The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-07-03
THE DEMOCRATIC PLATFORM

Iteers before the bar of criminal justice
 THE TARIFF
 We reaffirm the traditional policy of the democratic party in favor of a tariff l for revenue only and to confirm the policy of passing tariff revisions upon the intelligent research of a nonpartisan commission, rather than upon the de- mands of selfish interests, temporarily held in abeyance.
 BUDGET
 1 Tn the interest of economy and good administration, we favor the creation of | an effective budget system that will | function in accord with the principles ot the constitution. The reform should reach both the executive and legislative aspects of the question. The supervision and preparation of the budget should be vested in the Secretary of the Treasury az the representative of the President The budget as such, should not be in- creased by the Congress except by two thirds vote each house, however, being free to exercise it's constitutional privi- lcge of making appropriations through | independent bills. The appropriation bills should be considered by single com mittees of the House and Senate. The audit system should be consolidated and its powers expanded so as to pass upon the wisdom of as well the authority for expenditures.
 A budget bill was passed In the clos ing days of the second session of the sixty-six Congress which invalfdated lby plain constitutional defects and de- faced by considerations of patronage the President was obliged to peto. The House amended the bill to meet the executives objections. We condemned the republican Senate for adjourning without passing the amended measure when by devoting an hour or two more to this urgent public business a budget system could have been provided.
 SENATE RULES
 We favor such alteration of the rules of procedure of the Senate of the United States as will permit the prompt trans action of the nations legislative busi- ness.
 AGRICULTURAL INTERESTS
 To the great agricultural interests of the country the democratic party does not find it necessary to make promises 1t already is rich in it's record of things actually accomplished. For nearly half a century of republican rule, not a sen tence was written Into the federal statu- tes affording dollar of bank credits to the farming interests of America. In the first term of this democratic ad- ministration the national bank act was so altered as to authorize loans of five years maturity on improved farm lands. Later was established a system of farm loan banks, from which the borrowings already exceed 300000,000 of dollars and under which the interest rate to farmers has been so materially reduced to drive out of business the farm loan sharks who formerly subsisted by ex- tortion upon the great agricultural in- terests of the country.
 Thus it was a democratic Congress in the administration of democratic Presi- dent which enabled the farmers of Amer ica for the first time to obtain credit upon reasonable terms and insured their opportunity for the future development of the nations agricultural resources. Tied up in supreme court proceedings, in a suit by hostile interests, the federal farm loan system, originally opposed by the republican candidate for the presidency appealed in vain to a repub- lican Congress for adequate financial as- sstance to tide over the interim be- tween the beginning and the ending Of the current year. awaiting a final de- cjson of the highest court on the validity of the contested act We pledge prompt and consistent support of sound and ef- fectve measures to sustain, amplify and perfect the rural credits statutes and thus to check and reduce the growth and course of farm tenancy.
 Not only did the democratic party put into effect a great farm loan sys- tenn of land mortgag banks but it passed the Smith-Lever agricultural extension act carrying to every farmer in every section of the country through the medi- um of trained experts and by demon- stration farms. the practical knowledge acquired by the federal agricultural de- partment in all things relating to agri- culture, horticulture and animal lfe it established the bureau of markets, the bureau of farm management and passed the cotton futures act, the grain grades bill, the cooperative farm ad- mnistration act and the federal ware house act.
 | The democratic party has vastly inn proved the rural mail system and has built up the parcel post system to such an extent as to render to activities and it's practical service indispensable to the farming community. It was this wise en- lcouragement and this effective concern of the democratic party for the farmers of the United States that enabled this great interest to render such essential service in feeding the armies of Amer ica and the allied nations of the war, and succoring starving populations since armistice day.
 Meanwhile the republican leaders at Washington have failed utterly to pro pose one single measure to make rural life more tolerable. They have signal ized their fifteen months of congressional power by matching schemes which would strip the farms of labor by assailng the principles of the farm loan system. and seeking to impair it's effiency and covertly attempting to destroy the great nitrogen plant at Muscle Shoals upon which the government has expended s70, ,O00,00O to supply American farmers with fertilizers at reasonable costs' ruthlessly crippling nearly every branch of agricultural endeavor, literally crip- bling the productive mediums through which the people must be fed.
 We favor such legislation as will con- firm to the primary producers of the na- Ition the right of collective bargaining and the right of cooperative handling and | marketing of the products of the work shops and the farm, and such legislation as will facilitate the exportation of our farm products.
 We favor comprehensive studies of farm production costs and the uncen- sored publication of facts found in such 1 studies
 , The democratic party is now. as ever, l the firm friend of honest labor and the promoter of progressive industry. It es- tablished the department of labor at } Washington and democratic President called to his official councial board the first practical workngman who ever lheld a cabinet portfolio. Under this ad- ministration have been established em- , ployment bureaus to bring the man and { the job together; have been peaceably determined many bitter disputes -betwee' < capital and labor; were passed the child , labor act the wcrkingmen's compensa- f tion act (the extension of which we ad- l, vocated so as to include laborers en-