Mr. Randall said he yielded to no man on his side of the House in his desire for continued Democratic control in the administration of the Federal Government. He did not believe the adoption of the committee’s bill would make such result certain, and added:
“I cannot be coerced into any particular action upon economic questions by the direction of party caucus. The period of the political caucus has departed never to return, and yet we should confer and have unity, if it is possible.
“In these matters I speak only for myself. My convictions on the tariff are strong, and founded, as I think, upon principle, and upon information and intelligent comprehension of the subject. When any one here enters upon the task of invoking caucus power or other modes of coercion, I can only say to him, if he acts with good purpose, that it will prove a fruitless undertaking; or if with ill motive, then I consign him to all the natural contempt which such self-constituted superciliousness deserves.”
In conclusion, Mr. Randall quoted from the earliest statesmen in support of his views upon the tariff, and said:
“If Jackson could say he was confirmed in his opinions by the opinions of Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe, how much more am I confirmed in my opinions by his great authority added to that of the founders and builders of the Democratic party? I warn the party that it is not safe to abandon principles so fundamental to our institutions and so necessary to the maintenance of our industrial system; principles which attest the wisdom of those who established them by the fruits they have borne, the full fruition of which, however, can only be realized in the extension of diversified industries to all parts of the country, not in the North and East alone, but in the South and West as well. A new era of industrial enterprise has already dawned upon the South; no section of the country possesses greater natural advantages than the South, with her genial climate, her limitless raw materials, her mines of coal and iron, with abundant labor ready to develop them. Considering what has been there achieved in a single decade, what may not a century bring forth from her under a system calculated to favor the highest industrial development? When I read the history of my country and consider the past and present, and reflect on what is before us, I cannot believe that the idea that went down in the convulsions of 1861 will ever again dominate the destinies of the Republic.”
Tariff Speech of Major Wm. McKinley, Jr.,
Member of Congress from Ohio.
In the great tariff campaign of 1888 the two most distinguished Republican speakers were Mr. Blaine and Major McKinley. The latter was invited by the Chautauqua Society of Georgia to explain the doctrine of Protection, and did so in the following comprehensive speech:
Fellow-citizens: I make my acknowledgments to the Piedmont Society for the courtesy and cordiality of its invitation, which has given me the opportunity to meet, for the first time, an assemblage of the citizens of Georgia.
I have come, upon the suggestion of the committee, to address you upon a public question of great national import, which concerns not only the prosperity of one section, but of all sections of our common country, and which is of commanding interest to our sixty millions of people. It is no new subject which I propose to consider. It is as old as government by men. Taxation, with few exceptions, has been the chief and absorbing issue for more than a century of the republic.