HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK the body of our citizens by depriving them of the benefits of natural competition. "Every democratic rule of governmental action is violated when, through unnecessary taxation, a vast sum of money, far beyond the needs of an economical administration, is drawn from the people and the channels of trade and accumulated as a demoralizing surplus in the national treasury. The money now lying idle in the Federal treasury, resulting from superfluous taxation, amounts to more than one hundred and twenty-five millions, and the surplus collected is reaching the sum of more than sixty millions annually. Debauched by this immense temptation, the remedy of the Republican party is to meet and exhaust, by extravagant appropriations and expenditures, whether constitutional or not, the accumulation of extravagant taxation. The Democratic remedy is to enforce frugality in public expenses and to abolish needless taxation. "Our established domestic industries and enterprises should not and need not be endangered by the reduction and correction of the burdens of taxation. On the contrary, a fair and careful revision of our tax laws, with due allowance for the difference between the wages of American and foreign labor, must promote and encourage every branch of such industries and enterprises by giving them assurance of an extended market and steady and continuous operations. In the interests of American labor, which should in no event be neglected, the revision of our tax laws contemplated by the Democratic party would promote the advantage of such labor by cheapening the cost of necessaries of life in the home of every workingman, and at the same time securing to him steady and remunerative employment. Upon this great issue of tariff reform, so closely concerning every phase of our national life, and upon every question involved in the problem of good government, the Democratic party submits its principles and professions to the intelligent suffrages of the American people. "Resolved, That this convention hereby endorses and recommends the early passage of the bill for the reduction of the revenue now pending in the House of Representatives. "Resolved, That a just and liberal policy should be pursued in reference to the Territories; that the right of self-government is inherent in the people and guaranteed under the Constitution; that the Territories of Washington, Dakota, Montana, and New Mexico are, by virtue of population and development, entitled to admission into the Union as States, and we unqualifiedly condemn the course of the Republican party in refusing statehood and self-government to their people. "Resolved, That we express our cordial sympathy with the struggling people of all nations in their efforts to secure for themselves the inestimable blessings of self-government and civil and religious liberty, and we especially declare our sympathy with the efforts of those noble patriots who, led by Gladstone and Parnell, have conducted their grand and peaceful contest for home rule in Ireland." Republican Party Convention held in Chicago, June 19-25, 1888; temporary chairman, John M. Thurston, of Nebraska; permanent chairman, Morris M. Estee, of California. Nine candidates for the Presidential nomination were formally presented to the convention, as follows: Joseph R. Hawley, of Connecticut; Walter Q. Gresham, of Indiana; Benjamin Harrison, of Indiana; William B. Allison, of Iowa; Russell A. Alger, of Michigan; Chauncey M. Depew, of New York; John Sherman, of Ohio; Edwin H. Fitler, of Pennsylvania; and Jeremiah M. Rusk, of Wisconsin. On the first ballot Sherman showed by far the greatest strength, and he retained the lead for six ballots; on the seventh he was passed by Harrison, who was nominated on the eighth by the following vote: Harrison, 544; Sherman, 118; Alger, 100; Gresham, 59; James G. Blaine, 5; William McKinley, 4. HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK The first ballot for Vice-President resulted in the choice of Levi P. Morton, of New York, who had 592 votes to 234 for four others. Platform: "The Republicans of the United States, assembled by their delegates in national convention, pause on the threshold of their proceedings to honor the memory of their first great leader, the immortal champion of liberty and the rights of the people, Abraham Lincoln; and to cover also with wreaths of imperishable remembrance and gratitude the heroic names of our later leaders, who have been more recently called away from our councils-Grant, Garfield, Arthur, Logan, Conkling. May their memories be faithfully cherished. We also recall, with our greetings and with prayer for his recovery, the name of one of our living heroes, whose memory will be treasured in the history both of Republicans and of the republic— the name of that noble soldier and favorite child of victory, Philip H. Sheridan. "In the spirit of those great leaders, and of our own devotion to human liberty, and with that hostility to all forms of despotism and oppression which is the fundamental idea of the Republican party, we send fraternal congratulations to our fellow-Americans of Brazil upon their great act of emancipation, which completed the abolition of slavery throughout the two American continents. We earnestly hope that we may soon congratulate our fellow-citizens of Irish birth upon the peaceful recovery of home rule for Ireland. "We reaffirm our unswerving devotion to the national Constitution and to the indissoluble Union of the States; to the autonomy reserved to the States under the Constitution; to the personal rights and liberties of citizens in all the States and Territories in the Union, and especially to the supreme and sovereign right of every lawful citizen, rich or poor, native or foreign-born, white or black, to cast one free ballot in public elections and to have that ballot duly counted. We hold the free and honest popular ballot and the just and equal representation of all the people to be the foundation of our republican government, and demand effective legislation to secure the integrity and purity of elections, which are the fountains of all public authority. We charge that the present administration and the Democratic majority in Congress owe their existence to the suppression of the ballot by a criminal nullification of the Constitution and laws of the United States. "We are uncompromisingly in favor of the American system of protection; we protest against its destruction as proposed by the President and his party. They serve the interests of Europe; we will support the interests of America. We accept the issue and confidently appeal to the people for their judgment. The protective system must be maintained. Its abandonment has always been followed by general disaster to all interests except those of the usurer and the sheriff. We denounce the Mills bill as destructive to the general business, the labor, and the farming interests of the country, and we heartily endorse the consistent and patriotic action of the Republican Representatives in Congress in opposing its passage. "We condemn the proposition of the Democratic party to place wool on the free list, and we insist that the duties thereon shall be adjusted and maintained so as to furnish full and adequate protection to that industry throughout the United States. "The Republican party would effect all needed reduction of the national revenue by repealing the taxes upon tobacco, which are an annoyance and burden to agriculture, and the tax upon spirits used in the arts and for mechanical purposes, and by such revision of the tariff laws as will tend to check imports of such articles as are produced by our people, the production of which gives employment to our labor and releases from import duties those articles of foreign production (except luxuries) the like of which cannot be produced at home. If there shall remain a larger revenue than is requisite for the wants of the government, we favor the entire repeal of internal revenue taxes rather than the surrender of any part of our protective system at the joint behests of the whiskey trusts and the agents of foreign manufacturers. "We declare our hostility to the introduction into this country of foreign contract labor and of Chinese labor, alien to our civilization and Constitution, and we demand the rigid enforcement of the exist HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK ing laws against it, and favor such immediate legislation as will exclude such labor from our shores. "We declare our opposition to all combinations of capital, organized in trusts or otherwise, to control arbitrarily the condition of trade among our citizens; and we recommend to Congress and the State Legislatures, in their respective jurisdictions, such legislation as will prevent the execution of all schemes to oppress the people by undue charges on their supplies, or by unjust rates for the transportation of their products to market. We approve the legislation by Congress to prevent alike unjust burdens and unfair discriminations between the States. "We reaffirm the policy of appropriating the public lands of the United States to be homesteads for American citizens and settlers, not aliens, which the Republican party established in 1862 against the persistent opposition of the Democrats in Congress, and which has brought our great western domain into such magnificent development. The restoration of unearned railroad land grants to the public domain for the use of actual settlers, which was begun under the administration of President Arthur, should be continued. We deny that the Democratic party has ever restored one acre to the people, but declare that by the joint action of the Republicans and Democrats in Congress about 60,000,000 acres of unearned lands originally granted for the construction of railroads have been restored to the public domain, in pursuance of the conditions inserted by the Republican party in the original grants. We charge the Democratic administration with failure to execute the laws securing to settlers title to their homesteads, and with using appropriations made for that purpose to harass innocent settlers with spies and prosecutions under the false pretense of exposing frauds and vindicating the law. "The government by Congress of the Territories is based upon necessity only, to the end that they may become States in the Union; therefore, whenever the conditions of population, material resources, public intelligence, and morality are such as to insure a stable local government therein, the people of such Territories should be permitted, as a right inherent in them, to form for themselves Constitutions and State governments and be admitted into the Union. Pend |