Our Presidents and how we make them

by Alexander K. McClure

There were two distinct Labor parties in existence in 1888, and they both called their national conventions to meet at Cincinnati on the 15th of May. The Union Labor party was the only one whose candidate figured in the contest. Mr. Streeter, its nominee for President, received 146,935 votes, with only 2418 for Cowdrey, who was the candidate of the United Labor party. The Union Labor Convention had representatives from twenty States, and John Seitz was permanent president. There was no ballot for President, as Alson J. Streeter, of Illinois, was nominated by acclamation, and Samuel Evans, of Texas, was selected for Vice-President on the 1st ballot, receiving 124 votes, to 44 for T. P. Rynders, of Pennsylvania, and 32 for Charles R. Cunningham, of Arkansas. The following platform was unanimously adopted:

General discontent prevails on the part of the wealth-producer. Farmers are suffering from a poverty which has forced most of them to mortgage their estates, and the prices of products are so low as to offer no relief, except through bankruptcy, and laborers are sinking into greater dependence. Strikes are resorted to without bringing relief, because of the inability of employers, in many cases, to pay living wages, while more and more are driven into the street. Business men find collections almost impossible, and, meantime, hundreds of millions of idle public money, which is needed for relief, is locked up in the United States Treasury, or placed without interest in favored banks in grim mockery of distress. Land monopoly flourishes as never before, and more owners of the soil are daily becoming tenants. Great transportation corporations still succeed in extorting their profits on watered stock through unjust charges. The United States Senate has become an open scandal, its membership being purchased by the rich in open defiance of the popular will. Various efforts are made to squander the public money, which are designed to empty the Treasury without paying the public debt. Under these and other alarming conditions, we appeal to the people of our country to come out of old party organizations, whose indifference to the public welfare is responsible for this distress, and aid the Union Labor party to repeal existing class legislation, and relieve the distress of our industries by establishing the following principles:

Land.—While we believe that the proper solution of the financial question will greatly relieve those now in danger of losing their homes by mortgages and foreclosures, and enable all industrious persons to secure a home as the highest result of civilization, we oppose land monopoly in every form, demand the forfeiture of unearned grants, the limitation of land ownership, and such other legislation as will stop speculations in lands, and holding it unused from those whose necessities require it.

We believe the earth was made for the people, and not to enable an idle aristocracy to subsist, through rents, upon the toil of the industrious, and that corners in land are as bad as corners in food, and that those who are not residents or citizens should not be allowed to own lands in the United States. A homestead should be exempt, to a limited extent, from execution or taxation.

Transportation.—The means of communication and transportation should be owned by the people, as is the United States postal service.

Money.—The establishment of a national monetary system in the interest of the producer, instead of the speculator and usurer, by which the circulating medium, in necessary quantity and full legal tender, shall be issued directly to the people, without the intervention of banks, or loaned to citizens upon land security at a low rate of interest, to relieve them from extortions of usury and enable them to control the money supply. Postal savings banks should be established. While we have free coinage of gold, we should have free coinage of silver. We demand the immediate application of all the money in the United States Treasury to the payment of the bonded debt, and condemn the further issue of interest-bearing bonds, either by the National Government or by States, Territories, or municipalities.

Labor.—Arbitration should take the place of strikes and other injurious methods of settling labor disputes. The letting of convict labor to contractors should be prohibited, the contract system be abolished in public works, the hours of labor in industrial establishments be reduced, commensurate with the increased production by labor-saving machinery, employés protected from bodily injury, equal pay for equal work for both sexes, and labor, agricultural, and co-operative associations be fostered and encouraged by law. The foundation of a republic is in the intelligence of its citizens, and children who are driven into workshops, mines, and factories are deprived of the education which should be secured to all by proper legislation.

Pensions.—We demand the passage of a service pension bill to every honorably discharged soldier and sailor of the United States.

Income Tax.—A graduated income tax is the most equitable system of taxation, placing the burden of Government on those who can best afford to pay, instead of laying it on the farmers and producers, and exempting millionaire bondholders and corporations.

United States Senate.—We demand a constitutional amendment making United States Senators elective by a direct vote of the people.