercion, aided by the ignorance and
subserviency to the mandates of the
corporations on the part of a large
number of citizens of this republic
Mark Hanna was successful.
In the late state campaign the dem
ocratic millionaire chieftains, aided by
the treason of Smith and the perfidy of
Hartman, achieved success. The DEM
ocrats elected 10 of the total of. 95 mem
bers of the legislature. who registered
an oath to safeguard the rights of the
people and to cherish the honor of the
state, and what are the facts? There
are, $4,000 in the treasury of the state
that are indisputable evidence. substaii-
tiated by the testimony of the demo.
\
democratic members of the legislature,
that it was placed into the hands of a
democrat to be paid to certain parties
after they had voted for a specified
democratic candidate for the United
States senate, for which candidate IL
regular republicans and four silver re-
publicans also voted. This fact was IN
vestigated by grand jury which, in
the face of such democratic evidence,
could not find any democrat guilty
either of having attempted t. Oh done
anything that was in their opinion d
crime for democratic candidate.
THE democratic members split into
factions, the one accusing the other of
having been purchased outright; the
other retorting that they We're free
democrats and hence could sell if they
so desired privilege, they claimed
the other faction did not have, for the
reason that they were owned before
hand and held in the path of rectitude
by a copper collar which was attached
to the Standard Oil barrel. while their
own $1,000 bills could be exchanged for
gold, with which some of them were
going to buy the choicest bourbon in
barrels that had never contained OIL
and thus, to their minds. We're pure,
and from the contents of which any
good democrat could partake without
contamination.
But this fierce factional strife sud
denly had a lapse. The Standard Oil
people had measure known as house
bill 1872 on the passage of which their
hearts We're set, and as they did not
nave votes enough of their own to in
sure its passage they appealed to the
bourbon barrel faction for aid. who,
in the goodness of heart and no doubt
10 their well-oiled consciences, claspod
the owe branch and thereby insured
the success of a measure that placed
years of the labor and struggles of
thousands of prospectors in the state at
the mercy of stock iobbers and foreign
stockholders. If -hundredth part cf
what the democratic press has said
about the corruptness of the democratic
members of the Legislature be true and
If only a small fraction of what those
members themselves have accused each
othSr of is based on fact, then the
states prison would have been a far
more appropriate abode for them to
have served in for a much longer pc
riod than the term for which they drew
salary from the people,
"Of all the corrupt legislatures that
ever met, of which any record has been
preserved, it is the most notorious: in
brazen effrontery it's equal is not
known; in debauchery it far excelled
all the previous legislatures combined
with which this state has been cursed
1t has made the very name of Montana
an object of ridicule and scorn, and so
besmirched its escutcheon that it will
take generations to forget. 1t has fur
nished the people an object lesson that
representative government is failure
and demonstrated the absolute need of
direct legislation, taking from the cor
rupt millionaires and corporations the
power of special legislation; on these
measures the populist party has clean
record in the state in the last four ses-
sions of the legislature. 1t received the
full vote of the party. In the Fifth as
Sembly If was defeated by the votes of