The county record. [volume] (Kingstree, S.C.) 1885-1975, 1908-07-23
DEMOCRATIC PARTY PLATFORM
Statement Of Principles Drawn Up by
Committee on Resolutions.
PUBLICITY OF CAMPAIGN CON
TRlBUTIONS.
Continued from last week.

SStl leIulHdliuS tilS pai tnSiS Oil
which has existed between corpora
tions of the country and the Repub
lican party under the expressed an(
implied agreement that in return TO
the contributions of great sums o
money wherewith to purchase elec
tions they should be allowed to con
tinue substantially unmolested ii
their efforts to encroach upon th'
rights of the people.
Any reasonable doubt as to the ez
istence of this relation has been for
ever dispelled by the sworn testimon!
of witnesses examined IN the insur.
ance investigation in New York anC
the open admission, unchallenged by
the Republican national committee
OF single individual that he himself
at the personal request of the Re.
publican candidate for the presidency
raised over a quarter of million
dollars to be used in a single State
during the closing hours OF the last
campaign. In order that this prac-
tice shall be stopped for all time We
demand the enactment of a statute
Furnishing with imprisonment any
officer of a corporation who shall
either contribute on behalf of or
consent to the contribution by cor.
poration of any money or thing of
value to be used in furthering the
election of president and vice
president of the United States or of
any member of the congress thereof.
We denounce the action of the
Republican party, having complete
control of the federal government,
for its failure to pass the bill, intro
dueed in the last congress, to COM
pei the publication of the names of
contributors and the amounts con-
tributed toward campaign funds and
point to the evidence Of their incon-
sistency, when they set out by an
absolutely irrelevant and impossible
amendment to defeat the passage of
the bill. For evidence of their in
tention to conduct their campaign
in the coming contest with vast sums
Of money wrested from favor seeking
corporations, We call attention to the
fact that the recent Republican
national convention at Chicago re-
fused, when the plank was presented
to it, to declare against such prac.
tices.
We pledge the Democratic party
to the enactment of law preventing
any corporation contributing to a
campaign fund and any individual
from contributing an amount above
q reasonable maximum and provid-
ing for the publication before cleo
ton of all such contributions above
q reasonable minimum.
PANAMA CANAL.
We believe the Panama canal will
prove of great value TO our country
and favor its speedy completion.
THE RIGHTS OF STATES.
Believing with Jefferson IN "the
support of the State governments IN
all their rights as the most compe-
tent administration for our domestic
concerns and the surest bulwark
against anti-republican tendencies, y
and in "the preservation of the gen
eral government in its whole consti.
tutional vigor, as the sheet anchor
of our peace at home and the safety
abroad" We are opposed to the cen
tralizatlon implied in those sugges'
tions, now frequently made, that tht
powers of the general government
should be extended by judicial con-
structlon, There is no twilight zon'
between the nation and the State il
which exploiting interests can tak'
refuge from both +; and it is as neces
sary that the federal government
shall exercise the powers delegated
to it as it is that the State govern
ments shall use the authority reserved