The evening times., 1899-06-28
WEDNESDAY, JUNE rs. 1899.
Auti-ENpansiOn in Kentucky.


After a great deal of heat and bad Ian
guage, and under efficient police sur
veillance, the Kentucky Democrats have
managed to nominate candidate for gov
ernor. The platform on which he Will run,
although containing good planks. includes
one which will have the same effect on the
whole that rotten apple has on barrel
of sound ones With the party in the State
committed to the Hoar- r-Atkinson- Schurz-
Godkin heresy. Kentucky will not be likely
to appear in the Democratic column IN
1900 unless the national convention OF the
party shall. in terms unmistakable. de-
nounce the false doctrine and thereby save
the votes of Democrats who are also
American patriots, in al parts of the coun-
try.
What the chances for Goebel and the
Carl Schurz policy may be in the state.
in the present gubernatorial campaign, We
are not prepared to say. But ii is reason
able to assume that anti-expaasicn will
cost the organization many thousands OF
votes Provincial leaders seem too dense
to understand that the masses of the peo
pie have thought out the problem of ma
tional expansion for themselves TO much
greater extent than is generally realized.
The relations of our Philippine possessions
TO future American commerce with Asia:
their value as furnishing a virgin field
for American enterprise and development.
their necessity TO the trade and naval pow
CT of the United States in the Pacific. all
these things have been in excogitation by
the plain people of the Union for many
months.
The masses may be comparatively un-
learned in economic lore. but they know
enough to see the danger Of restriction to
overcrcwded home markets. They recog
nize the vital need OF new openings for the
surplus products of farm, mill, and fac
tory. and do not forget what depression
existed but a sort time ago for lack of
available foreign markets. The citizens
who have thought out these things, are
quite intelligent enough to appreciate the
coTollary of the proposition which is that
We cannot have great world commerce
without correspondingly great navy and
naval stations; and that, given these large
colonial possessions in the Eastern Hem
isphere will be SO much mere added to the
strength of our position and to our COM
mercial possibilities.
Anti-expansion is a direct and cruel at
tack upon all our material interests. Ii
seeks to throttle the chance of each farm
er, miner. manufacturer. and merchant to
find outland openings for the fruits of his
labor, or enterprise; and to subject him
oil tho
to a limited domestic market, already
overstocked. and becoming more so each
year: and. still worse, absolutely dominat-
ed by the heartless trusts and monopolies
which have been bred and fostered by the
iniQuitous Chinese wall tariff policy of the
Republican party.
Because national expansion is strictly an
economic issue, and a universal necessity
to all classes Of Americans in any way
connected with productive industry, it
cannot properly be made a political aues-
tion. II is the faith and hope of thinking
people in both of our great parties. That
It represents one of the glorious expansive
principles of genuine JefTersonian Democ-
racy. will not keep Republican freemen
from supporting il; and intelligent Demo-
Gratis will not fail to fight for it because a
few thick-headed bucolic leaders see fit to
antagonze it.
good thing will happen if the Demo-
cratic organizations in other States have
the sense to avoid the idiocy exhibited by
the Louisville convention in its platfrom
assault upon American progress and civili
zation. They Ought to be on notice by
this time that the party which shall adopt
as its slogan would do well
TO omit the trouble and expense of a
Presidential canvass. 1t will have as much |
chance of success before the American peo.
pie as the sheep has to kill the butcher.