A — ■ K i % Jf J F E E O EE —DELIVERED BY— he Political Issues, BEFORE Jefferson Chib, No. /, PRINGFIELD,LLL., AUGUST 2d. 1884. '. ■* •r-.'i'v^.'-A.v v : ;> « • > ^. -*■ . •«• u,' -<■ • * '■te&tffhF''** ' •V * , 1 -^ V' ' & i 5 Vv*-■*.> ; * JSe*;x" ’■-i. i «+■ - «vr " jfcv te. SPRINGFIELD: Slate Register,' Steam Book Print, 1884. THE POLITICAL- ISSUES. A speech delivered by James A. Creighton, Esq , before Jefferson Club No. 1, at Spring- y » field, Ill., August 2, 1884. ■k Mr. President , Members of Jefferson Club and Fellow-Citizens: The theory upon which this Government is founded is that K- the people are sovereign; that their will constitutionally ex- pressed shall determine its policies and agencies. It therefore becomes the duty of every citizen, before exercising the func¬ tions of sovereignty, which he exercises in the highest degree when casting his vote, to examine into the condition and needs of the country and make himself acquainted with proposed measures and men, and until he has done this and can vote in¬ telligently upon living issues he has not performed the duty of , a good citizen. Once every four years the people of this great Democratic i Republic are called upon to adopt governmental policies and se¬ lect agents to carry into effect the policies adopted. There has been, since the organization of this government—yea, since be¬ fore its organization—two lines* of political doctrine struggling for mastery in this country. One based upon the belief that governments are super-human entities, and exist by some sort of superior right for the purpose of governing the people. The adherents of this doctrine, tainted with lingering traces of fear of the common people and reverence for monarchy, would have made Washington king and the people subjects. Thwarted in this by the patriotism of Washington, they favored an aristocracy; resisted in this at every step by such men as Jefferson, and unable to force it upon the people, they iavored f and still favor, a strong, centralized government, as far removed from the people as possible, with large paternal powers, and few or no limitations. The party organizations which have adhered to and so far as lay in their power practiced this dangerous and un-American doctrine are the Federal party, the Loose Constructionist, the Whig party, the Know-nothing party, and the modern Repub¬ lican party, all lineal descendants of one common evil ancestor. Mind, I say, the modern Republican party. The Republican party of 1856 to 1864 was not the Republican party of to-day. Chase, Sumner, Seward, Greely, Curtin, Palmer, Trumbull and a host of pure men of those days have long since ceased to govern in its councils or affiliate with it. The party of 1856 was born of an emergency and died when that emergency passed away; and men of vastly different principles and for vastly dif- ferent purposes seized upon its organization and prostituted i to their own base ends. Tlio nflicv VvooDfl n foifli in fVin nononifiT nf flin noAnl! it The other, based upon faith in the capacity of the people to govern themselves, the belief that government agencies should be servants and not masters of the people, and an abkorence of the paternal idea in government. The party organization which has always adhered to and always practiced these safe and purely American principles is the grand old Democratic party. It has survived the Federal party, it has survived the Loose Construction party, it has survived the Whig 1 party, it has survived the Know-nothing party, and by the patriotism of the American people and the grace of the eternal God it will survive the modern Republican party and continue to live. Were it to die the star of liberty would go down in darkness, and free government perish from the face of the earth. During the time this grand peoples’ party was in power and its policies were pursued we prospered as no nation upon earth ever prospered. We acquired and added to the public domain Florida, Louisiana, California, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Min¬ nesota, Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Indian Territory, Texas, Col¬ orado, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Washington Territory, Ore¬ gon, Nevada, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico; increasing our territory 200 per cent, and extending our borders from the Missis¬ sippi river to the Pacific ocean. And the modern Republican party preaching and practicing paternal government, centralization, and loving and fostering monopolies, giving its favors to the rich and its promises to the poor; while constantly declaring that the public domain is a sacred heritage and must be pre¬ served for homes for the people, has actually given away to great corporations and allowed to fall into the hands of aliens, vast empires of this sacred heritage (all the best of it) more in acreage than is contained in all the cultivated farms in the United States to-day. While at the same they have refused to the soldiers of the Mexican war, by whose valor and blood most of this domain was won, the pitiful pittance of a pension of $8 per month. With these pledges in their mouths they returned from Chicago to the United States Senate and failed to pass the pending bill to forfeit the unearned and lapsed railroad land grants. All honest men agree that the public domain is a sacred heritage and ought to be preserved for homes for the people. * The political issue, is, Can the Republican party be trusted as the agents of the people to “preserve this sacred heritage?” We answer , No. By sympathy, by education and by practice the Republican party is incompetent to execute this trust. No; that party would vote what is left of it as it has what is gone to bloated corporations, composed of Republican Congressmen and English lords; and they to encourage “our diversified industries” would sell it to the disinherited settler at a tariff of ten dollars per acre. 'We need a Navy (we have none) to protect our interests upon the high seas, and have needed it for nineteen years. U During that time there has been appropriated and placed in the hands of Republican officials for the purpose of repairing and re-, building our Navy over three hundred million dollars of the people’s money, much of which is admitted to have been squan¬ dered, and all of which was so misused as to have produced no results, and to-day even little Chili in South America laughs our Navy to scorn. The political issue is , Can the Republican party be trusted as the agents of the people “to restore our navy to its old time strength and efficiency.” We ansvjer , No. If that party, with three hundred million dollars, in nineteen years has made no progress towards restor¬ ing our navy, the money it would squander would be too much, and the time it would consume too long to justify the people in entrusting the Republican party with this important government business. There was a time when the sails of American ships whitened every sea, when the masts of our merchant marine studded, like trees of the forest, every harbor upon the face of the globe, and the star spangled banner was known and respected by all peoples and in all lands; when American products were car¬ ried by American merchants and American sailors, in American ships, to every market in the world. Rut a Republican Congress imposed burdens upon American shipping, as a part of its policy of imposing burdens upon all American industries, and to-day American shipping is a thing of the past. It has succumbed to the burdens imposed. To-day the sails of our ships w’hiten no ^ seas, the masts of our merchant marine stud no harbors, the stars and stripes are neither known nor respected beyond our #' own coasts; no American merchant nor American sailor goes forth into the marts of the world seeking a market for Ameri- > can products. Our export trade such as has survived the burdens imposed upon it is taken from our own shores by foreign merchants, at their own price, in foreign ships by foreign sailors, to their own ports, and by them distributed to ' the markets of the world, they reaping the profits of carrying, the profits of buying and selling and the profits of seeking and finding the best markets of the world. The present desperate condition of our carrying and foreign trade and American ship¬ ping can no better be told than by quoting General Wallace, United States Minister to Turkey, (a Republican). He says: “Turkey is naturally a rich country; has thirty millions of peo- 6 % pie; they manufacture nothing, but are dependent for the most ordinary necessaries of life upon foreigners. What is needed on our side is that we should have ships to carry our products directly to that country, but there is no hope for us so long as our trade is carried there in foreign bottoms. In the three years that I have been at Constantinople (that great commercial . y center, I never have seen our flag upon a ship of commerce or a steamer there.” In 1882 of 560 ocean steamers plying the Atlantic between the United States and Europe only four bore the stars and stripes; and to-day there is not one. This tells a J tale that ought to bring a blush to the face of every American citizen, and stamp as ruinous the policy and as criminally in¬ competent the government agency that has produced such re- suits. The political issue is, Can the American people trust the Republican party as its agents to “ remove the burdens that have depressed American shipping and restore it to its old time prestige and vigor?” We answer, Wo. That party imposes the burdens. Dur¬ ing nineteen years of profound peace it has continued the burdens. It has seen our hampered producers at the mercy of foreigners, has seen foreign ship owners reaping a harvest of a hundred million dollars a year in carrying American products, has seen foreign merchants reap the profits of seeking and find¬ ing a market for American goods. Yea, it has not only seen all this but in all these long years has not so much as raised a hand or spoken a word in Congress to remedy it. No, that party cannot be trusted to remove these burdens; it is contrary to the arbitrary and abnormal doctrines upon which that party is founded, that permeates its whole warp and woof, which vicious principle distorts its judgment and lends a bias to its every act. The civil service of the country needs to be thoroughly re- ^ formed. Its condition has been for sixteen years a crying evil. It has become corrupt from circumference to core. The political issue is, Can the country trust the Republican party as its agent to reform these abuses? ^ We answer, No. For sixteen years the Republican party has been promising to reform the civil service, and each suc¬ ceeding administration has left it worse than it found it. No, it cannot be trusted to accomplish this great reform. The Re¬ publican party is in the hands of corrupt and dishonest men, and the honest members of that party are powerless for good inside its ranks. It is desirable that American citizens, native or naturalized, when traveling or sojourning abroad should have the protection of the American government. The political issue is. Can such citizens trust the Repub* lican party as the agent of this government to extend prompt and proper protection in such cases? We answer , No. On the 2d day of June, 1881, Daniel Me- Sweeney, a naturalized citizen of the United States, while on a visit to Ireland with his family was arrested and imprisoned and no charge made against him. He demanded a hearing and a trial of the English government, which were refused him; and he demanded the protection of the United States. Mr. Lowell, the American Minister to England, did not heed his demands for protection. His wife wrote a most pitiful and imploring letter to James G. Blaine, then Secretary of State, calling upon this government to perform its duty and protect her innocent hus¬ band; but Blaine was so busy with his South American guano schemes, his schemes for collecting revenue by the general gov¬ ernment from whisky, ale, beer and wine to divide up among the States, and his electioneering scheme of having the general government assume the payment of the repudiated debt of the State of Virginia (wonder if he and his friends control any of those bonds) that he had no time to even answer her letter. A brother of McSweeney called upon Blaine and was informed that Lowell’s action was in strict accordance with the instructions of his government. McSweeney, in his letter to his daughter, written behind the bars of an English prison, says: “ Your mother wrote to Mr. Blaine about my case, but that gentleman did not deign even a reply.” How did the question of the duty of this government to protect its citizens become a political issue? Only by the neglect of this government through its agents, the Republican officeholders, notably James G. Blaine, to perform that duty in the case of McSweeney and other similar cases. It is a burn¬ ing, damnable shame that it ever should have become a political issue in this country. The neglect became so protracted, so patent that the whole country became ablaze with indignation, and public meetings were held from one coast to the other; and at one of these meetings held in the city of Buffalo April 9, 1882, Grover Cleveland presided, and on taking the chair he said: “But when in the westward march of empire this nation was founded and took root, we beckoned to the old world and invited hither its emigration, and provided a mode by which those who sought a home among us might become our fellow citizens; they came by thousands and hundreds of thousands; they came and Hewed the dark old woods away And gave the virgin fields to-day. They came to our temples of justice and under the solemnity of an oath renounced all allegiance to every other state, potenteat 8 and sovereignty, and surrendered to us all the duty pertaining to such allegiance. They have surrendered the protection of their native land, we have accepted their fealty, and good faith and everv dictate of honor demands that we give them the same liberty and protection here and elsewhere which we vouchsafed to our native born citizens.” How grand, how true, how \ patriotically inspired are these words. When Wm. L. Marcy was Secretary of State and Commodore Ingraham commanded in { the* Navy, and Kosta, who had renounced his allegiance to the sovereign of his native land and declared his intention of be- coming an American citizen, was seized and imprisoned by Austria, Commodore Ingraham sailed into the harbor of Trieste and with broadside too, demanded the surrender of Kosta on penalty of blowing the town and fort to atoms. Kosta walked forth a free man > Under Democratic rule this question was not a political issue. Compare the action of this governmental agency with that in power when McSweeney’s case arose. Com¬ pare the conduct and language of Cleveland with the conduct and language of Blaine and answer me, you American citizen of foreign birth, yea and you American citizen of native birth who loves mankind, liberty and his country, can the modern Repub¬ lican party be trusted as the agents of this government to pro¬ tect American citizens while sojourning abroad? It is desirable that American labor should be protected. There was a time when the importation of hoards of pauper labor under ironclad contracts at starvation wages into this country to compete with citizen labor was not practiced; when it was not necessary for laborers to strike and finally submit to re¬ duction after reduction in wages; when tramps were unknown; when the laborer was respected as the equal of any man; when he could acquire a home and property; when plenty and comfort was well nigh universal and a millionaire almost unheard of. Now the manufacturing districts are supplied by imported ^ pauper labor under contract to their importers; strikes have be¬ come powerless for good; wages especially in the protected in¬ dustries have been constantly decreasing from year to year; wage workers are compelled to be much of the time out of em- V ployment; the power of the laborer to acquire property is now the exception and not the rule; discontent and in hundreds of thousands of instances want and destitution stalk abroad in the land; vast monopolies prosper; the rich are becoming richer and the poor poorer; we are fast becoming a nation of million¬ aires and paupers. This is the result of abnormal causes, of arbitrary, illadjusted legislation affecting our industries; of that policy which has shut us out from the world and turned us in upon ourselves, causing the strong to prey upon the weak and the rich to consume the poor. We must have a tariff The 9 people must be taxed for the support of the government, for payment of the interest and principal of the national debt, for the payment of pensions to our soldiers, their widows and orphans, and for the making and maintaining of all necessary public improvements; and there is no better way, at least at t present, of raising these vast sums of money than by a tariff tax. And so long as that reliable, patriotic and patient beast of burden , the American farmer, who pays such a large proportion ^ of this tax and gets so little in return for it , is willing to submit , * there will be no very large party in this country opposed to raising all the money needed by that method. But the tariff must be adjusted so as to protect American labor, and must be reduced to the legitimate needs of the government. As it now is it hampers and cripples labor and fosters monopoly, and col¬ lects from the people and takes out of the channels of trade one hundred and twenty-five million dollars a year in excess of all governmental demands of every kind and character, including both the extravagant expenditure and the “leakage” which have drawn so heavily upon it for these sixteen long years. A tariff of ten per cent, on diamonds and comparatively low on silks, and a hundred per cent, on socks and flannels, is ill-adjusted, and in¬ equitable. A tariff that lets in rosewood, satin wood and mahog- ony wood free and taxes the pine boards with which the laborer builds his cottage (if he ever gets able to build one), $2 per thou¬ sand is a monster piece of wrong which discriminates against the poor and in favor of the rich. A tariff tax which puts three dollars into the pockets of proprietors of protected industries for every one it puts into the national treasury, imposes an onerous burden upon that part of the people who pay most of the tax and get least or none of its protection. A tariff system which will enable a protected industry to lie idle one-third of the time with its employes out of employment, and constantly year after year | reduce wages of employes, for the time they do work; and still make a net profit per annum on the investment of thirty-seven * per cent, calls loudly for an equitable readjustment. The political issue is, Can the Republican party be trusted as the agents of the people to reduce the tariff tax and correct its inequalities in favor of labor? We answer, no. It created these inequalities and for more than twenty years has maintained them, and has refused to cor¬ rect them though admitting that they exist. Mr. Blaine says in his letter that this system produced an increase of wealth from I860 to 1880 of $30,000,000,000. The statement is utterly false. The assessed value of all the property in 1860 was $12,000,000,- 000 and in 1880 was $16,000,000,000. In his estimate Mr. Blaine includes the 292,000,000 acres of land which in 1860 was public domain and not estimated, and which his party has voted away, V 10 and which is now scheduled (not for taxation) but in the census reports and in Wall street and London at from $5 to $25 per acre for the purpose of bolstering the bonds and watered stock of the bloated concerns to whom it has voted it, which will not be¬ come accumulated wealth until the poor disinherited home¬ steader or emigrant has bought it back from the corporations to jL which the Republican party has voted it, and by privation, toil and economy has improved it. He estimates as accumulated wealth the tens of thousand miles of railroad built on credit jb since 1865, many times the cost of which is still represented by ' debt due to foreign bondholders for the money used and squan¬ dered in building them, all of which together witli interest and dividends on watered stock representing many more times their cost must before it becomes accumulated wealth be earned and paid in extortionate, freights and charges by the laborer and farmer; and when in the dim distant future the patient plod¬ ding beasts of burden have accomplished this result, if the pres¬ ent system is continued, a very small portion of the accumulated wealth will fall to their shares. Of these and such items does he make up his false and glittering statement that under our present system the wealth of the country has increased $30,000,- 000,000 in twenty years. Every laboring man knows it is false; every farmer knows it is false. He knows he has not got his share of any such sum, and he knows his neighbors have not got their share of it. He knows that it exists in intangibilities by * which men who have not earned it hope to draw interest and dividends from men who yet have it to earn. In the same letter he says, “No dollar of the public revenue has been wasted.” What a monstrous falsehood! Says: “It is impossible to point to a single monopoly in the United States that has been created or fostered by the industrial system which is upheld by the Re¬ publican party.” What a bold, brazen falsehood! Can a man who so misunderstands the facts or so willfully misstates them % be trusted as the agent of the people to lead in effecting these re¬ forms? ; It is desirable for the bettering of the condition of labor A that the eight hour law be enforced. Can the Republican party * be trusted to enforce that law? No. It has been a dead letter on the statute books for twelve years. Each incoming officer has sworn to obey it, and each has sternly refused to recognize it, and now in June, 1884, at Chicago, they resolve that they are iii favor of creating a commission to enforce the eight hour law. Great God have mercy on a suffering people! More offices to be created. What for? To make the laboring man quit work when his day’s work is done. Why, within a year a delegation of laborers in the employ of the government called upon a cabinet officer and demanded the right to quit work when their day’s 11 work was done. He refused their demands. They pointed him to the law, and he still refused to pay them a day’s wages for less than ten hour’s work, or to keep them in the government employ if they refused to work more than eight hours. No, you don’t want any commission to keep the laborer from working ten hours for a day’s work if you will pay him a day’s wages for less than ten hours (tor eight). He does not need the papa government principle applied to that extent. It is desirable that free, honest labor should not be compelled to compete with prison labor. Can the Republican party be trusted to protect the laborers of this state from such degrading and ruinous competition* No. It has for twenty-six years leased out the contract labor of this state and put it in direct competi¬ tion with free, honest labor; and though recommending at Peoria the passing of laws for the protection of labor, yet they have extended the convict labor leases so they will not expire for eight years yet. What limitless hypocrisy and false pretense! The gi'eat and overshadowing political issve is , can Os party in power , holding the offices and machinery of the government in its own hands , he made hy peaceful means to yield up that power in obedience to the will of the people constitutionally ex¬ pressed . That submission to the will of the people constitution¬ ally expressed can in this country be compelled by force of fire and sword, was demonstrated, and I hope and pray demonstrated once for all time to come, in the result of the destructive, bloody conflict waged from 1861 to 1865. In 1860 the people of this government expressed their will upon measures and men, and Abraham Lincoln was, by constitutional methods, elected presi¬ dent of the United States; not by a majority of the popular vote, for he lacked a million votes of having a majority of all the votes cast, but the measures and men of the Republican party secured a sufficient number of votes in the electoral college to entitle them under the constitution to carry into effect their policies and have Lincoln recognized as president of the United States, in every part of the United States, and by all the people in the United States. When the result was known a stubborn and refractory element, composed largely of men who adhered to the Democratic party, refused to submit to the will of the people thus expressed. In the terrible struggle which ensued to com¬ pel their submission 2,600,000 men were called to armc.in sup¬ port of the government, to enforce submission to the will of the people. 2,600,000 men were marshalled in the union army, and of that number over 1,200,000 were Democrats who had op¬ posed the measures of the Republican party and the election of Lincoln; but they loved their country, and 1,200,000 of them re¬ sponded to their country’s call and went forth shoulder to shoulder with their political adversaries and victors to compel submission to the will of the people, and over 100,000 of those brave Democrats gave their lives to save the country and secure to the Republican party the fruits of its victory at the polls. In 1876 the will or the people was again expressed and fifteen distinct reforms demanded, and Samuel J. Tilden was elected President to carry these reforms into execution. He was not elected by a minority of a million, but by a majority over all of 200,000 votes, and by a handsome majority of the electors actually chosen. When the will of the people was known, a re¬ factory element in the Republican party in possession of the offices and machinery of government marshaled the army around Washington, distributed the nSy along our coasts and defied the majority and refused to jubmit to the will of the peo¬ ple. Refused to admit to office tl^Pofficers elected, and to carry into execution the reforms demanded. The Democratic party having faith in the people, in their capacity for self-government, in their love of justice and fair play, in their patriotism, and be¬ lieving in the power of the ballot, and loving country more than office and patronage, suffered the wrong for the time being, and have appealed to the American people; that it may be determined whether or not a party in possession of the offices and machinery of government can be made to submit to the will of the people by peaceful means. We appeal to every American citizen, to every voter of every party, to lend his influence and his vote. We appeal to our Re¬ publican brothers in this hour of the country’s extremity, when the will of the people has been defied to fall into line until this emergency is passed. We don’t ask that 1,200,000 of you leave your peaceful homes and engage in five long years of hardships and fearful blood and slaughter as 1,200,000 Democrats did for your cause. We don’t ask that 100,000 of you give your lives as 100,000 loyal Democrats gave their lives for your cause. We don’t ask you to join us in the slaughter of 310,000 J of the refractory element in your own party-. No, may God for¬ bid that it shall ever again in this country become necessary to enforce the will of the people with fire and sword. But we do appeal to you for the sake of outraged justice; for the sake of free government and its perpetuation in this country; in the name of the living and the dead, to put aside your petty prejudiced until this dark night is passed, and give our cause; our common country’s cause, your moral support. Give us a votf where-we gave you a life. And assist in so overwhelming the defiers of the will of the people by the moral force of num¬ bers of votes, that they will see in these peaceful precursors the brewing of impending vengeance, and recognize that the voice of the pa?pie is the voice of God.