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sipibibcib: OF HON. W. Y. ATKINSON, Delivered at Canton, Ga., August 13th, 1892. Stenographically Reported by C. B. Willingham. Fellow Georgians: The partiality of my distinguished friend has placed me in a very embarrassing position. He has extolled my abiUty and my powers as an orator so highly, that I know I shall fall far below your expectations. I am here to discuss with you the great political questions which the people are called upon to solve. I shall talk to you in a friendly and brotherly spirit. KIND WORDS FOB THE RANK AND FILE IN THE THIRD PARTY. I meet you as friends, as felloW Georgians, as compatriots, who desire to advance the interests of Georgia. If there be divisions among you, If there be those who have become restless and dissatisfied under the existing conditions, I have no word of abuse to utter. If there be lead ers who, to promote their selfish ambition, advise you to a course that wIU destroy the,best interests of this country, they deserve that condem nation which an honest and patriotic people wiU visit upon them. The rank and file of those men who think of leaving the Democratic party are honest and sincere, but they are about to commit a grievous wrong. lam here to reason with them as friend and as brother. I shaU talk to them in a conversational manner, appeal to their reason and seek to convince their judgment. lam a Georgian as they are Georgians. They and their children must share with me and my children the future gloom or the future greatness of this State. Whatever there is of shame or of glory in Georgia’s future, we all must share. Enter with me then into a discussion of the questions which are now upon the publio mind, and let us ascertain what in this hour is best for you and best for Georgia. It is admitted that there is dissatisfaction, poverty, distress, and oppression. What has caused it? WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE EXISTING STATE OF THINGS? It is the result of the violation of Democratic principles by the party In power during the last thirty years. During the last 30 years, there has not been a day nor an hour when the Democratic party had the power to write one law upon the statute books of this republic. The laws which oppress and wrong you cannot, then, be laid at the door of the Democratic party. It is true that at times the Democratic party has had control of the Lower House in Congress, at another time it had the presidency; but there has not been a time since the war when the Democratic party has been in control of the Presidency, the Senate and the House of Representatives. It has not since 1860 been able to write one law upon the statute books of the United States. DEMOCRATIC AND REPUBLICAN ADMINISTRATION COMPARED. What is the condition of affairs In 1892 as compared with 1860, when the Democrats went out of power ? In 1860, under Democratic administration, sixty-six million dollars defrayed the expenses of the Federal Government. After thirty years *of Republican rule the expenditures have grown from $60,000,000 to $500,000,000 per year. In 1860 the tariff was an ad valorem tax of 20 per cent.; after thirty years the taxes, levied under the name of a protective tariff, have increased from 20 per cent, to near 60 per cent. During this same time, there has been a change in the distribution of the wealth of the country. In 1860 thl farmer prospered; in 1892 his industry lan guishes. In 1860 he lent money to the people living in towns; in 1892 he must borrow from them. The most prosperous have been those upon whom the law has conferred the special privileges and special favors. Under Republican legislation, the wealth of the country has drifted into the hands of the favored few in the money centers in the North and East. The South struggles in poverty while other sections revel in wealth and luxury. Do you wonder that the people of this section should grow restless, discontented and dissatisfied ? I do not. Hence, I meet them in a spirit of kindness, to discuss with fairness the issues of the day, and to point out how these growing evils are to be corrected, and how they are to obtain relief. I shall do it frankly and candidly. I shall shirk no issue, I shall straddle no question. I shall meet every question, and if there be any present who think I am evading any point or issue, I ask that my attention be called to it. I will discuss candidly and respectfully the points to which my attention is invited. We have ascertained that the wrongs of which we complain have been brought upon us by the Republican party. THE REMEDY. What is the remedy? It is to go back to the good old-time doctrine of Jefferson and plant this Government upon the principles of De mocracy. When this is done, peace, prosperity and happiness will again reign over this fair land. To do this you must repeal the laws of which you complain, which have been passed in violation of Democratic principles. If these laws have wronged and oppressed you, the remedy is to repeal them, and place the people under a government which is controlled and guided by Democratic principles. What are some of the fundamental principles of Democracy? Every right and liberty should be retained by the individual which can be left to him without doing injustice to his fellow man—the Government must touch the individual in as few points as possible—special priv ileges shall be granted to no man. In the earliest platforms of the party, time and again the doctrine is announced that every citizen must be equal before the law, and that special privileges shall be granted to no man and to no class. To secure economic government, to guarantee to the States their constitutional rights and to all men equal and exact justice, is the mission of the Democratic party. All questions of finance and political policy is embraced in these announcements, and we find in them the cardinal rule by which they should be solved. GOVERNMENT WILL NOT MAKE YOU RICH. There are people going over the country talking as though the Gov ernment would make you rich if you would only allow them to go into power. My friends, the Government can make no one man rich unless it rote some one else to do it. What you are complaining of to-day is that the Government has robbed you to make some one else rich. What we need is to give to every individual an equal chance; to take from the protected manufactories, and other privileged classes, the special privi leges which have been given them and leave every man to work out his own salvation with fear and trembling. You may follow such will-o the-wisps as the Third Party, but you will find you are chasing the rainbow. All that the farmers, ail that the people of Georgia ask, is that the hand of oppression be taken off, and that they be allowed to pursue their own business with equal opportunities and equal protection given to other classes of citizens. When the Government does that, it has done all it has legitimately a right to do —all that we should ask. OUR LONG FIGHT FOR VICTORY. The Democratic party has fought for this for years. We knew at the close of the war that it would be very difficult to again get control of this Government, for the logical result of the war placed the Govern ment under the control of the Republican party. We knew that we had to wait long before the prejudice against our people and our principles would dwarf to a point where we could again control this Government and place it under the guidance of Democratic principles. Two years ago we went to the people upon the issues between the two great political parties. We elected twenty-eight out of the forty four Governors in the United States. We elected a House in which there was one hundred and forty-eight Democratic majority. We suc ceeded by ah overwhelming majority of the popular vote of the United States. There was a clear, distinct, unequivocal verdict of the people recorded in that election in favor of the Democratic party, in favor of Democratic principles. We have only to hold our ground and go to the people upon the same issues in 1892 and achieve a great victory. As a result of this victory the Democratic party would be in control ot this Government, and enabled to give the people the needed relief. The Democratic party stood with an arm strong enough to carry the cause to victory; she stood with the voice of the people already pro claiming the justice of her cause. She stood in sight of victory, and was marching on to receive its fruits. In this hour, which had been hoped and prayed for by the people of the South for twenty-five years, there appeared upon the scene a new Richmond—a new party, they call it. You are now called upon to desert your friends, your own blood, your own fellow-citizens, and follow after these men and women from Kansas, who call upon you to follow their political flag. Whose advice will you heed? Will you take the Judgment of th«t array of statesmen who adorn your own State, or will you follow the flag of such men as Weaver, Simpson, Post, and that long-haired states man, the Widow Lease? [Laughter.] My friends, you are called upon to desert in an hour when unity will secure a triumphant victory. You are called upon to divide, when it will take the united strength of all to right our wrongs. What good can come from division? In division there is weakness. THE ST. LOUIS CONVENTION. Who gave this party birth? They met at St. Louis. Who were they? It was the grandest aggregation of cranks that ever assembled on the American continent. [Applause.] There was the saloonist and the pro hibitionist; the free trader and the protectionist, the woman’s suffragist, the anarchist, and the communist. It was a convention of croakers, cranks and communists. A party given birth to by such elements can not live; it will go to pieces of its own weight. [Applause.] It carries with it the seed which will bring upon it disintegration and destruction. Look at it from the standpoint of reason. Was that convention composed of the character of people with whom Georgians can form an alliance? In that convention there were women political delegates, there were wo men stump speakers, and there was a woman upon the platform commit tee. There was a resolution passed by that convention calling upon the respective states to act favorably upon the question of woman’s suftYage; and when they met at Omaha they put in the platform the straight prop osition to secure equal privileges to men and women. This means thtft we must give to women the right to vote, to sit on juries, and exercise ail the political rights of men. Is this country, with our mixed population, ready for that? Are you ready for it? My countrymen, I protest against a step which looks to the destruction of that social system which has been the proudest boast of the Southern people, and which has given to them a civilization that challenges the admiration of the world. lam proud of this Southern people; lam proud of the glorious history which they have made; proud of the heroism and genius of her sons; but more than all, I am proud of her matchless social system, if the purity and the loveliness of her women. [Applause.] Never will I, and never will Georgia join with any political party which pro poses to drag down her womanhood and destroy the grandest and purest social system known to the civilized world. I stand as a Georgian to protest against any movement which makes war upon the purity of her womanhood, the holiness of the offices of sisterhood, motherhood and wifehood. [Applause.] * My friends, let me ask you again, does a party with such ideas com mend itself to your consideration? It means about as much good to you in 1892 as John Brown meant in 1859. My friends, we need no third party. There are but two sides to the great questions which confront us. If it be admitted for the sake of argument that we need a third party, this is not the third party you need. A man might need a wife, but he might marry one who would make home a hell instead of a heaven. He might get the wrong woman. [Laughter.] If you are dissatisfied with the present political parties, and want to find another, don’t join this Third party. It will be worse than marrying the wrong woman. [Laughter.] It is not the party you are looking for. OWNERSHIP OF RAILROADS, TELEGRAPH AND TELEPHONE. Take its platform and see what relief it proposes to bring to the people. One plank in it proposes to bring relief through Government ownership of all the railroads, telegraph and telephone lines. How are you going to get them ? There are but two ways. One is to buy them, and the other is to confiscate them. The man who advises you to buy them is a simpleton. The man who would confiscate them is a thief and ought to be in the penitentiary. Let us see about buying them. The rail roads alone are estimated at ten billions ($10,000,000,000.) The expenses of the Government in purchasing would be immense. No one would expect the Government to go into the market as a purchaser upon such a scalewithout being swindled and without paying exhorbitant prices. Estimate all at $10,000,000,000. That amounts to $154 for every man, woman and child in the United States. The population of Cherokee county being 15,412, you must pay two million three hundred and seventy-two thousand ($2,372,000) dollars. If the railroads, telegraph and telephone properties could be purchased for half this estimate, it would impose upon the people a rate of taxa tion that would crush them. We have only about a billion and a half ($1,500,000,000) in circulation in the United States. Where are we to get the money to buy them ? If we arranged to pay for them during a series of years, what a debt you would assume and what an interest debt you must pay! A debt of about one hundred and fifty-four dollars for every man, woman and child in the United States, which must be paid with interest. These men are going to save you from the grasp of Wall street, they say—save you from the clutches of the money power. When they buy the railroads and tax you to pay for them, where do they put the money? Whose bands do they place the money in ? They take it out of your pockets and place it in the hands of the owners of the railroads, and enable them to withdraw the money from circulation, bankrupt you and drive you and your children to want. What statesmanship! Why should we own the railroads? The United'States Government and the State Government can lay their hands upon the railroads and say to them, through their railroad commissioners, “ So much shall you charge and no more.” They have the legislative power to fix absolutely the charges of railroads, telegraph and telephone. What better do we want? After the Government purchased them it could not do more. Why bankrupt the Government to buy them when you have the power to control them? You can control them now; when you have bought them you will have no more power to fix rates than you have now. I could not understand for some time why it was that these Third party fellows wanted to buy all these, but I finally struck it. There are more than three quarters of a million employes on the railroads, be sides those with the telegraph and telephone lines, and that crowd at St. Louis got dead broke, and wanted to fix a place to get a fat job. [A p plause.] The Third party wants to tax you to death, and increase the offices. It is for more offices and more taxes. That is what they call re relief. Relieve the people by increasing taxation, and relieve their leaders by giving to each an office. [Applause.] Buy the railroads ! Why, we own one little railroad 138 miles long. Some of you gentlemen remem ber that gome years ago we tried to run the railroad, and instead of the State running the railroad, the railroad ran the State. [Laughter.] The road was generally calling for an appropriation, and the members of the Legislature were generally in a position to demand places for their friends. The road was a political machine, and when it wanted money it went into your State treasury to get it. Nearly all the roads in Georgia are now in the hands of a receiver. As it is, the loss falls upon the owners. If the Government owned them you would have to tax the people and appro priate money to them. If we owned 171,000 miles of railroad in the United States, and the telegraph and telephone lines, and had to give places to all the no-account kinfolks of the leaders of the Third party, what a aet of officers we would have! [Laughter.] You would be called on often to appropriate your taxes to make good losses and stealage to support the railroads. There is another reason why we ought not to own them. The office holders and pensioners would then number two million. If you Increase the number of Government dependents to this vast army, you will make of this Government a corrupt tyrant, and give to an administration the power to perpetuate its rule. The Third party people say, “We will have a system of civil service that will prevent their interfering with politics.” How will they do that? By simply disfranchising. Our people know what it is to be disfranchised, and we want no more of it. For my part, I want no man in an office in the United States who has so little epurage, so little self-respect, and so little manhood, that in order to get an office he will go to the Gov ernment, crouch at the feet of the administration, and say to it: “I surrender my manhood, I surrender my citizenship, I surrender my right of suffrage that I may get an office.” When you entrust this Government to such men, your Government is at an end, and liberty and free Government will no longer exist in America. SAVINGS BANKS. What else do the Third party people propose to do? They say if you will put them in power, they will grant relief by establishing savings banks all over the country. Some of their orators say they are fight ing National banks, but their platform does not look that way. I do not know what the trouble is with you up here. You may be in trouble about finding a place to put your money. I don’t know, but down in my country the trouble with our farmers is to find the money to put and not the places to put it. [Laughter and applause.] But you see this means more officers again. [Applause.] LAND PLANK. They make one other proposition. They declare that land is the heritage of all the people, and that no man has a right to hold it for speculative purposes. That is the very essence of communism and con fiscation. If a man has more land than he is working, they will say to him: “You hold that for speculative purposes; we will take it away from you and give it to some one else.” That is the spirit of that section. Is there relief to you in that plank? It is a blow at the right STTFFX4I, of private property. It is a blow at your title to your home. It Is a blow at a most sacred right of the American citizen. It is a blow at civilization. There is in this movement, which is being fostereS by the nihilists, socialists, communists, and other discontented elements from the old world, the spirit of confiscation ; it is he that hath not against him that hath. That will not do, my countryman, in a free country. It must be crushed out of existence. It cannot live in free America. THE FINANCE PLANK—IT WRONGS THE POOR. Again, they say they will bring relief to the people by loaning them money at 2 per cent, on land. How many in your county own land? Less than half. If money belongs to the Government it belongs to everybody in the Government. If it is worth 8 per oent. interest is it right for a man who already owns a home to get money at 2 per cent, at the expense of the whole people, a majority of whom own no land and no collaterals upon which to borrow from the government. How will that help the man who has nothing? It wrongs him. The man who needs help most can get nothing. He has no ooiiaieraia to give, he has no land to deposit, and yet you take the money that is worth 8 per cent, and lend it to the man that is worth more than he is at 2 per cent. I call your attention to that just to show its injustice and folly. Let’s discuss money a little. The Government has no money to lend at 2 per cent. The men who are now engaged in trying to deceive the people with this unjust and visionary scheme never expect to see the Government go into the business of lending money to the people upon land, cotton or anything else. The Government will never lend It at 2 per cent. TO GET MONEY THE GOVERNMENT MUST TAKE IT FROM THE PEOPLE. Where does the Government get its money ? Take from it the power of taxation and the Government is a pauper. The Government has not one cent except what it takes from you. Bring it home, what has your county that it has not taxed out of you. Every dollar it gets, it must take out of your pockets. So with the National Government. It cannot get a dollar without taxing you to get it There is another means used to supplement the currency. It is credit. The Government issues a paper money and calls it a dollar, and it agrees to redeem that paper money in gold or silver. What is that? That is nothing more than its promissory note. When you have nd money you send out your note and agree to redeem it. So does the Government. When it needs more money it uses its credit, and seuds out its note. Now, how far can the Government go upon that line. It is like an individual. When you get too many of your notes out, they go below par. When the Government gets too many out they go below par. Think of the con dition of our currency after the war! When it Issued more paper money than it could redeem promptly the paper money went down and gold and silver were at a premium. Why was that? It was because the Government had used its credit beyond its limit. Well, now, how far has our Government already used its credit? The United States already carries a larger amount of uncovered or credit paper money than any nation in the world except Russia. The United States carries fourhundredand twenty-two million dollars of uncovered paper money. Great Britain carries only thirty million. France carries only eiglity one million. Now, we have used our credit to that extent. The credit of the Government ought to be used so far as it can safely be used for the purpose of providing ample currency to answer the needs of com merce and business. But whenever you pass beyond the limit, when ever you pass to the point where you take your paper money to the Treasury of the United States and say “redeem it” and it cannot redeem it, your money goes below par. To put it, in short, In the sense in which I have discussed it, every paper dollar that floats ought to be able to say: “I know that my redeemer liveth." [Applause.] just “stomp” monby. What is the programme of the Third party leaders? What is their idea about money? Their idea seems to be that the Government will Just issue it and throw it about, until they have got a good many people to believing that if the Third party gets into power, they will get at least fifty dollars per capita. The toiling people of this country, the laboring people of this country, the poor people of this country are more inter ested in having a sound currency than any one else. Flood this coun try with a depreciated currency if you will. What will be the result? You need not be uneasy about the banks or Wall street. They will take care of themselves. They will keep the good money in their vaults and send the worthless paper money down here and pay you for your cotton. They will send down here and pay off the colored man for his labor in money worth, perhaps, fifty cents in the dollar. These fellows have an idea that all the Government has to do to make money is to stamp it, or, as some of them say, "stomp” it. When Governor Mc- Donald was the Chief Executive of the State a member of the Legisla ture became enthused with a scheme to build a system of railroads in Georgia. He went to Governor McDonald and unfolded his scheme to him, and said: “What do you think about it, Governor ?” The Gov ernor replied: "It is a good sheme, but I don’t see where we are going to get the money." The member readily answered: “O, there is no trouble about that; just ‘stomp’ it, by God, ‘stomp’ it.” LLaughter.] You cannot stamp paper and make itpassas money unless you have the ability to redeem it. When tile Government puts out its paper money which it has not the ability to redeem, and declares it a legal tender, the man who owes you can require you to take it, for the Government says you must; but when you go to buy, the seller will say: “Bring me good money or I will not let you have my goods.” QUIT WORK AND LET THE GOVERNMENT RUN ITB PRINTING PRESSES. I have been amused at the Third party discussion of the currency question. If they are right they have made a great discovery that will enable the Government to make money and protect the people from work. If they are correct they have solved the question of the ages. If the Government can make money we should run our printing presses and sit down and do nothing and let the rest of the world make something for us to eat and wear. We will get the money from the Government and send it over and buy the products of their labor. If their theory is correct that is what it amounts to. When you flood this country with depreciated and irredeemable currency, that moment you bring the laboring man to want, you bring the producers of this country to poverty. The most wonderful thing is that with all the dis cussion that has. been had upon this question they have not found one man of National character—no man with character for statesmanship or with financial ability—who agrees that the Government can adopt their policy without bringing upon the people financial bankruptcy. We live in that remarkable era when the men who know nothing know everything, and the men who have been accredited to possess ability and acquirements know nothing. DON’T LOAN BUT DECREASE TAXES. If the Government could loan, it ought not for the reason I Jiave given you. But it ought not to create a new army of office-holders to loan money for another reason. If the Government can use its credit to furnish a greater amount of currency, it should pay the expenses of the administration and decrease the taxes. To bring it home to you again, suppose it takes ten thousand dollars per annum to defray the expenses of this county; if you have at the end of a fiscal year five thou sand dollars in your treasury, what will you do with it? Are you going to levy the same rate of taxation that you did before, and take the five thousand dollars which belongs to all your people and lend it to a few at 2 per cent, interest? Will you do that? No, you will say, “we have already $5,000 and we only need to raise $5,000 more.” “We will levy a tax this year for only $5,000 and leave the other $5,000 in the people’s pockets where it belongs.” The United States Government, if it can use its credit to create a surplus of circulating medium, should do the same thing. There is no relief in that plank. It would involve the country in financial ruin, as a similar plan did the Argentine Republic. THE BACK TENSION GRAB. I believe there is another proposition that was in their platform, and the party is committed to it yet. When they started off at Ht. Louis it was said that a plank was put in the platform known as the Twelfth Plank, providing that we should issue money to pay to the Federal sol diers the difference between the value of greenbacks and gold at the time it was paid. This plank in substance was in the platform of the Greenback party; in the platform of the People’s party made at Cin cinnati aud at St. Louis. When they found that it was unpopular in the South they said it was not in it. [Laughter and applause.] I will deal with the proposition a little for the reason that they have nominated a man for President who is.tliat plank itself. Was it in there to start on? There is my friend, Moses, who was at the St. Louis Convention. He heard the platform read, and he says it was there. Liv ingston says it was there. Here is a Peoples’ party campaign book. This book was not intended to come South, it was not Intended for cir culation among you here; it was to take Horace Greeley’s advice: “Go West, young man, go West" —to send out to circulate among the sol diers as a boodle plank to induce them to stand by the Third party. Here it is: “We demand that the Government shall issue legal-tender aotM and pay the Union soldiers the difference between the price of the mouey in which they were paid and gold.” It does not say anything about paying us the difference between the price of gold and the paper money we received for our cotton and labor. Those Westerners were sharper than the Southerners at St. Louis and over-reached them. Here is the Videlte, a paper published at Washington in the interest of the pensioners, that was to circulate among Federal soldiers, and it publishes Plank Twelfth as a part of the St Louis platform. All the daily papers on the next day after the Bt. Louis Convention adopted ite platform, published Plank Twelfth as a part of It. The Southern Alli ance Farmer , of March Ist, published the St Louis platform and sent It out to the faithful, with Plank Twelfth In it. The other day, in his Thompson speech, Mr. Watson admits It all In this language: “They have abused us very much for our pension plank In our platform.” Now let me ask you what confidence can you place In the men who have been denying that the Twelfth Plank was In the St. Louis plat form. If they will deceive you about that, entrust them with power and they will deceive and rob you. When they met at Omaha they left that out of thejplatform; but they pass a resolution which declares in favor of liberal pensions to federal soldiers. They declare for libera* pensions to the soldiers without restricting them to the disabled ones. THE FATHER OF THE TWELFTH PLANK FOR PRESIDENT. They nominated as their candidate for President the man who was the father of this pension plank, the man who as a member of Congress had twice introduced a bill for the payment to the Federal soldiers back pensions In conformity with that plank. That is the way it was In their St. Louis platform, but they put a plank in their Omaha platform that can be construed to mean it, and they name for President of the United States a man who has made a record upon this question, and a man who, if he bo made president, will favor the making of that plank into law. So after all, the man who votes for Weaver, votes for thla twelfth plank. He is in favor of it, and the platform does not restrain him. What does that plank mean? When the Confederate soldier supports that twelfth plank he says to the Federal soldier, “I fought under Lee; you fought under Grant. I was paid in Confederate money; you were paid iu greenbacks. You devastated my country, you laid my home in ashes; you spilled the blood of my brother, you took tha lift of my father, you broke the heart of my mother, and greenback! are not good enough for you; we, the Third party people, will pay you for it iu gold.” With a candidate for President with such a record, with such an issue, is there a man iu Georgia who knows the record, who understands the question, that will cast his vote for Weaver? I appeal to you as Georgians, as men who love and honor her history, aa men who are proud of Georgia’s present, and look forward to a glorious future, to protect the character of her people against the record of a vote of a Confederate soldier tor this man who, not satisfied with the spilling of blood, desires now to rob them of their treasure and their money. The Southern people do not protest against the payment of proper pensions to disabled Federal soldiers, but do protest against this damnable outrage advocated by Weaver. [Applause.] The Third party offers the people no relief. It proposes to giite relief by dodging the tariff' question and declariug for fiat money, for loaning the money of the poor to the rich, for higher taxation and for more offices. What does the Democratic party offer? THE UNEQUAL DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH AND ITS CAUSE. The greatest trouble with this people is in the unequal distribution of wealth. In the State of Rhode Island there is three hundred and sixty-one ($361) dollars per capita of loanable wealth, while in Arkansas there is only six dollars per capita. Eleven Eastern States own 64 per cent, of tiie loanalrie wealth of the forty-four States, while eleven Southern States own only 3 per cent. Eleven Eastern States do 75 per cent, of the loan and discount busi ness done in the United States. Money is plentiful now in the North and East. It is important that wo have an ample volume of currency. But my friends, the most important question for us is, ndt how much money per capita is in circulation in the United States, but how much money is in circulation in Georgia. That is the question. How much money is in circulation in Cherokee county? It will be worth nothing to us if we had SIOO per capita in the United States, aud none of it In Georgia. How does this unequal distribution of wealth come about? How is it that Georgia lias not her share of the per capita circula tion to-day? It is because of that system of laws that takes It from Georgia and carries it North and East. What we want to do Is to pro vide a system of laws, by which we can secure our part of it. There Is, according to the reports, about $24.41 per capita now In the United States. There is not that much in Georgia. Why is it? THE GOVERNMENT APPROPRIATIONS TAKE MONEY FROM THE SOUTH. It is because of laws that takes it away from Georgia. How is it? We spend half a billion dollars per year to defray the expenses of the Government. The South pays about oue-third of that money, and Geor gia pays fourteen millions of it. Where does it all go? The most oI that money is paid out north of Mason and Dixon’s line. Georgia pays about five million dollars a year on pensions and hardly any of it comes back here. It is paid out north of Mason and Dixon’s line. Most of what you pay to support the army and navy goes North; what you pay on your public debt goes North. Substantially the expenses of the Government, amounting to five hundred millions of dollars ($500,000,- 000), is dumped down in one section of the country. Is not that enough to keep you poor? If you are taxed for oounty purposes, and every dollar of your money, instead of being paid out and put in circulation in this country, is paid out iu Chicago, it would be a fearful drain upon your energies and your resources. You would be taking money out of circulation aud making yourselves poor, Just aa tha South lias been kept poor. ANOTHER FACTOR IN THE UNEQUAL DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. In addition to the drain upon us by heavy taxes, which are expended almost entirely outside of our section of the country, there is another factor which aidsin keeping the South impoverished. It is the protective tariff. Under our tariff system we are required to pay an immense tribute to the protected manufacturers of the North. How is this done? You have a hundred dollars worth of cotton. You are obliged to sell It for what you can get for it in the open market of the world, unaffected by a protective tariff. You sell your cotton in Liverpool; you buy IKK) worth of goods that are on the protective tariff list In America; you put them on a ship and start home; you reach the port and the custom officer says: “You must pay SSO on this before you can get them home.” It is the tariff levied for the Government. You say, “ I sold my cotton iu the same market I bought these goods.” He says, “You must pay it.” What do you do? You have either to pay fifty dollars, making the goods cost you $l5O, or you have to sell enough of your goods to pay the tax on the balance aud bringing home the remainder. Suppose, to avoid this, you buy in America. How does that affect you ? The American manufacturer, knowing that the foreign importer must pay the tariff tax before ho can bring in his goods, puts up the price of his goods so as to about cover the amount of the tariff. When you buy these goods, instead of paying the tariff tax to the Gov ernment, you pay it to the manufacturer. The estimates are that you pay from $3 to $5 to the protected manufacturers of the United States where you pay one dollar into the treasury of the United States. In this way Georgia pays eighteen million of dollars annual tribute to the protected industries. We are living under a tax law that levies upon these people a tribute of $3 for the benefit of the protected manufacturer in order to get $1 into the treasury of the Government. It is really then not a tax for revenue, but a tax the prime object of which is to benefit the protected manufacturer. It is a misuse and perversion of the power to ta* which lias been entrusted by the people to the Government. It is robbing you of the fruits of your toil and placing it in the pocket of the protected money barons. These pro tected industries are almost entirely North, aud this immense sum leaves us and is harvested North. There is the greatest evil that afflicts this people. Give us economical Government; repeal this robber tariff; change your methods of appropriating the money that is taxed from the people, and you will leave these people where they will again prosper. > THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY WILL CORRECT THESE* EVILS. How is that to be done? There is but one way to do it. Standby the Democratic party; put the Democratic party in power, and when you do, you place in power a party that will distribute the appropria tions justly aud fairly over the country. You will place in power a party that will repeal the protective tariff, and place you where you will not be forced to jiay over your hard earnings to sustain the business of another. , My countrymen, the tariff question is the leading question in thla campaign. There is no measure that can bring to tho people the finan cial relief that would come with an honest tariff. If you can oheapen the purchase of goods, you increase the amount of money left in your pockets. If you can change the method of appropriations you bring the money back to your own doors, and it la put in circulation here. Every farmer and every producer should enter upon an earnest, zealsua