The Presidential election.
The silver question at issue.
Party Platforms and Nominations.
A national conference held at Washington, in March, 1895, may
be looked upon as the beginning of a widely and powerfully
organized movement to force the demand for a free and
unlimited coinage of silver, on equal terms, as legal tender
money, with gold, into the front of the issues of the
presidential canvass of 1896. The agitation then projected was
carried on with extraordinary ardor and skill and had
astonishing success. It was helped by the general depression
of business in the country, and especially by the long
continued ruling of low prices for the produce of the
farms,—for all of which effects the gold standard of values
was held to be the one relentless cause. In both political
parties the free silver propaganda was pushed with startling
effect, and there seemed to be doubt, for a time, whether the
controlling politicians in either would take an opposing
stand. Southern influences proved decisive of the result in
the Democratic party; eastern influences in that of the
Republicans. The ranks of the former were swept rapidly into
the movement for free silver, and the party chiefs of the
latter were driven to a conflict with it, not wholly by
convictions or will of their own. During the spring and early
summer of 1896, the Democratic Party in State after State
became committed on the question, by declarations for the
unlimited free coinage of silver, at the ratio of 16 to 1;
until there was tolerable certainty, some weeks before the
meeting of the national convention, that its nominee for
President must be one who represented that demand. How
positively the Republican Party would champion the gold
monetary standard was somewhat less assured, though its stand
on that side had been taken in a general way.
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
Republican Platform and Nominations.
The Republican national convention was held at St. Louis, on
the 16th, 17th and 18th of June. The "platform" reported by
the committee on resolutions was adopted without amendment on
the last named date. Its declarations were as follows:
"The Republicans of the United States, assembled by their
representatives in National Convention, appealing for the
popular and historical justification of their claims to the
matchless achievements of the thirty years of Republican rule,
earnestly and confidently address themselves to the awakened
intelligence, experience, and conscience of their countrymen
in the following declaration of facts and principles:
"For the first time since the civil war the American people
have witnessed the calamitous consequences of full and
unrestricted Democratic control of the Government. It has been
a record of unparalleled incapacity, dishonor, and disaster.
In administrative management it has ruthlessly sacrificed
indispensable revenue, entailed an unceasing deficit, eked out
ordinary current expenses with borrowed money, piled up the
public debt by $262,000,000 in time of peace, forced an
adverse balance of trade, kept a perpetual menace hanging over
the redemption fund, pawned American credit to alien
syndicates, and reversed all the measures and results of
successful Republican rule.
"In the broad effect of its policy it has precipitated panic,
blighted industry and trade with prolonged depression, closed
factories, reduced work and wages, halted enterprise, and
crippled American production while stimulating foreign
production for the American market. Every consideration of
public safety and individual interest demands that the
Government shall be rescued from the hands of those who have
shown themselves incapable to conduct it without disaster at
home and dishonor abroad, and shall be restored to the party
which for thirty years administered it with unequalled success
and prosperity, and in this connection we heartily endorse the
wisdom, patriotism, and the success of the administration of
President Harrison.
"We renew and emphasize our allegiance to the policy of
protection as the bulwark of American industrial independence
and the foundation of American development and prosperity.
This true American policy taxes foreign products and
encourages home industry; it puts the burden of revenue on
foreign goods; it secures the American market for the American
producer; it upholds the American standard of wages for the
American workingman; it puts the factory by the side of the
farm, and makes the American farmer less dependent on foreign
demand and price; it diffuses general thrift, and founds the
strength of all on the strength of each. In its reasonable
application it is just, fair, and impartial; equally opposed
to foreign control and domestic monopoly, to sectional
discrimination, and individual favoritism.
"We denounce the present Democratic tariff as sectional,
injurious to the public credit, and destructive to business
enterprise. "We demand such an equitable tariff on foreign
imports which come into competition with American products as
will not only furnish adequate revenue for the necessary
expenses of the Government, but will protect American labor
from degradation to the wage level of other lands. We are not
pledged to any particular schedules. The question of rates is
a practical question, to be governed by the conditions of the
time and of production; the ruling and uncompromising
principle is the protection and development of American labor
and industry. The country demands a right settlement, and then
it wants rest.
"We believe the repeal of the reciprocity arrangements
negotiated by the last Republican administration was a
national calamity, and we demand their renewal and extension
on such terms as will equalize our trade with other nations,
remove the restrictions which now obstruct the sale of
American products in the ports of other countries, and secure
enlarged markets for the products of our farms, forests, and
factories.
See, in volume 5,
TARIFF LEGISLATION (UNITED STATES):
A. D. 1890, and 1894.
"Protection and reciprocity are twin measures of Republican
policy and go hand in hand. Democratic rule has recklessly
struck down both, and both must be re-established. Protection
for what we produce; free admission for the necessaries of
life which we do not produce; reciprocity agreements of mutual
interests which again open markets for us in return for our
open markets to others. Protection builds up domestic industry
and trade and secures our own market for ourselves; reciprocity
builds up foreign trade and finds an outlet for our surplus.
We condemn the present administration for not keeping faith
with the sugar producers of this country. The Republican party
favors such protection as will lead to the production on
American soil of all the sugar which the American people use,
and for which they pay other countries more than $100,000,000
annually. To all our products—to those of the mine and the
fields as well as to those of the shop and the factory—to
hemp, to wool, the product of the great industry of sheep
husbandry, as well as to the finished woollens of the mill—we
promise the most ample protection.
"We favor restoring the early American policy of
discriminating duties for the upbuilding of our merchant
marine and the protection of our shipping in the foreign
carrying trade, so that American ships—the product of American
labor, employed in American shipyards, sailing under the Stars
and Stripes, and manned, officered, and owned by Americans—may
regain the carrying of our foreign commerce.
"The Republican party is unreservedly for sound money. It
caused the enactment of the law providing for the resumption
of specie payments in 1879; since then every dollar has been
as good as gold. We are unalterably opposed to every measure
calculated to debase our currency or impair the credit of our
country. We are, therefore, opposed to the free coinage of
silver except by international agreement with the leading
commercial nations of the world, which we pledge ourselves to
promote, and until such agreement can be obtained the existing
gold standard must be preserved. All our silver and paper
currency must be maintained at parity with gold, and we favor
all measures designed to maintain inviolably the obligations
of the United States and all our money, whether coin or paper,
at the present standard, the standard of the most enlightened
nations of the earth.
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"The veterans of the Union Army deserve and should receive
fair treatment and generous recognition. Whenever practicable,
they should be given the preference in the matter of
employment, and they are entitled to the enactment of such
laws as are best calculated to secure the fulfillment of the
pledges made to them in the dark days of the country's peril.
We denounce the practice in the Pension Bureau, so recklessly
and unjustly carried on by the present administration, of
reducing pensions and arbitrarily dropping names from the
rolls as deserving the severest condemnation of the American
people.
"Our foreign policy should be at all times firm, vigorous, and
dignified, and all our interests in the Western Hemisphere
carefully watched and guarded. The Hawaiian Islands should be
controlled by the United States, and no foreign power should
be permitted to interfere with them; the Nicaraguan Canal
should be built, owned, and operated by the United States; and
by the purchase of the Danish Islands we should secure a
proper and much needed naval station in the West Indies.
"The massacres in Armenia have aroused the deep sympathy and
just indignation of the American people, and we believe that
the United States should exercise all the influence it can
properly exert to bring these atrocities to an end. In Turkey
American residents have been exposed to the gravest dangers
and American property destroyed. There and everywhere American
citizens and American property must be absolutely protected at
all hazards and at any cost.
"We reassert the Monroe doctrine in its full extent, and we
reaffirm the right of the United States to give the doctrine
effect by responding to the appeal of any American State for
friendly intervention in case of European encroachment. We
have not interfered with and shall not interfere with the
existing possessions of any European power in this hemisphere,
but those possessions must not on any pretext be extended. We
hopefully look forward to the eventual withdrawal of European
powers from this hemisphere and to the ultimate union of all
the English-speaking parts of the continent by the free
consent of its inhabitants.
"From the hour of achieving their own independence the people
of the United States have regarded with sympathy the struggles
of other American people to free themselves from European
domination. We watch with deep and abiding interest the heroic
battle of the Cuban patriots against cruelty and oppression,
and our best hopes go out for the full success of their
determined contest for liberty. The Government of Spain having
lost control of Cuba, and being unable to protect the property
or lives of resident American citizens, or to comply with its
treaty obligations, we believe that the Government of the
United States should actively use its influence and good
offices to restore peace and give independence to the island.
"The peace and security of the Republic and the maintenance of
its rightful influence among the nations of the earth demand a
naval power commensurate with its position and responsibility.
We therefore favor the continued enlargement of the navy and a
complete system of harbor and seacoast defenses.
"For the protection of the quality of our American citizenship
and of the wages of our workingmen against the fatal
competition of low-priced labor, we demand that the
immigration laws be thoroughly enforced and so extended as to
exclude from entrance to the United States those who can
neither read nor write.
"The civil-service law was placed on the statute book by the
Republican party, which has always sustained it, and we renew
our repeated declarations that it shall be thoroughly and
honestly enforced and extended wherever practicable.
"We demand that every citizen of the United States shall be
allowed to cast one free and unrestricted ballot, and that
such ballot shall be counted and returned as cast.
"We proclaim our unqualified condemnation of the uncivilized
and barbarous practice, well known as lynching or killing of
human beings suspected or charged with crime, without process
of law. We favor the creation of a National board of
arbitration to settle and adjust differences which may arise
between employers and employed engaged in interstate commerce.
"We believe in an immediate return to the free-homestead
policy of the Republican party, and urge the passage by
Congress of a satisfactory free-homestead measure such as has
already passed the House and is now pending in the Senate.
"We favor the admission of the remaining Territories at the
earliest practicable date, having due regard to the interests
of the people of the Territories and of the United States. All
the Federal officers appointed for the Territories should be
selected from bona fide residents thereof, and the right of
self-government should be accorded as far as practicable.
"We believe the citizens of Alaska should have representation
in the Congress of the United States, to the end that needful
legislation may be intelligently enacted.
"We sympathize with all wise and legitimate efforts to lessen
and prevent the evils of intemperance and promote morality.
"The Republican party is mindful of the rights and interests
of women. Protection of American industries includes equal
opportunities, equal pay for equal work, and protection to the
home. We favor the admission of women to wider spheres of
usefulness, and welcome their co-operation in rescuing the
country from Democratic and Populist mismanagement and
misrule.
"Such are the principles and policies of the Republican party.
By these principles we will abide and these policies we will
put into execution. We ask for them the considerate judgment
of the American people. Confident alike in the history of our
great party and in the justice of our cause, we present our
platform and our candidates in the full assurance that the
election will bring victory to the Republican party and
prosperity to the people of the United States."
Before the adoption of this platform, a motion to amend its
currency "plank," by substituting a declaration in favor of
"the use of both gold and silver as equal standard money," was
laid on the table by a vote of 818½ to 105½. A protest from
delegates representing Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, Utah, Montana
and South Dakota was then read, and twenty-two withdrew from
the convention, as a sign of secession from the party.
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Immediately following the adoption of the platform, the
Honorable William McKinley, ex-Governor of Ohio, and of fame
in his connection with the tariff act of 1890, was nominated
on the first ballot for President of the United States, by
661½ votes against 240½ divided among several opposing
candidates, and the nomination was then made unanimous. For
Vice President, the Honorable Garret A. Hobart, of New Jersey,
was named, and similarly by the first voting.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: 1896.
Democratic Platform and Nominations.
The Democratic national convention was held in Chicago, July
7-11. The delegates who came to it from the southern States,
and from most of the States west of Ohio, were arrayed with a
close approach to solid ranks for free silver; while those
from New England and the Middle States opposed them in a
phalanx almost equally firm. The "Gold Democrats" or "Sound
Money Democrats," as the latter were called, ably led by
ex-Governor Hill, of New York, fought hard to the end, but
without avail. The financial resolution they strove to place
in the platform was the following:
"We declare our belief that the experiment on the part of the
United States alone of free-silver coinage, and a change in
the existing standard of value independently of the action of
other great nations, would not only imperil our finances, but
would retard or entirely prevent the establishment of
international bimetallism, to which the efforts of the
government should be steadily directed. It would place this
country at once upon a silver basis, impair contracts, disturb
business, diminish the purchasing power of the wages of labor,
and inflict irreparable evils upon our nation's commerce and
industry.
"Until international co-operation among leading nations for
the coinage of silver can be secured, we favor the rigid
maintenance of the existing gold standard as essential to the
preservation of our national credit, the redemption of our
public pledges, and the keeping inviolate of our country's
honor. We insist that all our paper currency shall be kept at
a parity with gold. The democratic party is the party of hard
money, and is opposed to legal-tender paper money as a part of
our permanent financial system; and we therefore favor the
gradual retirement and cancellation of all United States notes
and treasury notes, under such legislative provisions as will
prevent undue contraction. We demand that the national credit
shall be resolutely maintained at all times and under all
circumstances. "
This resolution was rejected by 626 votes against 303. Another
resolution from the same source, commending "the honesty,
economy, courage and fidelity" of the "democratic national
administration" of President Cleveland, was voted down by 564
to 357. Resolutions to protect existing contracts against a
change of monetary standard, and to provide for a suspension
of silver free coinage, at the ratio of 16 to 1, after trial
for one year, if it failed to maintain parity between silver
and gold, were similarly voted down. The declarations then
adopted, for the "platform" of the party, were as follows:
"We, the Democrats of the United States, in National
Convention assembled, do reaffirm our allegiance to those
great essential principles of justice and liberty upon which
our institutions are founded, and which the Democratic party
has advocated from Jefferson's time to our own—freedom of
speech, freedom of the press, freedom of conscience, the
preservation of personal rights, the equality of all citizens
before the law, and the faithful observance of constitutional
limitations.
"During all these years the Democratic party has resisted the
tendency of selfish interests to the centralization of
governmental power, and steadfastly maintained the integrity
of the dual scheme of government established by the founders
of this Republic of republics. Under its guidance and
teachings the great principle of local self-government has
found its best expression in the maintenance of the rights of
the States and in its assertion of the necessity of confining
the General Government to the exercise of the powers granted
by the Constitution of the United States.
"Recognizing that the money question is paramount to all
others at this time, we invite attention to the fact that the
Federal Constitution names silver and gold together as the
money metals of the United States, and that the first coinage
law passed by Congress under the Constitution made the silver
dollar the monetary unit, and admitted gold to free coinage at
a ratio based upon the silver-dollar unit.
"We declare that the act of 1873 demonetizing silver without
the knowledge or approval of the American people has resulted
in the appreciation of gold and a corresponding fall in the
prices of commodities produced by the people; a heavy increase
in the burden of taxation and of all debts, public and
private; the enrichment of the money-lending class at home and
abroad; prostration of industry and impoverishment of the
people.
"We are unalterably opposed to gold monometallism, which has
locked fast the prosperity of an industrial people in the
paralysis of hard times. Gold monometallism is a British
policy, and its adoption has brought other nations into
financial servitude to London. It is not only un-American but
anti-American, and it can be fastened on the United States
only by the stifling of that spirit and love of liberty which
proclaimed our political independence in 1776 and won it in
the war of the Revolution.
"We demand the free and unlimited coinage of both gold and
silver at the present legal ratio of sixteen to one, without
waiting for the aid or consent of any other nation. We demand
that the standard silver dollar shall be a full legal tender,
equally with gold, for all debts, public and private, and we
favor such legislation as will prevent for the future the
demonetization of any kind of legal-tender money by private
contract.
"We are opposed to the policy and practice of surrendering to
the holders of the obligations of the United States the option
reserved by law to the Government of redeeming such
obligations in either silver coin or gold coin.
"We are opposed to the issuing of interest-bearing bonds of
the United States in time of peace, and condemn the
trafficking with banking syndicates which, in exchange for
bonds and at an enormous profit to themselves, supply the
Federal Treasury with gold to maintain the policy of gold
monometallism.
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"Congress alone has the power to coin and issue money, and
President Jackson declared that this power could not be
delegated to corporations or individuals. We therefore demand
that the power to issue notes to circulate as money be taken
from the National banks, and that all paper money shall be
issued directly by the Treasury Department, be redeemable in
coin, and receivable for all debts, public and private.
"We hold that the tariff duties should be levied for purposes
of revenue, such duties to be so adjusted as to operate
equally throughout the country and not discriminate between
class or section, and that taxation should be limited by the
needs of the Government honestly and economically
administered.
"We denounce, as disturbing to business, the Republican threat
to restore the:McKinley law, which has been twice condemned by
the people in national elections, and which, enacted under the
false plea of protection to home industry, proved a prolific
breeder of trusts and monopolies, enriched the few at the
expense of the many, restricted trade, and deprived the
producers of the great American staples of access to their
natural markets. Until the money question is settled we are
opposed to any agitation for further changes in our tariff
laws, except such as are necessary to make the deficit in
revenue caused by the adverse decision of the Supreme Court on
the income tax.
"There would be no deficit in the revenue but for the
annulment by the Supreme Court of a law passed by a Democratic
Congress in strict pursuance of the uniform decisions of that
court for nearly 100 years, that court having sustained
constitutional objections to its enactment which had been
overruled by the ablest judges who have ever sat on that
bench. We declare that it is the duty of Congress to use all
the constitutional power which remains after that decision, or
which may come by its reversal by the court, as it may
hereafter be constituted, so that the burdens of taxation may
be equally and impartially laid, to the end that wealth may
bear its due proportion of the expenses of the Government.
"We hold that the most efficient way to protect American labor
is to prevent the importation of foreign pauper labor to
compete with it in the home market, and that the value of the
home market to our American farmers and artisans is greatly
reduced by a vicious monetary system, which depresses the
prices of their products below the cost of production, and
thus deprives them of the means of purchasing the products of
our home manufacture.
"We denounce the profligate waste of the money wrung from the
people by oppressive taxation and the lavish appropriations of
recent Republican Congresses, which have kept taxes high,
while the labor that pays them is unemployed, and the products
of the people's toil are depressed in price till they no
longer repay the cost of production. We demand a return to
that simplicity and economy which best befit a Democratic
Government and a reduction in the number of useless offices,
the salaries of which drain the substance of the people.
"We denounce arbitrary interference by Federal authorities in
local affairs as a violation of the Constitution of the United
States and a crime against free institutions, and we
especially object to government by injunction as a new and
highly dangerous form of oppression, by which Federal judges,
in contempt of the laws of the States and rights of citizens,
become at once legislators, judges, and executioners, and we
approve the bill passed at the last session of the United
States Senate, and now pending in the House, relative to
contempts in Federal courts, and providing for trials by jury
in certain cases of contempt.
"No discrimination should be indulged by the Government of the
United States in favor of any of its debtors. We approve of
the refusal of the Fifty-third Congress to pass the Pacific
Railroad funding bill, and denounce the effort of the present
Republican Congress to enact a similar measure.
"Recognizing the just claims of deserving Union soldiers, we
heartily endorse the rule of the present Commissioner of
Pensions that no names shall be arbitrarily dropped from the
pension roll, and the fact of an enlistment and service should
be deemed conclusive evidence against disease or disability
before enlistment.
"We extend our sympathy to the people of Cuba in their heroic
struggle for liberty and independence.
"We are opposed to life tenure in the public service. We favor
appointments based upon merit, fixed terms of office, and such
an administration of the civil-service laws as will afford
equal opportunities to all citizens of ascertained fitness.
"We declare it to be the unwritten law of this Republic,
established by custom and usage of 100 years, and sanctioned
by the examples of the greatest and wisest of those who
founded and have maintained our Government, that no man should
be eligible for a third term of the Presidential office.
"The absorption of wealth by the few, the consolidation of our
leading railroad systems, and formation of trusts and pools
require a stricter control by the Federal Government of those
arteries of commerce. ''We demand the enlargement of the
powers of the Inter-state Commerce Commission, and such
restrictions and guarantees in the control of railroads as
will protect the people from robbery and oppression.
"We favor the admission of the Territories of New Mexico and
Arizona into the Union as States, and we favor the early
admission of all the Territories giving the necessary
population and resources to entitle them to Statehood; and
while they remain Territories we hold that the officials
appointed to administer the government of any Territory,
together with the District 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 that all public lands of the United
States should be appropriated to the establishment of free
homes for American citizens.
"We recommend that the Territory of Alaska be granted a
Delegate in Congress, and that the general land and timber
laws of the United States be extended to said Territory.
"The Federal Government should care for and improve the
Mississippi River and other great waterways of the Republic so
as to secure for the interior people easy and cheap
transportation to tidewater. When any waterway of the Republic
is of sufficient importance to demand aid of the Government,
such aid should be extended upon a definite plan of continuous
work until permanent improvement is secured.
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"Confiding in the justice of our cause and the necessity of
its success at the polls, we submit the foregoing declaration
of principles and purposes to the considerate judgment of the
American people. We invite the support of all citizens who
approve them, and who desire to have them made effective
through legislation for the relief of the people and the
restoration of the country's prosperity."
In the course of the debate upon the silver question, a speech
of impassioned eloquence was made by William J. Bryan, of
Nebraska, who had represented his district in Congress for two
terms, 1891-1894, and who was rising to prominence among the
leaders of the free-silver Democracy of the west. The speech
excited an enthusiasm and an admiration which led to the
nomination of Mr. Bryan for the presidency. That unexpected
choice was reached after four ballots, in each of which the
votes for the Nebraska orator rose steadily in number. At the
fifth ballot they had passed the requisite two-thirds, and his
nomination was declared to be unanimous, though protests were
made. The entire delegation from New York and many delegates
from New England and New Jersey cast no votes, refusing to
take any part in the nomination of a candidate on the platform
laid down. The chosen candidate for Vice President was Arthur
Sewall, of Maine.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: 1896.
The National Silver Party.
The considerable body of Republicans who desired an unlimited
free coinage of silver, and were prepared to quit their party
on that issue, had made efforts to persuade the Democratic
convention at Chicago to accept their leader, Senator Teller,
of Colorado, for its presidential candidate. Failing in that,
they assembled a convention of delegates at St. Louis, July
22-24, and, under the name of the "National Silver Party,"
took the alternative method of uniting the free-silver
Republican vote with that of the free-silver Democracy, by
accepting the Democratic nominations as their own. William J.
Bryan and Arthur Sewall were duly nominated for President and
Vice President, and a "platform" set forth as follows:
"The National Silver Party in Convention assembled hereby
adopts the following declaration of principles:
"First. The paramount issue at this time in the United States
is indisputably the money question. It is between the gold
standard, gold bonds, and bank currency on the one side and
the bimetallic standard, no bonds, and Government currency on
the other.
"On this issue we declare ourselves to be in favor of a
distinctively American financial system. We are unalterably
opposed to the single gold standard, and demand the immediate
return to the constitutional standard of gold and silver, by
the restoration by this Government, independently of any
foreign power, of the unrestricted coinage of both gold and
silver into standard money at the ratio of sixteen to one, and
upon terms of exact equality, as they existed prior to 1873;
the silver coin to be a full legal tender equally with gold
for all debts and dues, private and public, and we favor such
legislation as will prevent for the future the demonetization
of any kind of legal-tender money by private contract.
"We hold that the power to control and regulate a paper
currency is inseparable from the power to coin money, and
hence that all currency intended to circulate as money should
be issued, and its volume controlled by the General Government
only, and should be legal tender.
"We are unalterably opposed to the issue by the United States
of interest-bearing bonds in time of peace, and we denounce as
a blunder worse than a crime the present Treasury policy,
concurred in by a Republican House, of plunging the country in
debt by hundreds of millions in the vain attempt to maintain
the gold standard by borrowing gold, and we demand the payment
of all coin obligations of the United States as provided by
existing laws, in either gold or silver coin, at the option of
the Government and not at the option of the creditor.
"The demonetization of silver in 1873 enormously increased the
demand for gold, enhancing its purchasing power and lowering
all prices measured by that standard; and since that unjust
and indefensible act the prices of American products have
fallen upon an average nearly fifty per cent., carrying down
with them proportionately the money value of all other forms
of property. Such fall of prices has destroyed the profits of
legitimate industry, injuring the producer for the benefit of
the non-producer, increasing the burden of the debtor,
swelling the gains of the creditor, paralyzing the productive
energies of the American people, relegating to idleness vast
numbers of willing workers, sending the shadows of despair
into the home of the honest toiler, filling the land with
tramps and paupers, and building up colossal fortunes at the
money centres.
"In the effort to maintain the gold standard the country has,
within the last two years, in a time of profound peace and
plenty, been loaded down with $262,000,000 of additional
interest-bearing debt, under such circumstances as to allow a
syndicate of native and foreign bankers to realize a net
profit of millions on a single deal.
"It stands confessed that the gold standard can only be upheld
by so depleting our paper currency as to force the prices of
our product below the European and even below the Asiatic
level to enable us to sell in foreign markets, thus
aggravating the very evils our people so bitterly complain of,
degrading American labor, and striking at the foundations of
our civilization itself.
"The advocates of the gold standard persistently claim that
the cause of our distress is over-production; that we have
produced so much that it has made us poor—which implies that
the true remedy is to close the factory, abandon the farm, and
throw a multitude of people out of employment, a doctrine that
leaves us unnerved and disheartened, and absolutely without
hope for the future.
"We affirm it to be unquestioned that there can be no such
economic paradox as over-production, and at the same time tens
of thousands of our fellow-citizens remaining half-clothed and
half-fed, and who are piteously clamoring for the common
necessities of life.
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"Second. That over and above all other questions of policy we
are in favor of restoring to the people of the United States
the time-honored money of the Constitution—gold and silver,
not one, but both—the money of Washington and Hamilton and
Jefferson and Monroe and Jackson and Lincoln, to the end that
the American people may receive honest pay for an honest
product; that the American debtor may pay his just obligations
in an honest standard, and not in a standard that has depreciated
100 per cent. above all the great staples of our country, and
to the end further that the standard countries may be deprived
of the unjust advantage they now enjoy in the difference in
exchange between gold and silver—an advantage which tariff
legislation alone cannot overcome.
"We therefore confidently appeal to the people of the United
States to leave in abeyance for the moment all other
questions, however important and even momentous they may
appear, to sunder, if need be, all former party ties and
affiliations, and unite in one supreme effort to free
themselves and their children from the domination of the money
power—a power more destructive than any which has ever been
fastened upon the civilized men of any race or in any age, and
upon the consummation of our desires and efforts we invoke the
gracious favor of Divine Providence.
"Inasmuch as the patriotic majority of the Chicago convention
embodied in the financial plank of its platform the principles
enunciated in the platform of the American Bimetallic party,
promulgated at Washington, D. C., January 22, 1896, and herein
reiterated, which is not only the paramount but the only real
issue in the pending campaign, therefore, recognizing that
their nominees embody these patriotic principles, we recommend
that this convention nominate William J. Bryan, of Nebraska, for
President, and Arthur Sewall, of Maine, for Vice President."
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: 1896.
People's or Populist Party Platform and Nominations.
The People's Party, more commonly called the Populist Party,
held its national convention at St. Louis on the 22d-25th of
July, simultaneously with that of the National Silver Party,
and with strong influences urging it to act on the same line.
One section of the party strove to bring about a complete
endorsement of the Democratic nominations made at Chicago.
Another section, styled the "Middle-of-the-Road" Populists,
opposed any coalition with other parties; while a third wished
to nominate Bryan, with a Populist candidate for Vice
President, looking to an arrangement with the Democratic
organization for a fusion of electoral tickets in various
States. The idea of the latter prevailed, and William J. Bryan
was nominated for President, with Thomas E. Watson, of
Georgia, for Vice President. The People's Party had little
disagreement with the Chicago declarations of the Democratic
Party, and none at all on financial questions, concerning
which its doctrines were set forth in the following platform:
"The People's Party, assembled in National Convention,
reaffirms its allegiance to the principles declared by the
founders of the Republic, and also to the fundamental
principles of just government as enunciated in the platform of
the party in 1892.
"We recognize that through the connivance of the present and
preceding administrations the country has reached a crisis in
its National life, as predicted in our declaration of four
years ago, and that prompt and patriotic action is the supreme
duty of the hour.
"We realize that while we have political independence, our
financial and industrial independence is yet to be attained by
restoring to our country the constitutional control and
exercise of the functions necessary to a people's government,
which functions have been basely surrendered by our public
servants to corporations and monopolies. The influence of
European money-changers has been more potent in shaping
legislation than the voice of the American people. Executive
power and patronage have been used to corrupt our legislatures
and defeat the will of the people, and plutocracy has been
enthroned upon the ruins of democracy. To restore the
government intended by the fathers, and for the welfare and
prosperity of this and future generations, we demand the
establishment of an economic and financial system which shall
make us masters of our own affairs and independent of European
control, by the adoption of the following declaration of
principles:
"We demand a National money, safe and sound, issued by the
general government only, without the intervention of banks of
issue, to be a full legal tender for an debts, public and
private, and a just, equitable, and efficient means of
distribution direct to the people and through the lawful
disbursements of the Government.
"We demand the free and unrestricted coinage of silver and
gold at the present legal ratio of sixteen to one, without
waiting for the consent of foreign nations.
"We demand that the volume of circulating medium be speedily
increased to an amount sufficient to meet the demands of the
business population of this country and to restore the just
level of prices of labor and production.
"We denounce the sale of bonds and the increase of the public
interest-bearing bond debt made by the present administration
as unnecessary and without authority of law, and we demand
that no more bonds be issued except by specific act of
Congress.
"We demand such legislation as will prevent the demonetization
of the lawful money of the United States by private contract.
"We demand that the Government, in payment of its obligations,
shall use its option as to the kind of lawful money in which
they are to be paid, and we denounce the present and preceding
administrations for surrendering this option to the holders of
government obligations.
"We demand a graduated income tax, to the end that aggregated
wealth shall bear its just proportion of taxation, and we
denounce the recent decision of the Supreme Court relative to
the income-tax law as a misinterpretation of the Constitution
and an invasion of the rightful powers of Congress over the
subject of taxation.
"We demand that postal savings banks be established by the
Government for the safe deposit of the savings of the people
and to facilitate exchange.
"Transportation being a means of exchange and a public
necessity, the Government should own and operate the railroads
in the interest of the people and on non-partisan basis, to
the end that all may be accorded the same treatment in
transportation, and that the tyranny and political power now
exercised by the great railroad corporations, which result in
the impairment if not the destruction of the political rights
and personal liberties of the citizens, may be destroyed. Such
ownership is to be accomplished gradually, in a manner
consistent with sound public policy.
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"The interest of the United States in the public highways
built with public moneys and the proceeds of extensive grants
of land to the Pacific railroads should never be alienated,
mortgaged, or sold, but guarded and protected for the general
welfare as provided by the laws organizing such railroads. The
foreclosure of existing liens of the United States on these
roads should at once follow default in the payment of the debt
of the companies, and at the foreclosure sales of said roads
the Government should purchase the same if it becomes
necessary to protect its interests therein, or if they can be
purchased at a reasonable price; and the Government should
operate said railroads as public highways for the benefit of
the whole and not in the interest of the few, under suitable
provisions for protection of life and property, giving to all
transportation interests and privileges and equal rates for
fares and freight.
"We denounce the present infamous schemes for refunding those
debts and demand that the laws now applicable thereto be
executed and administered according to their true intent and
spirit.
"The telegraph, like the post-office system, being a necessity
for the transmission of news, should be owned and operated by
the Government in the interest of the people.
"The true policy demands that the National and State
legislation shall be such as will ultimately enable every
prudent and industrious citizen to secure a home, and
therefore the land should not be monopolized for speculative
purposes.
"All land now held by railroads and other corporations in
excess of their actual needs should by lawful means be
reclaimed by the Government and held for actual settlers only,
and private land monopoly, as well as alien ownership, should
be prohibited.
"We condemn the frauds by which the land grant to the Pacific
Railroad Companies have, through the connivance of the
Interior Department, robbed multitudes of bona fide settlers
of their homes and miners of their claims, and we demand
legislation by Congress which will enforce the exemption of
mineral land from such grants after as well as before patent.
"We demand that bona fide settlers on all public lands be
granted free homes, as provided in the National homestead law,
and that no exception be made in the case of Indian
reservations when opened for settlement, and that all lands
not now patented come under this demand.
"We favor a system of direct legislation through the
initiative and referendum under proper constitutional
safeguards.
"We demand the election of President, Vice-President, and
United States Senators by a direct vote of the people.
"We tender to the patriotic people of Cuba our deepest
sympathy in their heroic struggle for political freedom and
independence, and we believe the time has come when the United
States, the great Republic of the world, should recognize that
Cuba is and of right ought to be a free and independent State.
"We favor home rule in the Territories and the District of
Columbia and the early admission of the Territories as States.
"All public salaries should be made to correspond to the price
of labor and its products.
"In times of great industrial depression idle labor should be
employed on public works as far as practicable.
"The arbitrary course of the courts in assuming to imprison
citizens for indirect contempt and ruling by injunction should
be prevented by proper legislation.
"We favor just pensions for our disabled Union soldiers.
"Believing that the elective franchise and untrammelled ballot
are essential to a government of, for, and by the people, the
People's Party condemn the wholesale system of
disfranchisement adopted in some States as unrepublican and
undemocratic, and we declare it to be the duty of the several
State legislatures to take such action as will secure a full,
free, and fair ballot and an honest count.
"While the foregoing propositions constitute the platform upon
which our party stands, and for the vindication of which its
organization will be maintained, we recognize that the great
and pressing issue of the pending campaign, upon which the
present Presidential election will turn, is the financial
question, and upon this great and specific issue between the
parties we cordially invite the aid and co-operation of all
organizations and citizens agreeing with us upon this vital
question."
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: 1896.
National Democratic Platform and Nominations.
An extensive revolt in the Democratic Party against the
declarations and the action of the party convention at Chicago
had been quickly made manifest, and steps were soon taken
towards giving it an organized form. These led to the
assembling of a convention of delegates at Indianapolis, on
the 2d and 3d of September, which, in the name of the
"National Democratic Party," repudiated the platform and the
candidates put forward at Chicago, and branded them as false
to the historic party name which they assumed. General John M.
Palmer, of Illinois, was put in nomination for President, and
General Simon Bolivar Buckner, of Kentucky, for Vice
President, of the United States, and a declaration of
Democratic principles adopted, the fundamental passages of
which are quoted in the following:
"This convention has assembled to uphold the principles upon
which depend the honor and welfare of the American people, in
order that democrats throughout the Union may unite their
patriotic efforts to avert disaster from their country and
ruin from their party.
"The democratic party is pledged to equal and exact justice to
all men of every creed and condition; to the largest freedom
of the individual consistent with good government; to the
preservation of the federal government in its constitutional
vigor, and to the support of the states in all their just
rights; to economy in the public expenditures; to the
maintenance of the public faith and sound money; and it is
opposed to paternalism and all class legislation. The
declarations of the Chicago convention attack individual
freedom, the right of private contract, the independence of
the judiciary, and the authority of the president to enforce
federal laws. They advocate a reckless attempt to increase the
price of silver by legislation, to the debasement of our
monetary standard; and threaten unlimited issues of paper
money by the government.
{571}
They abandon for republican allies the democratic cause of
tariff reform, to court favor of protectionists to their
fiscal heresy. In view of these and other grave departures
from democratic principles, we cannot support the candidates
of that convention, nor be bound by its acts. The democratic
party has survived defeats, but could not survive a victory
won in behalf of the doctrine and policy proclaimed in its
name at Chicago.
"The conditions, however, which made possible such utterances
from a national convention, are the direct result of class
legislation by the republican party. It still proclaims, as it
has for years, the power and duty of government to raise and
maintain prices by law, and it proposes no remedy for existing
evils except oppressive and unjust taxation. … The demand of
the republican party for an increase in tariff taxation has
its pretext in the deficiency of the revenue, which has its
causes in the stagnation of trade and reduced consumption, due
entirely to the loss of confidence that has followed the
populist threat of free coinage and depreciation of our money,
and the republican practice of extravagant appropriations beyond
the needs of good government. We arraign and condemn the
populistic conventions of Chicago and St. Louis for their
cooperation with the republican party in creating these
conditions, which are pleaded in justification of a heavy
increase of the burdens of the people by a further resort to
protection. We therefore denounce protection and its ally,
free coinage of silver, as schemes for the personal profit of
a few at the expense of the masses; and oppose the two parties
which stand for these schemes as hostile to the people of the
republic, whose food and shelter, comfort and prosperity are
attacked by higher taxes and depreciated money. In fine, we
reaffirm the historic democratic doctrine of tariff for
revenue only. …
"The experience of mankind has shown that, by reason of their
natural qualities, gold is the necessary money of the large
affairs of commerce and business, while silver is conveniently
adapted to minor transactions, and the most beneficial use of
both together can be insured only by the adoption of the
former as a standard of monetary measure, and the maintenance
of silver at a parity with gold by its limited coinage under
suitable safeguards of law. Thus the largest possible
employment of both metals is gained with a value universally
accepted throughout the world, which constitutes the only
practical bimetallic currency, assuring the most stable
standard, and especially the best and safest money for all who
earn their livelihood by labor or the produce of husbandry. They
cannot suffer when paid in the best money known to man, but
are the peculiar and most defenceless victims of a debased and
fluctuating currency, which offers continual profits to the
money changer at their cost.
"Realizing these truths demonstrated by long and public
inconvenience and loss, the democratic party, in the interests
of the masses and of equal justice to all, practically
established by the legislation of 1834 and 1853 the gold
standard of monetary measurement, and likewise entirely
divorced the government from banking and currency issues. To
this long-established democratic policy we adhere, and insist
upon the maintenance of the gold standard, and of the parity
therewith of every dollar issued by the government, and are
firmly opposed to the free and unlimited coinage of silver and
to the compulsory purchase of silver bullion. But we denounce
also the further maintenance of the present costly patchwork
system of national paper currency as a constant source of
injury and peril. We assert the necessity of such intelligent
currency reform as will confine the government to its
legitimate functions, completely separated from the banking
business, and afford to all sections of our country uniform,
safe, and elastic bank currency under governmental
supervision, measured in volume by the needs of business.
"The fidelity, patriotism, and courage with which President
Cleveland has fulfilled his great public trust, the high
character of his administration, its wisdom and energy in the
maintenance of civil order and the enforcement of the laws,
its equal regard for the rights of every class and every
section, its firm and dignified conduct of foreign affairs,
and its sturdy persistence in upholding the credit and honor
of the nation are fully recognized by the democratic party,
and will secure to him a place in history beside the fathers
of the republic. We also commend the administration for the
great progress made in the reform of the public service, and
we indorse its effort to extend the merit system still
further. We demand that no backward step be taken, but that
the reform be supported and advanced until the un-democratic
spoils system of appointments be eradicated."
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: 1896.
Prohibition Platform and Nominations.
The Prohibition Party had been the first to open the
presidential campaign with candidates placed in the field. Its
national convention was held at Pittsburg, on the 27th and
28th of May, and its nominees for President and Vice President
were Joshua Levering, of Maryland, and Hale Johnson, of
Illinois. But a split in the convention occurred on attempts
made to graft free-silver and kindred doctrines on the
one-issue platform which the majority of the party desired.
Except in a single particular, the latter prevailed. The
platform adopted was as follows:
"The Prohibition Party, in national convention assembled,
declares its firm conviction that the manufacture,
exportation, importation, and sale of alcoholic beverages has
produced such social, commercial, industrial, and political
wrongs, and is now so threatening the perpetuity of all our
social and political institutions, that the suppression of the
same by a national party organized therefor is the greatest
object to be accomplished by the voters of our country, and is
of such importance that it, of right, ought to control the
political actions of all our patriotic citizens until such
suppression is accomplished. The urgency of this course
demands the union without further delay of all citizens who
desire the prohibition of the liquor traffic. Therefore be it
"Resolved, That we favor the legal prohibition by state and
national legislation of the manufacture, importation, and sale
of alcoholic beverages. That we declare our purpose to
organize and unite all the friends of prohibition into one
party; and in order to accomplish this end we deem it of right
to leave every prohibitionist the freedom of his own
convictions upon all other political questions, and trust our
representatives to take such action upon other political
questions as the changes occasioned by prohibition and the
welfare of the whole people shall demand."
{572}
Resolved, "The right of suffrage ought not to be abridged on
account of sex."
Those delegates who were dissatisfied with this platform
withdrew from the convention, assembled in another hall,
assumed the name of "The National Party," adopted the
following declarations, and nominated Charles E. Bentley, of
Nebraska, and J. II. Southgate, of North Carolina, for the two
highest offices in the national government:
"The National Party, recognizing God as the author of all just
power in government, presents the following declaration of
principles, which it pledges itself to enact into effective
legislation when given the power to do so:
"The suppression of the manufacture and sale, importation,
exportation, and transportation of intoxicating liquors for
beverage purposes. We utterly reject all plans for regulating
or compromising with this traffic, whether such plans be
called local option, taxation, license, or public control. The
sale of liquors for medicinal and other legitimate uses should
be conducted by the State, without profit, and with such
regulations as will prevent fraud or evasion.
"No citizen should be denied the right to vote on account of
sex.
"All money should be issued by the General Government only,
and without the intervention of any private citizen,
corporation, or banking institution. It should be based upon
the wealth, stability, and integrity of the nation. It should
be a full legal tender for all debts, public and private, and
should be of sufficient volume to meet the demands of the
legitimate business interests of the country. For the purpose
of honestly liquidating our outstanding coin obligations, we
favor the free and unlimited coinage of both silver and gold,
at the ratio of sixteen to one, without consulting any other
nation.
"Land is the common heritage of the people and should be
preserved from monopoly and speculation. All unearned grants
of land, subject to forfeiture, should be reclaimed by the
Government and no portion of the public domain should
hereafter be granted except to actual settlers, continuous use
being essential to tenure.
"Railroads, telegraphs, and other natural monopolies should be
owned and operated by the Government, giving to the people the
benefit of service at actual cost.
"The National Constitution should be so amended as to allow
the national revenues to be raised by equitable adjustment of
taxation on the properties and incomes of the people, and
import duties should be levied as a means of securing
equitable commercial relations with other nations.
"The contract convict-labor system, through which speculators
are enriched at the expense of the State, should be abolished.
"All citizens should be protected by law in their right to one
day of rest in seven, without oppressing any who
conscientiously observe any other than the first day of the
week.
"American public schools, taught in the English language,
should be maintained, and no public funds should be
appropriated for sectarian institutions.
"The President, Vice-President, and United States Senators
should be elected by direct vote of the people.
"Ex-soldiers and sailors of the United States army and navy,
their widows, and minor children, should receive liberal
pensions, graded on disability and term of service, not merely
as a debt of gratitude, but for service rendered in the
preservation of the Union.
"Our immigration laws should be so revised as to exclude
paupers and criminals. None but citizens of the United States
should be allowed to vote in any State, and naturalized
citizens should not vote until one year after naturalization
papers have been issued.
"The initiative and referendum and proportional representation
should be adopted.
"Having herein presented our principles and purposes, we
invite the co-operation and support of all citizens who are
with us substantially agreed."
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: 1896.
Socialist-Labor Party Nominations.
Still another party which placed candidates for the presidency
and vice-presidency in nomination was the Socialist-Labor
organization, which held a convention in New York, July 4-10,
and named for the two high offices, Charles H. Matchett, of
New York, and Mathew Maguire, of New Jersey. Its platform
embodied the essential doctrines of socialism, as commonly
understood, and was as follows:
"The Socialist Labor Party of the United States, in convention
assembled, reasserts the inalienable rights of all men to
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
"With the founders of the American Republic we hold that the
purpose of government is to secure every citizen in the
enjoyment of this right; but in the right of our conditions we
hold, furthermore, that no such right can be exercised under a
system of economic inequality, essentially destructive of
life, of liberty, and of happiness.
"With the founders of this Republic we hold that the true
theory of politics is that the machinery of government must be
owned and controlled by the whole people; but in the light of
our industrial development we hold, furthermore, that the true
theory of economics is that the machinery of production must
likewise belong to the people in common.
"To the obvious fact that our despotic system of economics is
the direct opposite of our democratic system of politics, can
plainly be traced the existence of a privileged class, the
corruption of Government by that class, the alienation of
public property, public franchises, and public functions to
that class, and the abject dependence of the mightiest of
nations upon that class.
"Again, through the perversion of democracy to the ends of
plutocracy, labor is robbed of its 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.
{573}
"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 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 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 modern factors of
civilization.
"With a view to immediate improvement in the condition of
labor we present the following demands:
"1. Reduction of the hours of labor in proportion to the
progress of production.
"2. The United States shall obtain possession of the
railroads, canals, telegraphs, telephones, and all other means
of public transportation and communication; the employés to
operate the same co-operatively under control of the Federal
Government and to elect their own superior officers, but no
employé shall be discharged for political reasons.
"3. The municipalities shall obtain possession of the local
railroads, ferries, waterworks, gas-works, electric plants,
and all industries requiring municipal franchises; the
employés to operate the same co-operatively under control of
the municipal administration and to elect their own superior
officers, but no employé shall be discharged for political
reasons.
"4. The public lands declared inalienable. Revocation of all
land grants to corporations or individuals the conditions of
which have not been complied with.
"5. The United States to have the exclusive right to issue
money.
"6. Congressional legislation providing for the scientific
management of forests and waterways, and prohibiting the waste
of the natural resources of the country.
"7. Inventions to be free to all: the inventors to be
remunerated by the nation.
"8. Progressive income tax and tax on inheritances; the
smaller incomes to be exempt.
"9. School education of all children under fourteen years of
age to be compulsory, gratuitous, and accessible to all by
public assistance in meals, clothing, books, etc., where
necessary.
"10. Repeal of all pauper, tramp, conspiracy, and sumptuary
laws. Unabridged right of combination.
"11. Prohibition of the employment of children of school age
and of female labor in occupations detrimental to health or
morality. Abolition of the convict-labor contract system.
"12. Employment of the unemployed by the public authorities
(county, State, or nation).
"13. All wages to be paid in lawful money of the United
States. Equalization of women's wages to those of men where
equal service is performed.
"14. Laws for the protection of life and limb in all
occupations, and an efficient employers' liability law.
"15. The people to have the right to propose laws and to vote
upon all measures of importance according to the referendum
principle.
"16. Abolition of the veto power of the Executive (National,
State, or municipal), wherever it exists.
"17. Abolition of the United States Senate and all upper
legislative chambers.
"18. Municipal self-government.
"19. Direct vote and secret ballots in all elections.
Universal and equal right of suffrage without regard to color,
creed, or sex. Election days to be legal holidays. The
principle of proportional representation to be introduced.
"20. All public officers to be subject to recall by their
respective constituencies.
"21. Uniform civil and criminal law throughout the United
States. Administration of justice free of charge. Abolition of
capital punishment."
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: 1896.
The Canvass and Election.
The canvass which occupied the months between party
nominations and the election was the most remarkable, in many
respects, that the country had ever gone through. On both
sides of the silver question intense convictions were burning
and intense anxieties being felt. To the defenders of the gold
standard of value—the monetary standard of the world at
large—an unlimited free coinage of silver legal tender money,
at the ratio of 16 to 1, meant both dishonor and ruin—national
bankruptcy, the wreck of industry, and chaos in the commercial
world. To many of those who strove with desperate eagerness to
bring it about it meant, on the contrary, a millennial social
state, in which abundance would prevail, the goods of the
world be divided more fairly, and labor have a juster reward.
So the issue fronted each as one personal, vital, almost as of
life and death. Their conflict bore no likeness to those
commonly in politics, where consequences seem remote, vague,
general to the body politic,—not, instantly overhanging the
head of the individual citizen, as in this case they did. Not
even the patriotic and moral excitements of the canvass of
1860 produced so intense a feeling of personal interest in the
election—so painful an anxiety in waiting for its result. And
never in any former political contest had the questions
involved been debated so earnestly, studied so widely and
intently, set forth by every artifice of exposition and
illustration with so much ingenious pains. The "campaign
literature" distributed by each party was beyond computation
in quantity and beyond classification in its kinds. The
speeches of the canvass were innumerable. Mr. Bryan
contributed some hundreds, in tours which he made through the
country, and Mr. McKinley, at his home, in Canton, Ohio,
received visiting delegations from all parts of the country
and addressed them at more or less length.
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With all the excitement of anxiety and the heated conflict of
beliefs there was little violence of any kind, from first to
last. The critical election day (November 3) passed with no
serious incidents of disorder. The verdict of the people,
pronounced for the preservation of the monetary standard which
the world at large has established in general use, was
accepted with the equanimity to which self-governing citizens
are trained. Nearly fourteen millions of votes were cast, of
which the Republican presidential electors received 7,104,244;
electors representing the various parties which had nominated
Mr. Bryan received, in all, 6,506,835; those on the National
Democratic ticket received 134,652; those on the Prohibition
tickets, 144,606; those on the Socialist-Labor ticket, 36,416.
In the Electoral College, there were 271 votes for McKinley,
and 176 for Bryan. The States giving their electoral votes for
McKinley were California (excepting 1 vote, cast for Bryan),
Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky
(except 1), Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan,
Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota,
Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, West
Virginia, Wisconsin. The States which chose electors for Bryan
were Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho,
Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska,
Nevada, North Carolina, South Carolina, South Dakota,
Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, Wyoming, besides
the single votes won in California and Kentucky. For Vice
President, Hobart received 271 electoral votes—the same as
McKinley; but Sewall received 27 less than Bryan, that number
being cast for the Populist candidate, Watson. This was
consequent on fusion arrangements between Democrats and
Populists in 28 States.
In some States, the majority given against silver free coinage
was overwhelming, as for example, in New York, 268,000
plurality for McKinley, besides 19,000 votes cast for the
"Gold Democratic" candidate; New Jersey, 87,000 Republican
plurality and 6,000 votes for General Palmer; Pennsylvania,
295,000 and 11,000; Massachusetts, 173,000 and 11,000. On the
other hand, Texas gave Bryan a plurality of 202,000, and
Colorado 135,000.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1896 (November).
Agreement with Great Britain for the settlement of the
Venezuela dispute.
See (in this volume)
VENEZUELA: A. D. 1896-1899.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1896 (December).
President Cleveland on affairs in Cuba.
See (in this volume)
CUBA: A. D. 1896-1897.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1896-1897.
Immigration Bill vetoed by President Cleveland.
On the 17th of December, 1896, a bill to amend the immigration
laws, which had passed the House of Representatives during the
previous session of Congress, passed the Senate, with
amendments which the House refused to accept. By conferences
between the two branches of Congress an agreement was finally
reached, in which the House concurred on the 9th of February
and the Senate on the 17th. But the President disapproved the
measure, and returned it to Congress on the 2d of March, with
his objections set forth in the following Message:
"I herewith return without approval House bill No. 7864,
entitled 'An act to amend the immigration laws of the United
States.'
"By the first section of this bill it is proposed to amend
section 1 of the act of March 3, 1891, relating to immigration
by adding to the classes of aliens thereby excluded from
admission to the United States the following: 'All persons
physically capable and over 16 years of age who can not read
and write the English language or some other language; but a
person not so able to read and write who is over 50 years of
age and is the parent or grandparent of a qualified immigrant
over 21 years of age and capable of supporting such parent or
grandparent may accompany such immigrant, or such a parent or
grandparent may be sent for and come to join the family of a
child or grandchild over 21 years of age similarly qualified
and capable, and a wife or minor child not so able to read and
write may accompany or be sent for and come and join the
husband or parent similarly qualified and capable.'
"A radical departure from our national policy relating to
immigration is here presented. Heretofore we have welcomed all
who came to us from other lands except those whose moral or
physical condition or history threatened danger to our
national welfare and safety. Relying upon the zealous
watchfulness of our people to prevent injury to our political
and social fabric, we have encouraged those coming from
foreign countries to cast their lot with us and join in the
development of our vast domain, securing in return a share in
the blessings of American citizenship. A century's stupendous
growth, largely due to the assimilation and thrift of millions
of sturdy and patriotic adopted citizens, attests the success
of this generous and free-handed policy which, while guarding
the people's interests, exacts from our immigrants only
physical and moral soundness and a willingness and ability to
work. A contemplation of the grand results of this policy can
not fail to arouse a sentiment in its defense, for however it
might have been regarded as an original proposition and viewed
as an experiment its accomplishments are such that if it is to be
uprooted at this late day its disadvantages should be plainly
apparent and the substitute adopted should be just and
adequate, free from uncertainties, and guarded against
difficult or oppressive administration.
"It is not claimed, I believe, that the time has come for the
further restriction of immigration on the ground that an
excess of population overcrowds our land. It is said, however,
that the quality of recent immigration is undesirable. The
time is quite within recent memory when the same thing was
said of immigrants who, with their descendants, are now
numbered among our best citizens. It is said that too many
immigrants settle in our cities, thus dangerously increasing
their idle and vicious population. This is certainly a
disadvantage. It can not be shown, however, that it affects
all our cities, nor that it is permanent; nor does it appear
that this condition where it exists demands as its remedy the
reversal of our present immigration policy. The claim is also
made that the influx of foreign laborers deprives of the
opportunity to work those who are better entitled than they to
the privilege of earning their livelihood by daily toil. An
unfortunate condition is certainly presented when any who are
willing to labor are unemployed, but so far as this condition
now exists among our people it must be conceded to be a result
of phenomenal business depression and the stagnation of all
enterprises in which labor is a factor.
{575}
With the advent of settled and wholesome financial and
economic governmental policies and consequent encouragement to
the activity of capital the misfortunes of unemployed labor
should, to a great extent at least, be remedied. If it
continues, its natural consequences must be to check the
further immigration to our cities of foreign laborers and to
deplete the ranks of those already there. In the meantime
those most willing and best entitled ought to be able to
secure the advantages of such work as there is to do.
"It is proposed by the bill under consideration to meet the
alleged difficulties of the situation by establishing an
educational test by which the right of a foreigner to make his
home with us shall be determined. Its general scheme is to
prohibit from admission to our country all immigrants
'physically capable and over 16 years of age who can not read
and write the English language or some other language,' and it
is provided that this test shall be applied by requiring
immigrants seeking admission to read and afterwards to write
not less than twenty nor more than twenty-five words of the
Constitution of the United States in some language, and that
any immigrant failing in this shall not be admitted, but shall
be returned to the country from whence he came at the expense
of the steamship or railroad company which brought him.
"The best reason that could be given for this radical
restriction of immigration is the necessity of protecting our
population against degeneration and saving our national peace
and quiet from imported turbulence and disorder. I can not
believe that we would be protected against these evils by
limiting immigration to those who can read and write in any
language twenty-five words of our Constitution. In my opinion,
it is infinitely more safe to admit a hundred thousand
immigrants who, though unable to read and write, seek among us
only a home and opportunity to work than to admit one of those
unruly agitators and enemies of governmental control who can
not only read and write, but delights in arousing by
inflammatory speech the illiterate and peacefully inclined to
discontent and tumult. Violence and disorder do not originate
with illiterate laborers. They are, rather, the victims of the
educated agitator. The ability to read and write, as required
in this bill, in and of itself affords, in my opinion, a
misleading test of contented industry and supplies
unsatisfactory evidence of desirable citizenship or a proper
apprehension of the benefits of our institutions. If any
particular element of our illiterate immigration is to be
feared for other causes than illiteracy, these causes should
be dealt with directly, instead of making illiteracy the
pretext for exclusion, to the detriment of other illiterate
immigrants against whom the real cause of complaint cannot be
alleged.
"The provisions intended to rid that part of the proposed
legislation already referred to from obvious hardship appear
to me to be indefinite and inadequate. A parent, grandparent,
wife, or minor child of a qualified immigrant, though unable
to read and write, may accompany the immigrant or be sent for
to join his family, provided the immigrant is capable of
supporting such relative. These exceptions to the general rule
of exclusion contained in the bill were made to prevent the
separation of families, and yet neither brothers nor sisters
are provided for. In order that relatives who are provided for
may be reunited, those still in foreign lands must be sent for
to join the immigrant here. What formality is necessary to
constitute this prerequisite, and how are the facts of
relationship and that the relative is sent for to be
established? Are the illiterate relatives of immigrants who
have come here under prior laws entitled to the advantage of
these exceptions? A husband who can read and write and who
determines to abandon his illiterate wife abroad will find
here under this law an absolutely safe retreat. The illiterate
relatives mentioned must not only be sent for, but such immigrant
must be capable of supporting them when they arrive. This
requirement proceeds upon the assumption that the foreign
relatives coming here are in every case, by reason of poverty,
liable to become a public charge unless the immigrant is
capable of their support. The contrary is very often true. And
yet if unable to read and write, though quite able and willing
to support themselves and their relatives here besides, they
could not be admitted under the provisions of this bill if the
immigrant was impoverished, though the aid of his fortunate
but illiterate relative might be the means of saving him from
pauperism.
"The fourth section of this bill provides—'That it shall be
unlawful for any male alien who has not in good faith made his
declaration before the proper court of his intention to become
a citizen of the United States to be employed on any public works
of the United States or to come regularly or habitually into
the United States by land or water for the purpose of engaging
in any mechanical trade or manual labor for wages or salary,
returning from time to time to a foreign country.' The fifth
section provides—'That it shall be unlawful for any person,
partnership, company, or corporation knowingly to employ any
alien coming into the United States in violation of the next
preceding section of this act.'
"The prohibition against the employment of aliens upon any
public works of the United States is in line with other
legislation of a like character. It is quite a different
thing, however, to declare it a crime for an alien to come
regularly and habitually into the United States for the
purpose of obtaining work from private parties, if such alien
returns from time to time to a foreign country, and to
constitute any employment of such alien a criminal offense.
When we consider these provisions of the bill in connection
with our long northern frontier and the boundaries of our
States and Territories, often but an imaginary line separating
them from the British dominions, and recall the friendly
intercourse between the people who are neighbors on either
side, the provisions of this bill affecting them must be
regarded as illiberal, narrow, and un-American. The residents
of these States and Territories have separate and especial
interests which in many cases make an interchange of labor
between their people and their alien neighbors most important,
frequently with the advantage largely in favor of our
citizens. This suggests the inexpediency of Federal
interference with these conditions when not necessary to the
correction of a substantial evil, affecting the general
welfare. Such unfriendly legislation as is proposed could
hardly fail to provoke retaliatory measures, to the injury of
many of our citizens who now find employment on adjoining
foreign soil.
{576}
The uncertainty of construction to which the language of these
provisions is subject is a serious objection to a statute
which describes a crime. An important element in the offense
sought to be created by these sections is the coming
'regularly or habitually into the United States.' These words
are impossible of definite and certain construction. The same
may be said of the equally important words 'returning from
time to time to a foreign country.'
"A careful examination of this bill has convinced me that for
the reasons given and others not specifically stated its
provisions are unnecessarily harsh and oppressive, and its
defects in construction would cause vexation and its operation
would result in harm to our citizens.
GROVER CLEVELAND."
In the House of Representatives, the Bill was passed again,
over the veto, by the requisite vote of two-thirds; in the
Senate it was referred to the Committee on Immigration, and no
further action was taken upon it. Therefore, it did not become
a law.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1896-1898.
Agitation for monetary reforms.
The Indianapolis Commission.
Secretary Gage's plan.
The Senatorial block in the way.
On November 18, 1896, the Governors of the Indianapolis Board
of Trade invited the Boards of Trade of Chicago, St. Louis,
Cincinnati, Louisville, Cleveland. Columbus, Toledo, Kansas
City, Detroit, Milwaukee, St. Paul, Des Moines, Minneapolis,
Grand Rapids, Peoria, and Omaha to a conference on the first
of December following, to consider the advisability of calling
a larger convention from commercial organizations throughout
the country for the purpose of discussing the wisdom of
selecting a non-partisan commission to formulate a sound
currency system. This preliminary conference issued a call for
a non-partisan monetary convention of business men, chosen
from boards of trade, chambers of commerce, and commercial
clubs, to meet in Indianapolis, on January 12, 1897. At the
convention there were assembled, with credentials, 299
delegates, representing business organizations and cities in
nearly every State in the Union. The result of its
deliberations was expressed in resolutions which opened as
follows:
"This convention declares that it has become absolutely
necessary that a consistent, straightforward, and deliberately
planned monetary system shall be inaugurated, the fundamental
basis of which should be: First, that the present gold
standard should be maintained. Second, that steps should be
taken to insure the ultimate retirement of all classes of
United States notes by a gradual and steady process, and so as
to avoid the injurious contraction of the currency, or
disturbance of the business interests of the country, and that
until such retirements provision should be made for a
separation of the revenue and note-issue departments of the
Treasury. Third, that a banking system be provided, which
should furnish credit facilities to every portion of the
country and a safe and elastic circulation, and especially
with a view of securing such a distribution of the loanable
capital of the country as will tend to equalize the rates of
interest in all parts thereof."
Recognizing the necessity of committing the formulation of
such a plan to a body of men trained and experienced in these
matters, a commission was proposed. In case no commission
should be authorized by Congress in the spring of 1897, the
Executive Committee of the Convention was authorized to select
a commission of eleven members, "to make thorough
investigation of the monetary affairs and needs of this
country, in all relations and aspects, and to make appropriate
suggestions as to any evils found to exist, and the remedies
therefor."
Congress did not authorize the appointment of a monetary
commission; and the Executive Committee of the Convention
selected a commission of eleven members, which began its
sittings in Washington, September 22, 1897. … The Commission
was composed as follows: George F. Edmunds, Vermont, chairman;
George E. Leighton, Missouri, vice-chairman; T. G. Bush,
Alabama; W. B. Dean, Minnesota; Charles S. Fairchild, New
York; Stuyvesant Fish, New York; J. W. Fries, North Carolina;
Louis A. Garnett, California; J. Laurence Laughlin, Illinois;
C. Stuart Patterson, Pennsylvania; Robert S. Taylor, Indiana;
and L. Carron Root and H. Parker Willis, secretaries. Early in
January, 1898, the report of the Monetary Commission was
made public, and a second convention of delegates from the
boards of trade and other commercial organizations of leading
cities in the country was called together at Indianapolis,
January 20-26, to consider its recommendations. The measures
proposed by the Commission were approved by the convention,
and were submitted to Congress by a committee appointed to
urge their enactment in law. The Secretary of the Treasury,
Mr. Gage, had already, in his first annual report and in the
draft of a bill which he laid before the House committee on
banking and currency, made recommendations which accorded in
principle with those of the Commission, differing somewhat in
details. Both plans, with some proposals from other sources,
were now taken in hand by the House committee on banking and
currency, and a bill was prepared, which the committee
reported to the House on the 15th of June. But the other
branch of Congress, the Senate, had already declared itself in
a way which forbade any hope of success. By a vote of 47 to
32, that body had resolved, on the 28th of January, that "all
the bonds of the United States issued, or authorized to be
issued, under the said acts of Congress herein before recited,
are payable, principal and interest, at the option of the
government of the United States, in silver dollars, of the
coinage of the United States, containing 412½ grains each of
standard silver: and that to restore to its coinage such
silver coins as a legal tender in payment of said bonds,
principal and interest, is not in violation of the public
faith, nor in derogation of the rights of the public
creditor." The House, by 182 to 132, had rejected this
resolution; but the Senate action had demonstrated the evident
uselessness of attempting legislation in the interest of a
monetary reform. Accordingly the House bill, after being
reported and made public, for discussion outside, was
withdrawn by the committee, and the subject rested in
Congress, while agitation in the country went on.
{577}
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897.
The Industrial Revolution.
"In 1865 the problem presented was this: The United States
could certainly excel any European nation in economic
competition, and possibly the whole Continent combined, if it
could utilize its resources. So much was admitted; the doubt
touched the capacity of the people to organize a system of
transportation and industry adequate to attain that end.
Failure meant certain bankruptcy. Unappalled by the magnitude
of the speculation, the American people took the risk. What
that risk was may be imagined when the fact is grasped that in
1865, with 35,000 miles of road already built, this people
entered on the construction of 160,000 miles more, at an
outlay, probably, in excess of $10,000,000,000. Such figures
convey no impression to the mind, any more than a statement of
the distance of a star. It may aid the imagination, perhaps,
to say that Mr. Giffen estimated the cost to France of the war
of 1870, including the indemnity and Alsace and Lorraine, at
less than $3,500,000,000, or about one-third of this
portentous mortgage on the future.
"As late as 1870 America remained relatively poor, for
America, so far as her export trade went, relied on
agriculture alone. To build her roads she had to borrow, and
she expected to pay dear; but she did not calculate on having
to pay twice the capital she borrowed, estimating that capital
in the only merchandise she had to sell. Yet this is very nearly
what occurred. Agricultural prices fell so rapidly that
between 1890 and 1897, when the sharpest pressure prevailed,
it took something like twice the weight of wheat or cotton to
repay a dollar borrowed in 1873, that would have sufficed to
satisfy the creditor when the debt was contracted. Merchandise
enough could not be shipped to meet the emergency, and
balances had to be paid in coin. The agony this people endured
may be measured by the sacrifice they made. At the moment of
severest contraction, in the single year 1893. the United
States parted with upwards of $87,000,000 of gold, when to
lose gold was like draining a living body of its blood. …
"What America owed abroad can never be computed; it is enough
that it reached an enormous sum, to refund which, even under
favorable circumstances, would have taken years of effort;
actually forced payment brought the nation to the brink of a
convulsion. Perhaps no people ever faced such an emergency and
paid, without recourse to war. America triumphed through her
inventive and administrative genius. Brought to a white heat
under compression, the industrial system of the Union suddenly
fused into a homogeneous mass. One day, without warning, the
gigantic mechanism operated, and two hemispheres vibrated with
the shock. In March, 1897, the vast consolidation of mines,
foundries, railroads, and steamship companies, centralized at
Pittsburg, began producing steel rails at $18 the ton, and at
a bound America bestrode the world. She had won her great
wager with fate. … The end seems only a question of time.
Europe is doomed not only to buy her raw material abroad, but
to pay the cost of transport. And Europe knew this
instinctively in March, 1897, and nerved herself for
resistance. Her best hope, next to a victorious war, lay in
imitating America, and in organizing a system of
transportation which would open up the East.
"Carnegie achieved the new industrial revolution in March,
1897. Within a twelvemonth the rival nations had emptied
themselves upon the shore of the Yellow Sea. In November
Germany seized Kiao-chau, a month later the Russians occupied
Port Arthur, and the following April the English appropriated
Wei-hai-wei; but the fact to remember is that just 400 miles
inland, due west of Kiao-chau, lies Tszechau, the centre,
according to Richthofen, of the richest coal and iron deposits
in existence. There with the rude methods used by the Chinese,
coal actually sells at 13 cents the ton. Thus it has come to
pass that the problem now being attacked by all the statesmen,
soldiers, scientific men, and engineers of the two eastern
continents is whether Russia, Germany, France, England, and
Japan, combined or separately, can ever bring these resources
on the market in competition with the United States."
_B. Adams,
The New Industrial Revolution
(Atlantic Monthly, February, 1901)._
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (January-May).
Arbitration Treaty with Great Britain rejected by the Senate.
See, (in this volume),
VENEZUELA: A. D. 1896-1899.
The correspondence which took place between the governments of
the United States and Great Britain, on the subject of an
arbitration of the Venezuela Boundary dispute, having led to
the revival of a project for the negotiation of a general
treaty of arbitration, which the late American Secretary of
State, Mr. Gresham, had broached to the British government in
the spring of 1895, the terms of such an arrangement were
carefully and fully discussed between Secretary Olney and Lord
Salisbury, during the year 1896, and an agreement was reached
which took form in a solemn compact for the settlement by
arbitration of all matters in difference between the two
countries, signed at Washington on the 11th of January, 1897.
The treaty thus framed was as follows:
"ARTICLE I.
The High Contracting Parties agree to submit to Arbitration in
accordance with the provisions and subject to the limitations
of this Treaty all questions in difference between them which
they may fail to adjust by diplomatic negotiation.
"ARTICLE II.
All pecuniary claims or groups of pecuniary claims which do
not in the aggregate exceed £100,000 in amount, and which do
not involve the determination of territorial claims, shall be
dealt with and decided by an Arbitral Tribunal constituted as
provided in the next following Article. In this Article and in
Article IV the words 'groups of pecuniary claims' mean
pecuniary claims by one or more persons arising out of the
same transactions or involving the same issues of law and
fact.'
"ARTICLE III.
Each of the High Contracting Parties shall nominate one
arbitrator who shall be a jurist of repute and the two
arbitrators so nominated shall within two months of the date
of their nomination select an umpire. In case they shall fail
to do so within the limit of time above mentioned, the umpire
shall be appointed by agreement between the Members for the
time being of the Supreme Court of the United States and the
Members for the time being of the Judicial Committee of the
Privy Council in Great Britain, each nominating body acting by
a majority. In case they shall fail to agree upon an umpire
within three months of the date of an application made to them
in that behalf by the High Contracting Parties or either of
them, the umpire shall be selected in the manner provided for
in Article X. The person so selected shall be the President of
the Tribunal and the award of the majority of the Members
thereof shall be final.
{578}
"ARTICLE IV.
All pecuniary claims or groups of pecuniary claims which shall
exceed £100,000 in amount and all other matters in difference,
in respect of which either of the High Contracting Parties
shall have rights against the other under Treaty or otherwise,
provided that such matters in difference do not involve the
determination of territorial claims, shall be dealt with and
decided by an Arbitral Tribunal, constituted as provided in
the next following Article.
"ARTICLE V.
Any subject of Arbitration described in Article IV shall be
submitted to the Tribunal provided for by Article III, the
award of which Tribunal, if unanimous, shall be final. If not
unanimous either of the High Contracting Parties may within
six months from the date of the award demand a review thereof.
In such case the matter in controversy shall be submitted to
an Arbitral Tribunal consisting of five jurists of repute, no
one of whom shall have been a member of the Tribunal whose
award is to be reviewed and who shall be selected as follows,
viz:—two by each of the High Contracting Parties, and one, to
act as umpire, by the four thus nominated and to be chosen
within three months after the date of their nomination. In
case they shall fail to choose an umpire within the limit of
time above-mentioned, the umpire shall be appointed by
agreement between the Nominating Bodies designated in Article
III acting in the manner therein provided. In case they shall
fail to agree upon an umpire within three months of the date
of an application made to them in that behalf by the High
Contracting Parties or either of them, the umpire shall be
selected in the manner provided for in Article X. The person
so selected shall be the President of the Tribunal and the
award of the majority of the Members thereof shall be final.
"ARTICLE VI.
Any controversy which shall involve the determination of
territorial claims shall be submitted to a Tribunal composed
of six members, three of whom (subject to the provisions of
Article VIII) shall be Judges of the Supreme Court of the
United States or Justices of the Circuit Courts to be
nominated by the President of the United States, and the other
three of whom (subject to the provisions of Article VIII)
shall be Judges of the British Supreme Court of Judicature or
Members of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council to be
nominated by Her Britannic Majesty, whose award by a majority
of not less than five to one shall be final. In case of an
award made by less than the prescribed majority, the award
shall also be final unless either Power shall, within three
months after the award has been reported, protest that the
same is erroneous, in which case the award shall be of no
validity. In the event of an award made by less than the
prescribed majority and protested as above provided, or if the
members of the Arbitral Tribunal shall be equally divided,
there shall be no recourse to hostile measures of any
description until the mediation of one or more friendly Powers
has been invited by one or both of the High Contracting
Parties.
"ARTICLE VII.
Objections to the jurisdiction of an Arbitral Tribunal
constituted under this Treaty shall not be taken except as
provided in this Article. If before the close of the hearing
upon a claim submitted to an Arbitral Tribunal constituted
under Article III or Article V either of the High Contracting
Parties shall move such Tribunal to decide, and thereupon it
shall decide that the determination of such claim necessarily
involves the decision of a disputed question of principle of
grave general importance affecting the national rights of such
party as distinguished from the private rights whereof it is
merely the international representative, the jurisdiction of
such Arbitral Tribunal over such claim shall cease and the
same shall be dealt with by arbitration under Article VI.
"ARTICLE VIII.
In cases where the question involved is one which concerns a
particular State or Territory of the United States, it shall
be open to the President of the United States to appoint a
judicial officer of such State or Territory to be one of the
Arbitrators under Article III or Article V or Article VI. In
like manner in cases where the question involved is one which
concerns a British Colony or possession, it shall be open to
Her Britannic Majesty to appoint a judicial officer of such
Colony or possession to be one of the Arbitrators under
Article III or Article V or Article VI.
"ARTICLE IX.
Territorial claims in this Treaty shall include all claims to
territory and all claims involving questions of servitudes,
rights of navigation and of access, fisheries and all rights
and interests necessary to the control and enjoyment of the
territory claimed by either of the High Contracting Parties.
"ARTICLE X.
If in any case the nominating bodies designated in Articles
III and V shall fail to agree upon an Umpire in accordance
with the provisions of the said Articles, the Umpire shall be
appointed by His Majesty the King of Sweden and Norway. Either
of the High Contracting Parties, however, may at any time give
notice to the other that, by reason of material changes in
conditions as existing at the date of this Treaty, it is of
opinion that a substitute for His Majesty should be chosen
either for all cases to arise under the Treaty or for a
particular specified case already arisen, and thereupon the
High Contracting Parties shall at once proceed to agree upon
such substitute to act either in all cases to arise under the
Treaty or in the particular case specified as may be indicated
by said notice; provided, however, that such notice shall have
no effect upon an Arbitration already begun by the constitution
of an Arbitral Tribunal under Article III. The High
Contracting Parties shall also at once proceed to nominate a
substitute for His Majesty in the event that His Majesty shall
at any time notify them of his desire to be relieved from the
functions graciously accepted by him under this Treaty either
for all cases to arise thereunder or for any particular
specified case already arisen.
"ARTICLE XI.
In case of the death, absence or incapacity to serve of any
Arbitrator or Umpire, or in the event of any Arbitrator or
Umpire omitting or declining or ceasing to act as such,
another Arbitrator or Umpire shall be forthwith appointed in
his place and stead in the manner provided for with regard to
the original appointment.
{579}
"ARTICLE XII.
Each Government shall pay its own agent and provide for the
proper remuneration of the counsel employed by it and of the
Arbitrators appointed by it and for the expense of preparing
and submitting its case to the Arbitral Tribunal. All other
expenses connected with any Arbitration shall be defrayed by
the two Governments in equal moieties. Provided, however,
that, if in any case the essential matter of difference
submitted to arbitration is the right of one of the High
Contracting Parties to receive disavowals of or apologies for
acts or defaults of the other not resulting in substantial
pecuniary injury, the Arbitral Tribunal finally disposing of
the said matter shall direct whether any of the expenses of
the successful party shall be borne by the unsuccessful party,
and if so to what extent.
"ARTICLE XIII.
The time and place of meeting of an Arbitral Tribunal and all
arrangements for the hearing and all questions of procedure
shall be decided by the Tribunal itself. Each Arbitral
Tribunal shall keep a correct record of its proceedings and
may appoint and employ all necessary officers and agents. The
decision of the Tribunal shall, if possible, be made within
three months from the close of the arguments on both sides. It
shall be made in writing and dated and shall be signed by the
Arbitrators who may assent to it. The decision shall be in
duplicate, one copy whereof shall be delivered to each of the
High Contracting Parties through their respective agents.
"ARTICLE XIV.
This Treaty shall remain in force for five years from the date
at which it shall come into operation, and further until the
expiration of twelve months after either of the High
Contracting Parties shall have given notice to the other of
its wish to terminate the same.
"ARTICLE XV.
The present Treaty shall be duly ratified by the President of
the United States of America, by and with the advice and
consent of the Senate thereof, and by Her Britannic Majesty;
and the mutual exchange of ratifications shall take place in
Washington or in London within six months of the date hereof
or earlier if possible."
_United States, 54th Congress, 2d Session,
Senate Document Number 63._
Public feeling in both countries gave joyful welcome to this
nobly conceived treaty when it was announced. All that was
best in English sentiment and American sentiment had been
shuddering at the thought of possible war between the kindred
peoples, and thanked God for what promised some certitude that
no dispute would be pushed to that barbarous appeal. Only the
mean thought and temper of either country was provoked to
opposition; but, unhappily, the meaner temper and the narrower
and more ignorant opinion on one side of the sea had been
getting so strong a representation in the United States Senate
as to prove capable of much mischief there, on this and other
matters of most serious public concern. When the great
covenant of peace went to that body for approval, there were
senators who found it offensive to them because it came from
the hands of President Cleveland and Secretary Olney; and
there were other senators whose dignity was hurt by the eager
impatience with which the public voice cried out for their
ratifying vote; and still others there were who looked with
official jealousy at the project of an arbitral tribunal which
might sometimes take something from senatorial functions in
foreign affairs. And the combination of pitiful motives had
strength enough to baffle the high hopes and defeat the will
of the American people.
Of the public feeling thus outraged, the following is one
expression of the time, among many which it would be possible
to quote:
Many people "are represented by influential papers like the
St. Paul 'Pioneer Press' and the Minneapolis 'Journal,' the
latter declaring that it is humiliating to think that, widely
as the treaty is favored throughout the country, a few
ill-natured men in the Senate have the power to delay
ratification. In the Central West the feeling is generally
strong for arbitration, if we may judge from the Chicago
'Times-Herald,' the St. Louis 'Republic,' the Indianapolis
'Journal,' and the Cleveland 'Leader.' In the South there are
such cheering reports as this from the Memphis 'Scimetar'; 'If
the treaty now under consideration in the Senate Committee on
Foreign Relations should fail of ratification, public opinion
in this country would demand that the incoming Administration
provide another embodying the same vital principle.' In the
East the sentiment in favor of immediate ratification of the
original draft has been almost universal, the only two
journals of note differing from this being the New York 'Sun'
and the Washington 'Post.' The trend of opinion is shown in
the adoption by the Massachusetts House of Representatives of
an endorsement by a vote of 141 to 11. An important meeting
took place last week in Washington in favor of ratification.
The speakers were ex-Secretary of State Foster, Mr. G. G.
Hubbard, Professor B. L. Whitman, ex-Senator J. B. Henderson,
ex-Governor Stanard, and Justice Brewer, of the Supreme Court.
The last named said; 'I do not believe in saying to the
gentlemen charged with the duty of considering carefully that
treaty, that "you must vote for it." There is something in my
own nature which, when anybody says to me "you must," causes
something to run up my spinal column which says "I won't." It
is the Senate's duty to consider that treaty carefully, and
when I say that, I say it is no trespass upon their rights for
American citizens to express their views of that treaty. What are
the errors and losses incidental to arbitration compared to
the horrors of war? What are a few million dollars of wrongful
damages in comparison to the sacrifice of thousands of human
lives?'"
_The Outlook, February 6, 1897._
"This treaty was greeted with widespread favor in the press,
but was antagonized at once in the Senate by the jingo element
and by the personal adversaries of the administration. The
committee on foreign relations reported the draft favorably,
but with certain amendments, on February 1. The ensuing debate
soon revealed that a vote on ratification could not be
obtained before March 4, and the whole matter was dropped. At
the opening of the new Congress the Senate Committee again
considered the treaty and reported it, with amendments, on
March 18. During two weeks' discussion the Senate adopted the
committee's amendments and also others, with the result that
the draft was radically transformed.
{580}
Instead of the general reference of all disputes to the
tribunals, it was provided that any difference 'which, in the
judgment of either power, materially affects its honor or its
domestic or foreign policy,' should be submitted to
arbitration only by special agreement; that no question should
be submitted save with the consent of the Senate in its
treaty-making capacity; and that no claim of a British subject
against a state or territory of the United States should be
submitted under any circumstances. The first of these changes
was due mainly to the objection that without it the Monroe
Doctrine might be subjected to arbitration; the second to the
sensitiveness of senators as to their constitutional functions
in foreign relations; and the third to a desire to protect
states against claims on their defaulted bonds. Other changes
modified materially the method of appointing the arbitrators
for the United States, and struck out entirely the designation
of the King of Sweden as umpire. Even with these amendments,
the opposition to the treaty was not overcome; and the final
vote on ratification, taken May 5, resulted in its rejection,
the vote standing 43 to 26, less than two-thirds in the
affirmative. Thirty Republicans and 13 Democrats voted for the
treaty; 8 Republicans, 12 Democrats and 6 Populists against
it."
_Political Science Quarterly,
June, 1897._
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (March).
Inauguration of President McKinley.
Leading topics of the inaugural address.
The President's Cabinet.
The inauguration of President McKinley was performed with the
customary ceremonies on the 4th of March. In his inaugural
address, the new President laid somewhat less emphasis than
might have been expected on the need of measures for reforming
the monetary system of the country, but strongly urged that
instant steps be taken to increase the revenues of the
government by a return to higher tariff charges. "With
adequate revenue secured," he argued, "but not until then, we
can enter upon such changes in our fiscal laws as will, while
insuring safety and volume to our money, no longer impose upon
the government the necessity of maintaining so large a gold
reserve, with its attendant and inevitable temptations to
speculation. Most of our financial laws are the outgrowth of
experience and trial, and should not be amended without
investigation and demonstration of the wisdom of the proposed
changes. We must be both 'sure we are right' and 'make haste
slowly.' …
"The question of international bimetallism will have early and
earnest attention. It will be my constant endeavor to secure
it by cooperation with the other great commercial powers of
the world. Until that condition is realized, when the parity
between our gold and silver money springs from and is
supported by the relative value of the two metals, the value
of the silver already coined, and of that which may hereafter
be coined, must be kept constantly at par with gold by every
resource at our command. The credit of the government, the
integrity of its currency, and the inviolability of its
obligations must be preserved. This was the commanding verdict
of the people, and it will not be unheeded.
"Economy is demanded in every branch of the government at all
times, but especially in periods like the present of
depression in business and distress among the people. The
severest economy must be observed in all public expenditures,
and extravagance stopped wherever it is found, and prevented
wherever in the future it may be developed. If the revenues
are to remain as now, the only relief that can come must be
from decreased expenditures. But the present must not become
the permanent condition of the government. It has been our
uniform practice to retire, not increase, our outstanding
obligations; and this policy must again be resumed and
vigorously enforced. Our revenues should always be large
enough to meet with ease and promptness not only our current
needs and the principal and interest of the public debt, but
to make proper and liberal provision for that most deserving
body of public creditors, the soldiers and sailors and the
widows and orphans who are the pensioners of the United
States. …
"A deficiency is inevitable so long as the expenditures of the
government exceed its receipts. It can only be met by loans or
an increased revenue. While a large annual surplus of revenue
may invite waste and extravagance, inadequate revenue creates
distrust and undermines public and private credit. Neither
should be encouraged. Between more loans and more revenue
there ought to be but one opinion. We should have more
revenue, and that without delay, hindrance, or postponement. A
surplus in the treasury created by loans is not a permanent or
safe reliance. It will suffice while it lasts, but it cannot
last long while the outlays of the government are greater than
its receipts, as has been the case during the last two years.
… The best way for the government to maintain its credit is to
pay as it goes—not by resorting to loans, but by keeping out
of debt—through an adequate income secured by a system of
taxation, external, or internal, or both. It is the settled
policy of the government, pursued from the beginning and
practiced by all parties and administrations, to raise the
bulk of our revenue from taxes upon foreign productions
entering the United States for sale and consumption, and
avoiding, for the most part, every form of direct taxation
except in time of war.
"The country is clearly opposed to any needless additions to
the subjects of internal taxation, and is committed by its
latest popular utterance to the system of tariff taxation.
There can be no misunderstanding either about the principle
upon which this tariff taxation shall be levied. Nothing has
ever been made plainer at a general election than that the
controlling principle in the raising of revenue from duties on
imports is zealous care for American interests and American
labor. The people have declared that such legislation should
be had as will give ample protection and encouragement to the
industries and the development of our country. … The paramount
duty of congress is to stop deficiencies by the restoration of
that protective legislation which has always been the firmest
prop of the treasury. The passage of such a law or laws would
strengthen the credit of the government both at home and
abroad, and go far toward stopping the drain upon the gold
reserve held for the redemption of our currency, which has
been heavy and well-nigh constant for several years. In the
revision of the tariff, especial attention should be given to
the re-enactment and extension of the reciprocity principle of
the law of 1890, under which so great a stimulus was given to
our foreign trade in new and advantageous markets for our
surplus agricultural and manufactured products."
{581}
Without effect, the incoming President urged the ratification
of the treaty of arbitration with Great Britain, negotiated by
his predecessor and still pending in the Senate. In concluding
his address he announced his intention to convene Congress in
extra session, saying: "The condition of the public treasury
demands the immediate consideration of congress. It alone has
the power to provide revenue for the government. Not to
convene it under such circumstances, I can view in no other
sense than the neglect of a plain duty."
On the day following his inauguration, the President sent to
the Senate the following nominations for his Cabinet, which
were confirmed:
Secretary of State, John Sherman of Ohio;
Secretary of the Treasury, Lyman J. Gage of Illinois;
Secretary of War, Russel A. Alger of Michigan;
Attorney-General, Joseph McKenna of California;
Postmaster-General, James A. Gary of Maryland;
Secretary of the Navy, John D. Long of Massachusetts;
Secretary of the Interior, Cornelius N. Bliss of New York;
Secretary of Agriculture, James Wilson of Iowa.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (March-July).
Passage of the Dingley Tariff Act.
Carrying out an intention announced in his Inaugural Address,
President McKinley called Congress together in extra session
on the 15th of March, asking for immediate action to increase
the revenue of the government by increased duties, "so levied
upon foreign products as to preserve the home market, so far
as possible, to our own producers." In his Inaugural Address
the President had expressed the understanding of his party as
to the chief meaning of the late election, by saying that "the
country is … committed by its latest popular utterance to the
system of tariff taxation. … The people have declared that
such legislation should be had as will give ample protection
and encouragement to the industries and development of our
country. … The paramount duty of Congress is to stop
deficiencies by the restoration of that protective legislation
which has always been the firmest prop of the treasury." To
the majority in both Houses of Congress these views were
entirely acceptable, and they were acted upon at once. The
Ways and Means Committee of the House of Representatives in
the previous Congress had already prepared a comprehensive new
tariff bill, which it passed on to its successor. This
ready-made bill was reported to the House on the first day of
the session, by Mr. Dingley, chairman of the newly appointed
committee, as he had been of the one before it. Debate on the
measure began a week later, and was controlled by a fixed
programme, which required it to be ended on the 31st of March.
The bill was then passed, by a vote of 205 against 121. Of the
action of the Senate upon it, and of the main features of the
bill as it was finally shaped and became law, the following is
a succinct account:
"The bill, referred at once to the Senate Committee on
Finance, was reported after a month, on May 8, with important
amendments. There was an attempt to impose some purely revenue
duties, and, as to the protective duties, the tendency was
towards lower rates than in the House bill, though on certain
articles, such as wools of low grade, hides, and others (of
which more will be said presently), the drift was the other
way. The Senate, however, paid much less respect than the
House to the recommendations of the committee in charge. In
the course of two months, from May 4 to July 7, it went over
the tariff bill item by item, amending without restraint,
often in a perfunctory manner, and not infrequently with the
outcome settled by the accident of attendance on the
particular day; on the whole, with a tendency to retain the
higher rates of the House bill. As passed finally by the
Senate on July 7, the bill, though it contained some 872
amendments, followed the plan of the House Committee rather
than that of the Senate Committee. As usual, it went to a
Conference Committee. In the various compromises and
adjustments in the Senate and in the Conference Committee
there was little sign of the deliberate plan and method which
the House had shown, and the details of the act were settled
in no less haphazard fashion than has been the case with other
tariff measures. As patched up by the Conference Committee,
the bill was promptly passed by both branches of Congress, and
became law on July 24. In what manner these political
conditions affected the character of the act will appear from
a consideration of the more important specific changes.
"First and foremost was the reimposition of the duties on
wool. As the repeal of these duties had been the one important
change made by the act of 1894, so their restoration was the
salient feature in the act of 1897. … Clothing wool was
subjected once more to a duty of 11 cents a pound, combing
wool to one of 12 cents. On carpet wool there were new graded
duties, heavier than any ever before levied. If its value was
12 cents a pound or less the duty was 4 cents; if over 12
cents, the duty was 7 cents. … The duties on carpet wool, as
has already been noted, were made higher than ever before. In
the House the rates of the act of 1890 had been retained; but
in the Senate new and higher rates were inserted. … They were
demanded by the Senators from some States in the Far West,
especially from Idaho and Montana. … They [the Senators in
question] needed to be placated and they succeeded in getting
higher duties on the cheap carpet wools, on the plea of
encouragement for the comparatively coarse clothing wool of
their ranches. … The same complications that led to the high
duty on carpet wool brought about a duty on hides. This rawest
of raw materials had been on the free list for just a quarter
of a century, since 1872, when the duty of the war days had
been repealed. … But here, again, the Senators from the
ranching States were able to dictate terms. … In the Senate a
duty of 20 per cent. was tacked on. The rate was reduced to 15
per cent. in the Conference Committee, and so remains in the
act. The restored duties on wool necessarily brought in their
train the old system of high compensating duties on woollens.
… In the main, the result was a restoration of the rates of
the act of 1890. There was some upward movement almost all
along the line; and the ad valorem duty alone, on the classes
of fabrics which are most largely imported, crept up to 55 per
cent. …
{582}
"On cotton goods the general tendency was to impose duties
lower than those of 1890. This was indicated by the drag-net
rate, on manufactures of cotton not otherwise provided for,
which had been 50 per cent. in 1890, and was 45 per cent. in
1897. On two large classes of textile goods new and distinctly
higher duties were imposed,—on silks and linens. … The mode of
gradation was to levy the duties according to the amount of
pure silk contained in the goods. The duties were fixed by the
pound, being lowest all goods containing a small proportion of
pure silk, and rising as that proportion became larger; with
the proviso that in no case should the duty be less than 50
per cent. … Thus, the duty on certain kinds of silks was $1.30
cents per pound, if they contained 45 per cent in weight of
silk; but advanced suddenly to $2.25, if they contained more
than 45 per cent. … On linens another step of the same kind
was taken, specific duties being substituted here also for
ad-valorem. … Linens were graded somewhat as cottons had been
graded since 1861, according to the fineness of the goods as
indicated by the number of threads to the square inch. If the
number of threads was 60 or less per square inch, the duty was
1¾ cents a square yard; if the threads were between 60 and
120, the duty was 2¾ cents; and so on,—plus 30 per cent.
ad-valorem duty in all cases. But finer linen goods, unless
otherwise specially provided for, were treated leniently. If
the weight was small (less than 4½ ounces per yard), the duty
was but 35 per cent. On the other hand, linen laces, or
articles trimmed with lace or embroidery, were dutiable at 60
percent.,—an advance at 10 per cent. over the rate of 1890. …
It was inevitable, under the political conditions of the
session, that in this schedule something should again be
attempted for the farmer; and, accordingly, we find a
substantial duty on flax. The rate of the act of 1890 was
restored,—3 cents a pound on prepared flax, in place of the
rate of 1½ cents imposed by the act of 1894. …
"On chinaware the rates of 1890 were restored. The duty on the
finer qualities which are chiefly imported had been lowered to
35 per cent. in 1894, and was now once more put at 60 per
cent. On glassware, also, the general ad-valorem rate, which
had been reduced to 35 per cent. in 1894, was again fixed at
45 per cent., as in 1890. Similarly the specific duties on the
cheaper grades of window-glass and plate-glass, which had been
lowered in 1894, were raised to the figures of 1890. … The metal
schedules in the act of 1897 showed in the main a striking
contrast with the textile schedules. Important advances of
duty were made on many textiles, and in some cases rates went
considerably higher even than those of 1890. But on most
metals, and especially on iron and steel, duties were left
very much as they had been in 1894. … On steel rails there was
even a slight reduction from the rate of 1894—$6.72 per ton
instead of $7.84. On coal there was a compromise rate. The
duty had been 75 cents a ton in 1890, and 40 cents in 1894; it
was now fixed at 67 cents. On the other hand, as to certain
manufactures of iron and steel farther advanced beyond the
crude stage, there was a return to rates very similar to those
of 1890. Thus, on pocket cutlery, razors, guns, we find once
more the system of combined ad-valorem and specific duties,
graded according to the value of the article. … Copper
remained on the free list, where it had been put in 1894. …
For good or ill the copper duty had worked out all its effects
years before. On the other hand, the duties on lead and on
lead ore went up to the point at which they stood in 1890.
Here we have once more the signs of concession to the silver
Republicans of the far West. … The duty on tin plate, a bone
of contention under the act of 1890, was disposed of, with
little debate, by the imposition of a comparatively moderate
duty. …
"A part of the act which aroused much public attention and
which had an important bearing on its financial yield was the
sugar schedule—the duties on sugar, raw and refined. … The act
of 1890 had admitted raw sugar free, while that of 1894 had
imposed a duty of 40 per cent. ad valorem. … The price of raw
sugar had maintained its downward tendency; and the duty of 40
per cent. had been equivalent in 1896 to less than one cent a
pound. In the act of 1897 the duty was made specific, and was
practically doubled. Beginning with a rate of one cent a pound
on sugar tested to contain 75 per cent., it advanced by stages
until on sugar testing 95 per cent. (the usual content of
commercial raw sugar) it reached 1.65 cents per pound. The
higher rate thus imposed was certain to yield a considerable
increase of revenue. Much was said also of the protection now
afforded to the beet sugar industry of the West. That
industry, however, was still of small dimensions and uncertain
future. … On refined sugar, the duty was made 1.95 cents per
pound, which, as compared with raw sugar testing 100 per
cent., left a protection for the domestic refiner,—i. e., for
the Sugar 'Trust,'—of 1/8 of one cent a pound. Some intricate
calculation would be necessary to make out whether this
'differential' for the refining interest was more or less than
in the act of 1894; but, having regard to the effect of the
substitution of specific for ad-valorem duties, the Trust was
no more favored by the act of 1897 than by its predecessor,
and even somewhat less favored. The changes which this part of
the tariff act underwent in the two Houses are not without
significance." In the bill passed by the House. "the so-called
differential, or protection to the refiners, was one-eighth of
a cent per pound. In the Senate there was an attempt at
serious amendment. The influence of the Sugar Trust in the
Senate had long been great. How secured, whether through party
contributions, entangling alliances, or coarse bribery, the
public could not know; but certainly great, as the course of
legislation in that body demonstrated." The Senate attempted
to make an entire change in the scheme of sugar duties, which
would give the Trust a fifth of a cent per pound of protective
differential, instead of an eighth; but the House resisted,
with more success than in 1894, and the senatorial friends of
the Sugar Trust had to give way.
See, also (in this volume),
TRUSTS: UNITED STATES;
and SUGAR BOUNTIES.
"The tariff act of 1894 had repealed the provisions as to
reciprocity in the act of 1890, and had rendered nugatory such
parts of the treaties made under the earlier act as were
inconsistent with the provisions of its successor. The act of
1897 now revived the policy of reciprocity, and in some ways
even endeavored to enlarge the scope of the reciprocity
provisions"
See below: A. D. 1899-1901.
_F. W. Taussig,
Tariff History of the United States,
4th edition, chapter 7 (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons)._
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (April-October).
Negotiations for an international bi-metallic agreement.
See (in this volume)
MONETARY QUESTIONS: A. D 1897 (APRIL-OCTOBER).
{583}
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (June).
Appointment of the Nicaragua Canal Commission.
See (in this volume)
CANAL, INTEROCEANIC: A. D. 1889-1899.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (November).
Refusal to negotiate with the insurgent republic of the
Philippine Islands.
On the 3d of November, 1897, Mr. Rounseville Wildman, the U.
S. Consul at Hongkong, addressed the following to the State
Department: "Since my arrival in Hongkong I have been called
upon several times by Mr. F. Agoncilla, foreign agent and high
commissioner, etc., of the new republic of the Philippines.
Mr. Agoncilla holds a commission, signed by the president,
members of cabinet, and general in chief of the republic of
Philippines, empowering him absolutely with power to conclude
treaties with foreign governments. Mr. Agoncilla offers on
behalf of his government alliance offensive and defensive with
the United States when the United States declares war on
Spain, which, in Mr. Agoncilla's judgment, will be very soon.
In the meantime he wishes the United States to send to some
port in the Philippines 20,000 stand of arms and 200,000
rounds of ammunition for the use of his government, to be paid
for on the recognition of his government by the United States.
He pledges as security two provinces and the custom-house at
Manila. He is not particular about the price—is willing the
United States should make 25 per cent or 30 per cent profit.
He is a very earnest and attentive diplomat and a great
admirer of the United States. On his last visit he surprised
me with the information that he had written his government
that he had hopes of inducing the United States to supply the
much-needed guns, etc. In case Señor Agoncilla's dispatch
should fall into the hands of an unfriendly power and find its
way into the newspapers, I have thought it wise to apprise the
State Department of the nature of the high commissioner's
proposals. Señor Agoncilla informs me by late mail that he
will proceed at once to Washington to conclude the proposed
treaty, if I advise. I shall not advise said step until so
instructed by the State Department."
To this communication, the Third Assistant Secretary of State,
Mr. Cridler, returned the following reply, December 15, 1897:
"I have to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatch Number 19
of November 3, 1897, in which you announce the arrival at your
post of Mr. F. Agoncilla, whom you describe as foreign agent
and high commissioner of the new republic of the Philippines,
and who holds full power to negotiate and conclude treaties
with foreign powers. Mr. Agoncilla offers an alliance
'offensive and defensive with the United States when the
United States declares war on Spain, which, in Mr. Agoncilla's
judgment, will be very soon,' and suggests that 20,000 stand
of arms and 200,000 rounds of ammunition be supplied to his
government by that of the United States. You may briefly
advise Mr. Agoncilla, in case he should call upon you, that
the Government of the United States does not negotiate such
treaties and that it is not possible to forward the desired
arms and ammunition. You should not encourage any advances on
the part of Mr. Agoncilla, and should courteously decline to
communicate with the Department further regarding his alleged
mission."
_Treaty of Peace and Accompanying Papers
(55th Congress, 3d Session, Senate Document
Number 62, part 1, pages 333,334)._
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (November).
Treaty with Russia and Japan to suspend pelagic sealing.
See (in this volume)
BERING SEA QUESTIONS.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (December).
President McKinley on Cuban affairs.
See (in this volume)
CUBA: A. D. 1896-1897.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897 (December).
Stringent measures against pelagic sealing.
See (in this volume)
BERING SEA QUESTIONS.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897-1898 (December-March).
Reports from Cuba of the suffering condition of
the "reconcentrados."
See (in this volume)
CUBA: A. D. 1897-1898 (DECEMBER-MARCH).
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897-1899.
Agreements with the Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, Cherokee,
and Seminole tribes of Indians.
Work of the Dawes Commission.
See (in this volume)
INDIANS, AMERICAN: A. D. 1893-1899.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1897-1900.
Treaty for the annexation of Hawaii.
Its failure of ratification.
Passage of joint resolution to annex, and of an Act
for the government of the islands.
See (in this volume)
HAWAII.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1898 (February-March).
American sympathy with the Cubans and indignation
against Spain.
Destruction of the United States battle-ship "Maine"
in Havana harbor.
Investigation and findings of the American and
Spanish courts of inquiry.
Public feeling in the United States, excited by a terrible
state of suffering in Cuba, resulting from Spanish methods of
dealing with insurrection in that island, had been gathering
intensity for months past, and threatening a rupture of
peaceful relations between the United States and Spain.
See (in this volume),
CUBA: A. D. 1896-1897 and 1897-1898)
A sudden crisis in the situation was produced, on the morning
of the 15th of February, 1898, by news that the United States
battle-ship "Maine," while paying a visit of courtesy to the
harbor of Havana, had been totally destroyed, on the previous
evening, by an explosion which killed most of her crew. In a
subsequent message on the subject to Congress, President
McKinley recited the circumstances of the catastrophe, and the
proceedings adopted to ascertain its cause, with the
conclusions reached, in the following words: "For some time
prior to the visit of the 'Maine' to Havana Harbor our
consular representatives pointed out the advantages to flow
from the visit of national ships to the Cuban waters, in
accustoming the people to the presence of our flag as the
symbol of good will and of our ships in the fulfillment of the
mission of protection to American interests, even though no
immediate need therefor might exist. Accordingly on the 24th
of January last, after conference with the Spanish minister;
in which the renewal of visits of our war vessels to Spanish
waters was discussed and accepted, the peninsular authorities
at Madrid and Havana were advised of the purpose of this
Government to resume friendly naval visits at Cuban ports, and
that in that view the 'Maine' would forthwith call at the port
of Havana. This announcement was received by the Spanish
Government with appreciation of the friendly character of the
visit of the 'Maine,' and with notification of intention to
return the courtesy by sending Spanish ships to the principal
ports of the United States. Meanwhile the 'Maine' entered the
port of Havana on the 25th of January, her arrival being
marked with no special incident besides the exchange of
customary salutes and ceremonial visits.
{584}
"The 'Maine' continued in the harbor of Havana during the
three weeks following her arrival. No appreciable excitement
attended her stay; on the contrary, a feeling of relief and
confidence followed the resumption of the long-interrupted
friendly intercourse. So noticeable was this immediate effect
of her visit that the consul-general strongly urged that the
presence of our ships in Cuban waters should be kept up by
retaining the 'Maine' at Havana, or, in the event of her
recall, by sending another vessel there to take her place. At
forty minutes past 9 in the evening of the 15th of February
the 'Maine' was destroyed by an explosion, by which the entire
forward part of the ship was utterly wrecked. In this
catastrophe 2 officers and 264 of her crew perished, those who
were not killed outright by her explosion being penned between
decks by the tangle of wreckage and drowned by the immediate
sinking of the hull. Prompt assistance was rendered by the
neighboring vessels anchored in the harbor, aid being
especially given by the boats of the Spanish cruiser 'Alfonso
XII' and the Ward Line steamer 'City of Washington,' which lay
not far distant. The wounded were generously cared for by the
authorities of Havana, the hospitals being freely opened to
them, while the earliest recovered bodies of the dead were
interred by the municipality in a public cemetery in the city.
Tributes of grief and sympathy were offered from all official
quarters of the island.
"The appalling calamity fell upon the people of our country
with crushing force, and for a brief time an intense
excitement prevailed, which in a community less just and
self-controlled than ours might have led to hasty acts of
blind resentment. This spirit, however, soon gave way to the
calmer processes of reason and to the resolve to investigate
the facts and await material proof before forming a judgment
as to the cause, the responsibility, and, if the facts
warranted, the remedy due. This course necessarily recommended
itself from the outset to the Executive, for only in the light
of a dispassionately ascertained certainty could it determine
the nature and measure of its full duty in the matter. The
usual procedure was followed, as in all cases of casualty or
disaster to national vessels of any maritime State. A naval
court of inquiry was at once organized, composed of officers
well qualified by rank and practical experience to discharge
the onerous duty imposed upon them. Aided by a strong force of
wreckers and divers, the court proceeded to make a thorough
investigation on the spot, employing every available means for
the impartial and exact determination of the causes of the
explosion. Its operations have been conducted with the utmost
deliberation and judgment, and while independently pursued no
attainable source of information was neglected, and the
fullest opportunity was allowed for a simultaneous
investigation by the Spanish authorities. The finding of the
court of inquiry was reached, after twenty-three days of
continuous labor, on the 21st of March, instant, and, having
been approved on the 22d by the commander in chief of the
United States naval force on the North Atlantic Station, was
transmitted to the Executive. It is herewith laid before the
Congress, together with the voluminous testimony taken before
the court. Its purport is, in brief, as follows:
"When the 'Maine' arrived at Havana she was conducted by the
regular Government pilot to buoy Number 4, to which she was
moored in from 5½ to 6 fathoms of water. The state of
discipline on board and the condition of her magazines,
boilers, coal bunkers, and storage compartments are passed in
review, with the conclusion that excellent order prevailed and
that no indication of any cause for an internal explosion
existed in any quarter. At 8 o'clock in the evening of
February 15 everything had been reported secure, and all was
quiet. At forty minutes past 9 o'clock the vessel was suddenly
destroyed. There were two distinct explosions, with a brief
interval between them. The first lifted the forward part of
the ship very perceptibly. The second, which was more open,
prolonged, and of greater volume, is attributed by the court
to the partial explosion of two or more of the forward
magazines. The evidence of the divers establishes that the
after part of the ship was practically intact and sank in that
condition a very few moments after the explosion. The forward
part was completely demolished. Upon the evidence of a
concurrent external cause the finding of the court is as
follows:
"'At frame 17 the outer shell of the ship, from a point of 11½
feet from the middle line of the ship and 6 feet above the
keel when in its normal position, has been forced up so as to
be now about 4 feet above the surface of the water, therefore
about 34 feet above where it would be had the ship sunk
uninjured. The outside bottom plating is bent into a reversed
V shape (˄), the after wing of which, about 15 feet broad and
32 feet in length (from frame 17 to frame 25), is doubled back
upon itself against the continuation of the same plating,
extending forward. At frame 18 the vertical keel is broken
in two and the flat keel bent into an angle similar to the
angle formed by the outside bottom plates. This break is now
about 6 feet below the surface of the water and about 30 feet
above its normal position. In the opinion of the court this
effect could have been produced only by the explosion of a
mine situated under the bottom of the ship at about frame 18
and somewhat on the port side of the ship.'
"The conclusions of the court are: That the loss of the
'Maine' was not in any respect due to fault or negligence on
the part of any of the officers or members of her crew; That
the ship was destroyed by the explosion of a submarine mine,
which caused the partial explosion of two or more of her
forward magazines; and That no evidence has been obtainable
fixing the responsibility for the destruction of the 'Maine'
upon any person or persons.
"I have directed that the finding of the court of inquiry and
the views of this Government thereon be communicated to the
Government of Her Majesty the Queen Regent, and I do not
permit myself to doubt that the sense of justice of the
Spanish nation will dictate a course of action suggested by
honor and the friendly relations of the two Governments. It
will be the duty of the Executive to advise the Congress of
the result, and in the meantime deliberate consideration is
invoked."
_Congressional Record, March 28, 1898._
{585}
A Spanish naval board of inquiry, convened by the maritime
authority at Havana, and investigating the matter with haste,
arrived at a conclusion quite opposite to that stated above,
reporting on the 22d of March that "an explosion of the first
order, in the forward magazine of the American ironclad
'Maine,' caused the destruction of that part of the ship and
its total submersion in the same place in this bay at which it
was anchored. … That the important facts connected with the
explosion in its external appearances at every moment of its
duration having been described by witnesses, and the absence
of all circumstances which necessarily accompany the explosion
of a torpedo having been proved by these witnesses and
experts, it can only be honestly asserted that the catastrophe
was due to internal causes. … That the character of the
proceedings undertaken and respect for the law which
establishes the absolute extra-territoriality of a foreign war
vessel have prevented the determination, even by conjecture,
of the said internal origin of the disaster, to which also the
impossibility of establishing the necessary communication
either with the crew of the wrecked vessel or the officials of
their Government commissioned to investigate the causes of the
said event, or with those subsequently intrusted with the
issue, has contributed. … That the interior and exterior
examination of the bottom of the 'Maine,' whenever it is
possible, unless the bottom of the ship and that of the place
in the bay where it is sunk are altered by the work which is
being carried on for the total or partial recovery of the
vessel, will prove the correctness of all that is said in this
report; but this must not be understood to mean that the
accuracy of these present conclusions requires such proof."
_U. S. Senate Report Number 885,
55th Congress, 2d Session, page 635._
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1898 (February-December).
In the Chinese "battle of concessions."
See (in this volume)
CHINA: A. D. 1898 (FEBRUARY-DECEMBER).
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1898 (March).
Account by Senator Proctor of the condition of
the "reconcentrados" in Cuba.
See (in this volume)
CUBA: A. D. 1897-1898 (DECEMBER-MARCH).
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1898 (March-April).
Continued discussion of Cuban affairs with Spain.
Unsatisfactory results.
Message of the President asking Congress for authority
to terminate hostilities in Cuba.
On the 11th of April, President McKinley addressed another
special message to Congress, setting forth the unsatisfactory
results with which Cuban affairs had been further discussed
with the government of Spain, and formally asking to be
authorized and empowered to take measures for securing a "full
and final termination of hostilities" in the oppressed island.
He said:
"Obedient to that precept of the Constitution which commands
the President to give from time to time to the Congress
information of the state of the Union and to recommend to
their consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary
and expedient, it becomes my duty now to address your body
with regard to the grave crisis that has arisen in the
relations of the United States to Spain by reason of the
warfare that for more than three years has raged in the
neighboring island of Cuba. I do so because of the intimate
connection of the Cuban question with the state of our own
Union, and the grave relation the course which it is now
incumbent upon the nation to adopt must needs bear to the
traditional policy of our Government, if it is to accord with
the precepts laid down by the founders of the Republic and
religiously observed by succeeding Administrations to the
present day.
"The present revolution is but the successor of other similar
insurrections which have occurred in Cuba against the dominion
of Spain, extending over a period of nearly half a century,
each of which, during its progress, has subjected the United
States to great effort and expense in enforcing its neutrality
laws, caused enormous losses to American trade and commerce,
caused irritation, annoyance, and disturbance among our
citizens, and, by the exercise of cruel, barbarous, and
uncivilized practices of warfare, shocked the sensibilities
and offended the humane sympathies of our people. Since the
present revolution began, in February, 1895, this country has
seen the fertile domain at our threshold ravaged by fire and
sword in the course of a struggle unequaled in the history of
the island and rarely paralleled as to the numbers of the
combatants and the bitterness of the contest by any revolution
of modern times where a dependent people striving to be free
have been opposed by the power of the sovereign state. Our
people have beheld a once prosperous community reduced to
comparative want, its lucrative commerce virtually paralyzed,
its exceptional productiveness diminished, its fields laid
waste, its mills in ruins, and its people perishing by tens of
thousands from hunger and destitution. We have found ourselves
constrained, in the observance of that strict neutrality which
our laws enjoin and which the law of nations commands, to
police our own waters and to watch our own seaports in
prevention of any unlawful act in aid of the Cubans. Our trade
has suffered; the capital invested by our citizens in Cuba has
been largely lost, and the temper and forbearance of our
people have been so sorely tried as to beget a perilous unrest
among our own citizens which has inevitably found its
expression from time to time in the National Legislature, so
that issues wholly external to our own body politic engross
attention and stand in the way of that close devotion to
domestic advancement that becomes a self-contained
commonwealth whose primal maxim has been the avoidance of all
foreign entanglements. All this must needs awaken, and has,
indeed, aroused the utmost concern on the part of this
Government, as well during my predecessor's term as in my own.
"In April, 1896, the evils from which our country suffered
through the Cuban war became so onerous that my predecessor
made an effort to bring about a peace through the mediation of
this Government in any way that might tend to an honorable
adjustment of the contest between Spain and her revolted
colony, on the basis of some effective scheme of
self-government for Cuba under the flag and sovereignty of
Spain. It failed through the refusal of the Spanish Government
then in power to consider any form of mediation or, indeed, any
plan of settlement which did not begin with the actual
submission of the insurgents to the mother country, and then
only on such terms as Spain herself might see fit to grant.
The war continued unabated. The resistance of the insurgents
was in no wise diminished. The efforts of Spain were
increased, both by the dispatch of fresh levies to Cuba and by
the addition to the horrors of the strife of a new and inhuman
phase happily unprecedented in the modern history of civilized
Christian peoples.
{586}
The policy of devastation and concentration, inaugurated by
the captain-general's bando of October 21, 1896, in the
province of Pinar del Rio, was thence extended to embrace all
of the island to which the power of the Spanish arms was able
to reach by occupation or by military operations. The
peasantry, including all dwelling in the open agricultural
interior, were driven into the garrison towns or isolated
places held by the troops. The raising and movement of
provisions of all kinds were interdicted. The fields were laid
waste, dwellings unroofed and fired, mills destroyed, and, in
short, everything that could desolate the land and render it
unfit for human habitation or support was commanded by one or
the other of the contending parties and executed by all the
powers at their disposal.
"By the time the present Administration took office, a year
ago, reconcentration—so called—had been made effective over
the better part of the four central and western
provinces—Santa Clara, Matanzas, Habana, and Pinar del Rio.
The agricultural population to the estimated number of 300,000
or more was herded within the towns and their immediate
vicinage, deprived of the means of support, rendered destitute
of shelter, left poorly clad, and exposed to the most
unsanitary conditions. As the scarcity of food increased with
the devastation of the depopulated areas of production,
destitution and want became misery and starvation. Month by
month the death rate increased in an alarming ratio. By March,
1897, according to conservative estimates from official
Spanish sources, the mortality among the reconcentrados, from
starvation and the diseases thereto incident, exceeded 50 per
centum of their total number. No practical relief was accorded
to the destitute. The overburdened towns, already suffering
from the general dearth, could give no aid. So-called 'zones
of cultivation' established within the immediate areas of
effective military control about the cities and fortified
camps proved illusory as a remedy for the suffering. The
unfortunates, being for the most part women and children, with
aged and helpless men, enfeebled by disease and hunger, could
not have tilled the soil without tools, seed, or shelter for
their own support or for the supply of the cities.
Reconcentration, adopted avowedly as a war measure in order to
cut off the resources of the insurgents, worked its
predestined result. As I said in my message of last December,
it was not civilized warfare; it was extermination. The only
peace it could beget was that of the wilderness and the grave.
"Meanwhile the military situation in the island had undergone
a noticeable change. The extraordinary activity that
characterized the second year of the war, when the insurgents
invaded even the thitherto unharmed fields of Pinar del Rio
and carried havoc and destruction up to the walls of the city
of Habana itself, had relapsed into a dogged struggle in the
central and eastern provinces. The Spanish arms regained a
measure of control in Pinar del Rio and parts of Habana, but,
under the existing conditions of the rural country, without
immediate improvement of their productive situation. Even thus
partially restricted, the revolutionists held their own, and
their conquest and submission, put forward by Spain as the
essential and sole basis of peace, seemed as far distant as at
the outset. In this state of affairs my Administration found
itself confronted with the grave problem of its duty. My
message of last December reviewed the situation, and narrated
the steps taken with a view to relieving its acuteness and
opening the way to some form of honorable settlement. The
assassination of the prime minister, Canovas, led to a change
of government in Spain. The former administration, pledged to
subjugation without concession, gave place to that of a more
liberal party, committed long in advance to a policy of reform
involving the wider principle of home rule for Cuba and Porto
Rico.
"The overtures of this Government, made through its new envoy,
General Woodford, and looking to an immediate and effective
amelioration of the condition of the island, although not
accepted to the extent of admitted mediation in any shape,
were met by assurances that home rule, in an advanced phase,
would be forthwith offered to Cuba, without waiting for the
war to end, and that more humane methods should thenceforth
prevail in the conduct of hostilities. Coincidentally with
these declarations, the new Government of Spain continued and
completed the policy already begun by its predecessor, of
testifying friendly regard for this nation by releasing
American citizens held under one charge or another connected
with the insurrection, so that by the end of November not a
single person entitled in any way to our national protection
remained in a Spanish prison.
"While these negotiations were in progress the increasing
destitution of the unfortunate reconcentrados and the alarming
mortality among them claimed earnest attention. The success
which had attended the limited measure of relief extended to
the suffering American citizens among them by the judicious
expenditure through the consular agencies of the money
appropriated expressly for their succor by the joint
resolution approved May 24, 1897, prompted the humane
extension of a similar scheme of aid to the great body of
sufferers. A suggestion to this end was acquiesced in by the
Spanish authorities. On the 24th of December last I caused to
be issued an appeal to the American people, inviting
contributions in money or in kind for the succor of the
starving sufferers in Cuba, following this on the 8th of
January by a similar public announcement of the formation of a
central Cuban relief committee, with headquarters in New York
City, composed of three members, representing the American
National Red Cross and the religious and business elements of
the community. The efforts of that committee have been
untiring and have accomplished much. Arrangements for free
transportation to Cuba have greatly aided the charitable work.
The president of the American Red Cross and representatives of
other contributory organizations have generously visited Cuba
and cooperated with the consul-general and the local
authorities to make effective distribution of the relief
collected through the efforts of the central committee. Nearly
$200,000 in money and supplies has already reached the
sufferers, and more is forthcoming. The supplies are admitted
duty free, and transportation to the interior has been
arranged, so that the relief, at first necessarily confined to
Habana and the larger cities, is now extended through most, if
not all, of the towns where suffering exists.
{587}
Thousands of lives have already been saved. The necessity for
a change in the condition of the reconcentrados is recognized
by the Spanish Government. Within a few days past the orders
of General Weyler have been revoked; the reconcentrados, it is
said, are to be permitted to return to their homes, and aided
to resume the self-supporting pursuits of peace. Public works
have been ordered to give them employment, and a sum of
$600,000 has been appropriated for their relief.
"The war in Cuba is of such a nature that short of subjugation
or extermination a final military victory for either side
seems impracticable. The alternative lies in the physical
exhaustion of the one or the other party, or perhaps of both—a
condition which in effect ended the ten years' war by the truce
of Zanjon. The prospect of such a protraction and conclusion
of the present strife is a contingency hardly to be
contemplated with equanimity by the civilized world, and least
of all by the United States, affected and injured as we are,
deeply and intimately, by its very existence. Realizing this,
it appeared to be my duty, in a spirit of true friendliness,
no less to Spain than to the Cubans who have so much to lose
by the prolongation of the struggle, to seek to bring about an
immediate termination of the war. To this end I submitted on
the 27th ultimo, as a result of much representation and
correspondence, through the United States minister at Madrid,
propositions to the Spanish Government looking to an armistice
until October 1 for the negotiation of peace with the good
offices of the President. In addition, I asked the immediate
revocation of the order of reconcentration, so as to permit
the people to return to their farms and the needy to be
relieved with provisions and supplies from the United States,
cooperating with the Spanish authorities, so as to afford full
relief.
"The reply of the Spanish cabinet was received on the night of
the 31st ultimo. It offered, as the means to bring about peace
in Cuba, to confide the preparation thereof to the insular
parliament, inasmuch as the concurrence of that body would be
necessary to reach a final result, it being, however,
understood that the powers reserved by the constitution to the
Central Government are not lessened or diminished. As the
Cuban parliament does not meet until the 4th of May next, the
Spanish Government would not object, for its part, to accept
at once a suspension of hostilities if asked for by the
insurgents from the general in chief, to whom it would
pertain, in such case, to determine the duration and
conditions of the armistice. The propositions submitted by
General Woodford and the reply of the Spanish Government were
both in the form of brief memoranda, the texts of which are
before me, and are substantially in the language above given.
The function of the Cuban parliament in the matter of
'preparing' peace and the manner of its doing so are not
expressed in the Spanish memorandum; but from General
Woodford's explanatory reports of preliminary discussions
preceding the final conference it is understood that the
Spanish Government stands ready to give the insular congress
full powers to settle the terms of peace with the
insurgents—whether by direct negotiation or indirectly by
means of legislation does not appear.
"With this last overture in the direction of immediate peace,
and its disappointing reception by Spain, the Executive is
brought to the end of his effort. In my annual message of
December last I said: 'Of the untried measures there remain
only: Recognition of the insurgents as belligerents;
recognition of the independence of Cuba; neutral intervention
to end the war by imposing a rational compromise between the
contestants, and intervention in favor of one or the other
party. I speak not of forcible annexation, for that can not be
thought of. That, by our code of morality, would be criminal
aggression.' Thereupon I review these alternatives, in the
light of President Grant's measured words, uttered in 1875,
when after seven years of sanguinary, destructive, and cruel
hostilities in Cuba he reached the conclusion that the
recognition of the independence of Cuba was impracticable and
indefensible; and that the recognition of belligerence was not
warranted by the facts according to the tests of public law. I
commented especially upon the latter aspect of the question,
pointing out the inconveniences and positive dangers of a
recognition of belligerence which, while adding to the already
onerous burdens of neutrality within our own jurisdiction,
could not in any way extend our influence or effective offices
in the territory of hostilities. Nothing has since occurred to
change my view in this regard; and I recognize as fully now as
then that the issuance of a proclamation of neutrality, by which
process the so-called recognition of belligerents is
published, could, of itself and unattended by other action,
accomplish nothing toward the one end for which we labor—the
instant pacification of Cuba and the cessation of the misery
that afflicts the island.
"Turning to the question of recognizing at this time the
independence of the present insurgent government in Cuba, we
find safe precedents in our history from an early day. They
are well summed up in President Jackson's message to Congress,
December 21, 1836, on the subject of the recognition of the
independence of Texas. He said: 'In all the contests that have
arisen out of the revolutions of France, out of the disputes
relating to the Crowns of Portugal and Spain, out of the
separation of the American possessions of both from the
European Governments, and out of the numerous and constantly
occurring struggles for dominion in Spanish America, so wisely
consistent with our just principles has been the action of our
Government that we have, under the most critical
circumstances, avoided all censure, and encountered no other
evil than that produced by a transient estrangement of good
will in those against whom we have been by force of evidence
compelled to decide. It has thus made known to the world that
the uniform policy and practice of the United States is to
avoid all interference in disputes which merely relate to the
internal government of other nations, and eventually to
recognize the authority of the prevailing party without
reference to our particular interests and views or to the
merits of the original controversy. … But on this, as on every
other trying occasion, safety is to be found in a rigid
adherence to principle. In the contest between Spain and the
revolted colonies we stood aloof, and waited not only until
the ability of the new States to protect themselves was fully
established, but until the danger of their being again
subjugated had entirely passed away.
{588}
Then, and not until then, were they recognized. Such was our
course in regard to Mexico herself. … It is true that with
regard to Texas the civil authority of Mexico has been
expelled, its invading army defeated, the chief of the
Republic himself captured, and all present power to control
the newly-organized government of Texas annihilated within its
confines; but, on the other hand, there is, in appearance at
least, an immense disparity of physical force on the side of
Texas. The Mexican Republic, under another Executive, is
rallying its forces under a new leader and menacing a fresh
invasion to recover its lost dominion. Upon the issue of this
threatened invasion the independence of Texas may be
considered as suspended; and were there nothing peculiar in
the relative situation of the United States and Texas, our
acknowledgment of its independence at such a crisis could
scarcely be regarded as consistent with that prudent reserve
with which we have hitherto held ourselves bound to treat all
similar questions.'
"Thereupon Andrew Jackson proceeded to consider the risk that
there might be imputed to the United States motives of selfish
interest in view of the former claim on our part to the
territory of Texas, and of the avowed purpose of the Texans in
seeking recognition of independence as an incident to the
incorporation of Texas in the Union, concluding thus:
'Prudence, therefore, seems to dictate that we should still
stand aloof and maintain our present attitude, if not until
Mexico itself or one of the great foreign powers shall
recognize the independence of the new government, at least
until the lapse of time or the course of events shall have
proved beyond cavil or dispute the ability of the people of
that country to maintain their separate sovereignty and to
uphold the government constituted by them. Neither of the
contending parties can justly complain of this course. By
pursuing it we are but carrying out the long-established
policy of our Government, a policy which has secured to us
respect and influence abroad and inspired confidence at home.'