Again, through the perversion of democracy to the ends of plutocracy, labor is robbed of the wealth which it alone produces, is denied the means of self-employment, and, by compulsory idleness in wage slavery, is even deprived of the necessaries of life.

Human power and natural forces are thus wasted, that the plutocracy may rule.

Ignorance and misery, with all their concomitant evils, are perpetuated, that the people may be kept in bondage.

Science and invention are diverted from their humane purpose to the enslavement of women and children.

Against such a system the Socialist Labor party once more enters its protest. Once more it reiterates its fundamental declaration that private property in the natural sources of production, and in the instruments of labor is the obvious cause of all economic servitude and political dependence.

The time is fast coming when, in the natural course of social evolution, this system, through the destructive action of its failures and crises on the one hand, and the constructive tendencies of its trusts and other capitalistic combinations on the other hand, shall have worked out its own downfall.

We, therefore, call upon the wage-workers of the United States, and upon all other honest citizens, to organize under the banner of the Socialist Labor party into a class-conscious body, aware of its rights, and determined to conquer them by taking possession of the public powers; so that, held together by an indomitable spirit of solidarity under the most trying conditions of the present class struggle, we may put a summary end to that barbarous struggle by the abolition of classes, the restoration of the land and of all the means of production, transportation and distribution to the people as a collective body, and the substitution of the Co-operative Commonwealth for the present state of planless production, industrial war and social disorder; a commonwealth in which every worker shall have the free exercise and full benefit of his faculties, multiplied by all the modern factors of civilization.

PARTY PLATFORMS.

1904

DEMOCRATIC, REPUBLICAN, PEOPLES' PARTY, SOCIALIST, SoCIALIST LABOR, UNITED CHRISTIAN, NATIONAL LIBERTY, PROHIBITION, CONTINENTAL.

NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC PLATFORM

ADOPTED AT ST. LOUIS, MO., JULY 8, 1904.

The Democratic party of the United States, in national convention assembled, declares its devotion to the essential principles of the Democratic faith which brings us together in party communion.

Under them local self-government and national unity and prosperity were alike established. They underlaid our independence, the structure of our free republic, and every Democratic extension from Louisiana to California, and Texas to Oregon, which preserves faithfully in all the States the tie between taxation and representation. They yet inspire masses of our people, guarding jealously their rights and liberties, and cherishing their fraternity, peace and orderly development. They remind us of our duties and responsibilities as citizens, and impress upon us, particularly at this time, the necessity of reform and the rescue of the administration of government from the headstrong, arbitrary and spasmodic methods which distract business by uncertainty, and pervade the public mind with dread, distrust and perturbation.

Fundamental Principles.-The application of these fundamental principles to the living issues of the day is the first step toward the assured peace, safety and progress of our nation. Freedom of the press, of conscience and of speech; equality before the law of all citizens; the right of trial by jury; freedom of the person defended by the writ of habeas corpus; liberty of personal contract untrammeled by sumptuary laws; the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; a well-disciplined militia; the separation of church and State; economy in expenditures; low taxes; that labor may be lightly burdened; the prompt and sacred fulfilment of public and private obligations; fidelity to treaties; peace and friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none; absolute acquiescence in the will of the majority, the vital principle of republicsthese are doctrines which Democracy has established as proverbs of the nation and they should be constantly invoked, preached, resorted to and enforced.

Capital and Labor.-We favor the enactment and adminis

tration of laws giving labor and capital impartially their just rights. Capital and labor ought not to be enemies. Each is necessary to the other. Each has its rights, but the rights of labor are certainly no less "vested," no less "sacred" and no less "inalienable" than the rights of capital.

Constitutional Guarantee.-Constitutional guarantees are violated whenever any citizen is denied the right to labor, acquire and enjoy property or reside where interests or inclination may determine. Any denial thereof by individuals, organizations or governments should be summarily rebuked and punished.

We deny the right of any executive to disregard or suspend any constitutional privilege or limitation. Obedience to the laws and respect for their requirements are alike the supreme duty of the citizen and the official.

The military should be used only to support and maintain the law. We unqualifiedly condemn its employment for the summary banishment of citizens without trial or for the control of elections.

We approve the measure which passed the United States Senate in 1896, but which a Republican Congress has ever since refused to enact, relating to contempts in Federal Courts and providing for trial by jury in cases of indirect contempt.

Waterways. We favor liberal appropriations for the improvement of waterways of the country. When any waterway like the Mississippi River is of sufficient importance to demand special aid of the Government, such aid should be extended with a definite plan of continuous work until permanent improvement is secured.

We oppose the Republican policy of starving home development in order to feed the greed for conquest and the appetite for national "prestige" and display of strength.

Economy of Administration.-Large reductions can easily be made in the annual expenditures of the Government without impairing the efficiency of any branch of the public service, and we shall insist upon the strictest economy and frugality compatible with vigorous and efficient civil, military and naval administration as a right of the people too clear to be denied or withheld.

We favor honesty in the public service, the enforcement of honesty in the public service, and to that end a thorough legislative investigation of those executive departments of the Government already known to teem with corruption, as well as other departments suspected of harboring corruption, and the punishment of ascertained corruptionists, without fear or favor or regard to persons. The persistent and deliberate refusal of both the Senate and House of Representatives to permit such investigation to be made demonstrates that only by a change in the executive and in the legislative departments can complete exposures, punishment and correction be obtained.

Federal Government Contracts with Trusts.-We condemn the action of the Republican party in Congress in refusing to prohibit an executive department from entering into contracts with convicted trusts or unlawful combinations in restraint of interstate trade. We believe that one of the best methods of

procuring economy and honesty in the public service is to have public officials, from the occupant of the White House down to the lowest of them, return as nearly as may be to Jeffersonian simplicity of living.

Executive Usurpation.-We favor the nomination and election of a President imbued with the principles of the Constitution, who will set his face sternly against executive usurpation of legislative and judicial functions, whether that usurpation be veiled under the guise of executive construction of existing laws, or whether it take refuge in the tyrant's pleas of necessity or superior wisdom.

Imperialism.-We favor the preservation, so far as we can, of an open door for the world's commerce in the Orient without any unnecessary entanglement in Oriental and European affairs, and without arbitrary, unlimited, irresponsibility and absolute government anywhere within our jurisdiction. We oppose, as fervently as did George Washington himself, an indefinite, irresponsible, discretionary and vague absolutism and a policy of colonial exploitation, no matter where or by whom invoked or exercised; we believe with Thomas Jefferson and John Adams that no government has a right to make one set of laws for those "at home" and another and a different set of laws, absolute in their character, for those "in the colonies." All men under the American flag are entitled to the protection of the institutions whose emblem the flag is; if they are inherently unfit for those institutions then they are inherently unfit to be members of the American body politic. Wherever there may exist a people incapable of being governed under American laws, in consonance with the American Constitution, the territory of that people ought not to be part of the American domain.

We insist that we ought to do for the Filipinos what we have already done for the Cubans, and it is our duty to make that promise now, and upon suitable guarantees of protection to citizens of our own and other countries resident there at the time of our withdrawal, set the Filipino people upon their feet, free and independent, to work out their own destiny. The endeavor of the Secretary of War, by pledging the Government's indorsement for "promoters" in the Philippine Islands, to make the United States a partner in speculative legislation of the archipelago, which was only temporarily held up by the opposition of the Democratic Senators in the last session, will, if successful, lead to entanglements from which it will be difficult to escape.

The Tariff.-The Democratic party has been, and will continue to be, the consistent opponent of that class of tariff legislation by which certain interests have been permitted, through Congressional favor, to draw a heavy tribute from the American people. This monstrous perversion of those equal opportunities which our political institutions were established to secure has caused what may once have been infant industries to become the greatest combinations of capital that the world has ever known. These especial favorites of the Government have, through trust methods, been converted into monopolies, thus

bringing to an end domestic competition, which was the only alleged check upon the extravagant profits made possible by the protective system. These industrial combinations, by the financial assistance they can give, now control the policy of the Republican party.

We denounce protection as a robbery of the many to enrich the few, and we favor a tariff limited to the needs of the Government, economically administered, and so levied as not to discriminate against any industry, class or section, to the end that the burdens of taxation shall be distributed as equally as possible.

We favor a revision and a gradual reduction of the tariff by the friends of the masses for the commonwealth, and not by the friends of its abuses, its extortions and its discriminations, keeping in view the ultimate ends of "equality of burdens and equality of opportunities," and the constitutional purpose of raising a revenue by taxation, to wit, the support of the Federal Government in all its integrity and virility, but in simplicity. Trusts and Unlawful Combinations.-We recognize that the gigantic trusts and combinations designed to enable capital to secure more than its just share of the joint products of capital and labor, and which have been fostered and promoted under Republican rule, are a menace to beneficial competition and an obstacle to permanent business prosperity. A private monopoly is indefensible and intolerable.

Individual equality of opportunity and free competition are essential to a healthy and permanent commercial prosperity, and any trust or monopoly tending to destroy these by controlling production, restricting competition or fixing prices, should be prohibited and punished by law. We especially denounce rebates and discrimination by transportation companies as the most potent agency in promoting and strengthening these unlawful conspiracies against trade.

We demand an enlargement of the powers of the Interstate Commerce Commission, to the end that the travelling public and shippers of this Government may have prompt and adequate relief from the abuses to which they are subjected in the matter of transportation. We demand a strict enforcement of existing civil and criminal statutes against all such trusts, combinations and monopolies; and we demand the enactment of such further legislation as may be necessary to effectually suppress them.

Any trust or unlawful combination in interstate commerce which is monopolizing any branch of business or production should not be permitted to transact business outside of the State of its origin. Whenever it shall be established in any court of competent jurisdiction that such monopolization exists, such prohibition should be enforced through comprehensive laws to be enacted on the subject.

Reclamation of Arid Lands and Domestic Development. We congratulate our Western citizens upon the passage of the law known as the Newlands Irrigation Act for the irrigation and reclamation of the arid lands of the West-a measure framed by a Democrat, passed in the Senate by a non-partisan vote, and passed in the House against the opposition of almost