The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1901-03-06
ARTHUR RoPHs. General Editor.
Four Years Of Mckinley.


Grover Cleveland was a candidate Tor
the office, the campaign rhymester was
assuring the country that with four
years more of Grover the people would
be in clover. The country had four
years more of Grover, but the clover
did not materialize. Instead of this
type of nutritious heritage, brakes and
brlArs and desolation spread over the
land.
Grover went out at last and four
years ago today Mckinley came in.
The reign of desolation came to an
end and the recovery of the country
from commercial, industrial and finan-
cial paralysis began. That measure
that closed the mills of the country
pro strated business and arrested the
Nations industrial march, the Wilson
tariff law, was replaced, in an extra ses-
sion of Congress by the Dingley law.
There was an end of the policy under
which the government had been borrow
ing hundreds of millions of dollars to
pay the expenses of its administration.
Confidence was restored. Industry,
severely crippled, took up its march
again, hobbled along painfully for a
few months amid the jeers of those
who had sustained the policy of desc
lation. Finally it's stiffened limbs were
limbered by exercise and its blood be-
gan to warm. Fires were rekindled in
mills that had long been cold and 81
lent, and operatives began to occupy
the deserted precincts. BY tens and
scores and hundreds the army of idle
and hungry laborers were reenlisted,
till all were again employed, again fed,
clothed and happy.
The tide of revenue came sparingly
at first, bat the prophets of evil were
a ain disappointed; under the opera
ton of the Dingley bill in good time
the treasury was refilled, the credit of
the government fully restored and
safeguarded against any peril. The
election of William Mckinley to the
presidency, the return of the govern
ment in all its departments to Re-
publican control, the Redistribution of
Republican policies, had been highly
indicated.
The administration inherited from
its predecessor one of those unsettled
issues that hath no mercy on the peace
of nations. The new Cuban revolu-
ton had been several years in progress.
The island under the oppression of
Spain presented spectacle that APP
pealed powerfully to the sympathies of
the American people. Intervention
was demanded from all parts of the re-
public. The Republican party was
pledged to intervene. While the ques.
ton of the form and manner of inter-
vening was still a matter of debate,
while this government was sending
ship loads of provisions to feed the
starving Cubans whom the Spaniards
had herded like cattle in the environs
OF the larger places, and the humane
agencies of the United States were en-
listed in the work of relieving or miti-
eating suffering and restitution that
were practically irremediable except by
the means of last resort, the blowing up
of the Maine came to end debate and
crystalline action.
The events of the war with Spain
are history. Opportuniti es that come
rarely to administrations for great SER
vice to the world at large, for honor
and distinction to their country and
great good to humanity, came to
President Mckinley and the party his
administration represented. These OPP
portunities were embraced. Cuba was
liberated, and the movement for it's
liberation set free from the oppression
of the same power some 10000, 900 peo-
pie on the other side of the globe. The
battle of Manila bay, the trip of the
Oregon, the naval action off the south
coast of Cuba, and innumerable minor
contests and incidents on the water,
and, on the land, San Juan, Ell Caney
and Santiago de Cuba, told of what
sort of stuff the men and officers Of the
military service of the United States
were made.
With a fulness of measure never
surpassed, President Mckinley has re-
deemed his pledges for the restoration
of prosperity to his country. So COM
plete has been the degree of fulfill
ment, the leading industrial nations OF
Europe are contemplating with alarm
American invasion of "the markets of
the world" and seeking means for their
own protection. American exports, in
the last fiscal year of the government,
reached the aggregate of billion and
a half of dollars, which is not simply
IN al hut ortafr;oa oil fo.,,, -