American politics (non-partisan) from the beginning to date - Thomas V. Cooper; Hector T. Fenton

Sec. 15.—For purposes of national defence and the promotion of commerce between the States we recognize the early construction of the Nicaragua Canal and its protection against foreign control as of great importance to the United States.

Sec. 16.—Recognizing the World’s Columbian Exposition as a national undertaking of vast importance, in which the general government has invited the co-operation of all the Powers of the world, and appreciating the acceptance by many of such Powers of the invitation for extended and the broadest liberal efforts being made by them to contribute to the grandeur of the undertaking, we are of the opinion that Congress should make such necessary financial provision as shall be requisite to the maintenance of the national honor and public faith.

Sec. 17.—Popular education being the only safe basis of popular suffrage, we recommend to the several States most liberal appropriations for the public schools. Free common schools are the nursery of good government and they have always received the fostering care of the Democratic party, which favors every means of increasing intelligence. Freedom of education being an essential of civil and religious liberty as well as a necessity for the development of intelligence, must not be interfered with under any pretext whatever. We are opposed to State interference with parental rights and rights of conscience in the education of children as an infringement of the fundamental democratic doctrine that the largest individual liberty consistent with the rights of others insures the highest type of American citizenship and the best government.

Sec. 18.—We approve the action of the present House of Representatives in passing bills for the admission into the Union as States of the Territories of New Mexico and Arizona, and we favor the early admission of all the Territories having necessary population and resources to admit them to Statehood, and while they remain Territories we hold that the officials appointed to administer the government of any Territory, together with the Districts of Columbia and Alaska, should be bona fide residents of the Territory or District in which their duties are to be performed. The Democratic party believes in home rule and the control of their own affairs by the people of the vicinage.

Sec. 19.—We favor legislation by Congress and State Legislatures to protect the lives and limbs of railway employés and those of other hazardous transportation companies and denounce the inactivity of the Republican party and particularly the Republican Senate for causing the defeat of measures beneficial and protective to this class of wageworkers.

Sec. 20.—We are in favor of the enactment by the States of laws for abolishing the notorious sweating system, for abolishing contract convict labor and for prohibiting the employment in factories of children under fifteen years of age.

Sec. 21.—We are opposed to all sumptuary laws as an interference with the individual rights of the citizen.

Sec. 22.—Upon this statement of principles and policies the Democratic party asks the intelligent judgment of the American people. It asks a change of administration and a change of party in order that there may be a change of system and a change of methods, thus assuring the maintenance, unimpaired, of institutions under which the Republic has grown great and powerful.

The Tariff Issue, 1892.

REPUBLICAN.	DEMOCRATIC.

We reaffirm the American doctrine of Protection. We call attention to its growth abroad. We maintain that the prosperous condition of our country is largely due to the wise revenue legislation of the Republican Congress. We believe that all articles which cannot be produced in the United States, except luxuries, should be admitted free of duty, and that on all imports coming into competition with the products of American labor there should be levied duties equal to the difference between wages abroad and at home. We assert that the prices of manufactured articles of general consumption have been reduced under the operation of the tariff act of 1890. We denounce the efforts of the Democratic majority of the House of Representatives to destroy our tariff laws, as is manifested by their attacks upon wool, lead and lead ores, the chief product of a number of States, and we ask the people for their judgment thereon.	We denounce Republican Protection as a fraud—as a robbery of the great majority of the American people for the benefit of a few. We declare it to be a fundamental principle of the Democratic party that the government has no constitutional power to impose and collect a dollar for tax except for purposes of revenue only, and demand that the collection of such taxes be imposed by the government when only honestly and economically administered. [The above paragraph was adopted by a vote of 504 to 342 as a substitute for the following, reported from the majority of the committee: “We reiterate the oft repeated doctrines of the Democratic party that the necessity of the government is the only justification for taxations, and whenever a tax is unnecessary it is unjustifiable; that when Custom House taxation is levied upon articles of any kind produced in this country, the difference between the cost of labor here and labor abroad, when such a difference exists, fully measures any possible benefits to labor, and the enormous additional impositions of the existing tariff fall with crushing force upon our farmers and workingmen, and, for the mere advantage of the few whom it enriches, exact from labor a grossly unjust share of the expenses of the government, and we demand such a revision of the tariff laws as will remove their iniquitous inequalities, lighten their oppressions and put them on a constitutional and equitable basis. But in making reduction in taxes, it is not proposed to injure any domestic industries, but rather to promote their healthy growth. From the foundation of this government, taxes collected at the Custom House have been the chief source of Federal revenue. Such they must continue to be. Moreover, many industries have come to rely upon legislation for successful continuance, so that any change of law must be at every step regardful of the labor and capital thus involved. The process of reform must be subject in the execution of this plain dictate of justice.”]

REPUBLICAN.

DEMOCRATIC.

We reaffirm the American doctrine of Protection. We call attention to its growth abroad. We maintain that the prosperous condition of our country is largely due to the wise revenue legislation of the Republican Congress.
We believe that all articles which cannot be produced in the United States, except luxuries, should be admitted free of duty, and that on all imports coming into competition with the products of American labor there should be levied duties equal to the difference between wages abroad and at home.
We assert that the prices of manufactured articles of general consumption have been reduced under the operation of the tariff act of 1890.
We denounce the efforts of the Democratic majority of the House of Representatives to destroy our tariff laws, as is manifested by their attacks upon wool, lead and lead ores, the chief product of a number of States, and we ask the people for their judgment thereon.

We denounce Republican Protection as a fraud—as a robbery of the great majority of the American people for the benefit of a few. We declare it to be a fundamental principle of the Democratic party that the government has no constitutional power to impose and collect a dollar for tax except for purposes of revenue only, and demand that the collection of such taxes be imposed by the government when only honestly and economically administered.
[The above paragraph was adopted by a vote of 504 to 342 as a substitute for the following, reported from the majority of the committee: “We reiterate the oft repeated doctrines of the Democratic party that the necessity of the government is the only justification for taxations, and whenever a tax is unnecessary it is unjustifiable; that when Custom House taxation is levied upon articles of any kind produced in this country, the difference between the cost of labor here and labor abroad, when such a difference exists, fully measures any possible benefits to labor, and the enormous additional impositions of the existing tariff fall with crushing force upon our farmers and workingmen, and, for the mere advantage of the few whom it enriches, exact from labor a grossly unjust share of the expenses of the government, and we demand such a revision of the tariff laws as will remove their iniquitous inequalities, lighten their oppressions and put them on a constitutional and equitable basis. But in making reduction in taxes, it is not proposed to injure any domestic industries, but rather to promote their healthy growth. From the foundation of this government, taxes collected at the Custom House have been the chief source of Federal revenue. Such they must continue to be. Moreover, many industries have come to rely upon legislation for successful continuance, so that any change of law must be at every step regardful of the labor and capital thus involved. The process of reform must be subject in the execution of this plain dictate of justice.”]