Year: 1876

Gentlemen Of the Jackson Corps-1
cordially thank you for this manifesto
tion or your kindness. | do not forget
that last year you enrolled me among
you as an honorary member. | regard
with satisfaction and pride your excel
lent discipline and training as military
body. / recognize in you many repre-
sentatives OF the working men OF
Albany. And when say working men,
/ do not forget that, in our country, the
number who live upon the income OF
what they have accumulated or inherit
ed Is extremely small, and that nearly
every citizen Of our vast republic lives
on the produce OF his daily toll. In
America we are nearly all working men
therefore the interest and prosperity OF
that class may almost be said to be the
/ interest and prosperity OF all. No
country which the sun ever shone upon
has had 30 many blessings as our own
stretching from the Atlantic to the
Pacific, and from the great lakes of the
north to the Gulf OF Mexico; with a
every natural and artificial facility
for travel and transportation, with
all the arts and industries Of
old civilization planted and flour
ishing amid the boundless national
wealth OF q virgin continent, we ought
to be to-day the most prosperous, the
most happy and contented people in the
world. But what is our actual condi-
ton? All business depressed, every
industry ianguishing, labor without en-
pioyment, and the wolf at the door OF
nearly every home In the land--gaunt
and hungry. What is the matter? We
know that For the last eleven years,
since the peace, the earnings of labor
and the income of capital have been
consumed or wasted in governmental
expenditures The taxes drawn from
the people Of the United States have
been larger than the entire net savings
OF the whole 44,000,000. These taxes
have Increased within a short period
fourfold. and the influence is felt upon
every business and every industry, and
in every home throughout our broad
land. What next do we find? In public
administration everywhere abuses, pee
ulations, frauds and corruption, until
we are almost becoming ashamed OF the
institutions OF our country; and instead
Of holding them up as examples for The
imitation or the oppressed people OF
other countries, we are confessing them
as a scandal in the eyes OF mankind.


What else do we find? We find the
officeholding class have become so nu-
4merous, powerful and dunscrupulous that
LnSy assume W COHtIOl Iuo CiCouioho,
and IL the people are Indifferent, or at
ali equally divided, are able to exert a
corrupt influence sufficient to perpetuate
their own power. At last we are reach
ling the worst condition Of the countries
1of the Old World. The Government no
slonger exists for the people. The people
exist only for the Government. Our
Centennial product is the evils, the
vices and wrongs, to escape which our
ancestors abandoned their homes in the
DID World and planted themselves in a
wilderness. Now, | ask, what is the
Eemedy for these public evils; for this
brivate distress; for this disorder in
business which carries suffering into
eyery household? 1t is comprised in
pne word Reform" Reform of the
Dublic administration. Upon this subject
here is difference OF ofopinion. One class
4ay: Elect the nominees OF the party
tnder which these evils have grown up,
Nv means OF the of1iceholding class,


Jhich is interested in perpetuating
Snese abuses and wrongs-adopt mega
Ions on whom all the contending fac
ions could agree without danger or
sy,arm to any or to the system by which
Eley fatten on the sufferings OF the peo-
sie That is one opinion. There is an


lsher opinion, and that opinion demands


ohange-a change of men for the sake


reform in administration. Fellow


tizens. / do not intend to argue this


Gestion. j intend to simply state it


Id leave 1t to your Judgment and to the
sdrment of the people. / am heartily


til you in sympathy and action, | am
ssppy to meet you tonight. trust L
Fsa2I have an opportunity of seeing you


;raafter. Again thanking you for your


nd attention, bid you good evening,