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About The Eugene City guard. (Eugene City, Or.) 1870-1899 | View Entire Issue (May 24, 1890)
IT.SNOYF.lt AKD WF.BRl A GRAND PREMIUM. rrrnnnnl. TOTERS OF OKEGOJ, READ! READ!! f ' i ComprehenslVe ' Bevlew of State . n -.1 U'LIk CI.AHt.11 (atterS A necwru nun-u nuuum he the PrWe of Every ToteiJ ' PUBLICAK CAHDIDATE'S BEO S'" VHTII.lTVn AMe and x-oalcal Address to tha r.nMientof Linn County.-' I must are return mv thanks at the very outset !i ht I shall aay to thecitizens of Leb anon for the honor thev have done me in pant by extending invitations, at two er three aiuereui, r s.nra I have not been able to comply Zmt .nnh renuest until now. At soon an I I iu nominated I remembered my obli gation to yon and promised even before ( the rtate committee had made appoint ments to come np here during this can vass and speak npon the Issues of the j. I am pleased to witness this large assemblage and I shall endeavor to grat- t tbe purpose of your assembling to- '( 'wer by presenting to you a frank Statement of the issues of the campaign. . ', STATE MAMAQKMENT. j I It is proper that the first thing I should tn von should be in regard to the management of state affairs. Four years IfO I irgg seiecieu ao your Bormii. w have charge of a specified branch of oar business, and h) is but proper that ' i when I speak before you in regard to ' ' iaestions of public importance, a plain itatement should be, made concerning my gtewardship. ' And I am greatly pleased to tell you here, ray fellow clti- tens of Lino county, that I can render a ,'' good account. I The, state is prosperous ; the small debt that existed at the com mencement of my term has been extin wished and tbe ordinary expenses of Die state have been kept within Just limits. A comparison of tbe first two years of the present official term, with "' (he last two vears of the preceding term, ' " shows that the total expenditures were Jess by over $200,000. and that the ordi nary expenditures were less by $500. not withstanding the growth of the state, and necessarily a corresponding growth ' ' of expenses, and notwithstanding the ' farther fact that such ordinary expend! 1 tnrM had been increased by over 125,000 for the two years by tbe creation of onr ' srnsmental. if not nsetui Doaras i rail road and fish commissioners. In the management of the school funds, we have dispensed with agents in the coun ties, where sometimes money was per mitted to lie idle, and all the money is paid into the state treasury whence it is at once loaned out. The growth of the school fund has been most gratifying. ' Tint fund in 1885 including all items amondted to 1868,735.16; in 1889 to $1, ' 766,700. The amounts actual W loaned ' not including certificates of sale, were. 'in 1885 $733,288.52; in December 1889 . ' $1,668,071.14. In 1885 $0.75 per scholar was distributed to each county ; in 1889 $1.40 was so distributed, and $1.60 will ' probably be the amount this year. In lie management of state affairs, strictly business methods have been adopted. There have been no fat jobs under this administration. Work has been fairly 1 let to the lowest responsible bidder and ' hthas been compelled to fulfill his con . tract to the letter. Tbe penitentiary and . asylum were never under bettor man agement, and the trust confided to the asylum and the reform school boards to purchase lands for those institutions has been faithfully and judiciously executed. 1 ' LEGISLATIVE EXTRAVAGANCE. The extravagant expenditures of the last legislature has been seriously felt by the taxpayers of, the state. Its total appropriations exceed those of the pre vious legislation by more than $239,000. ! It appeara that, in modern legislative '"bodies, measures are passed, not Bomuch npon their merits, as upon the facility of those advocating them to enter a combine or log-rolling scheme. Thus, at the last sesgidn the Portland water bill waB the measure concerning which a combina tion was made by which twelve wagon roads received ' anpropriationa aggregat ing the sum of $113,000, and by which ' additional favors were received both by the Agricultural College and State Uni- ;, .versify. I have been censured for not li vetoing the grants for wagon roads. ; I did not sign any of those bills because I did not believe! it to be just to levy a general tax for local benefit, but as I , do not believe tbe governor, while hav ing the power, has the moral right to in terfere with the action of the legislature , except where in his opinion such action is clearly unconstitutional, and as 1 could ot see any clear constitutional inhibi tion agaiiiBt such an expenditure, I suf fered them to become laws withhut ex ecutive approval. , But the most flagrant ctof extravagance perpetrated by the last legislature was in the increase in the number of railroad commissioners and the provision for their payment when it had been established by a division of the , , supreme court that they were utterly in effective of any good purpose whatever nniier the law as it now stands. $'J500 w the people's money, raised by taxing the already over-taxed people of this state, is paid out annually to four stal rt men, whose onlv effective labor un- ; aer the law is to ride to the capital at the nd of each quarter and draw from the treasury their fat salaries for doing noth ing. The party guilty of perpetrating -'h a cool and deliberate fraud upon Jhe taxpayers of the state a was perpe trated at the last legislature in perpetu 'ng in power the railroad commission, which can do nothing, as well as the fish , eo'oruiifcion, which defies the faw, and I hich are effective of really no other ' Purpose than a Honlutinn nf thn treasury 1 the extent of their salaries, ought to o i rebuked, and if I do not greatly mis the temper of the free people of the Ute of Oregon it will be rebuked. COLOMBIA BIVXB WPBOVBMENTS. .re is no question before the people ' -J Jfrgon of more importance than that w speedy opening of the Columbia Jr .to free navigation. It is the im perative duty of the Federal government Plily overcome the obstacles to its commerce. The people of the Pa cific North have been taxed for nearly a half a century tor the support .tei ,?,lK?v,ri"n.en,'l,d removal ol the obrtriu tions in onr great Interstate river is clearly within the cope of its duly and its powers, it has been clearly der lift in iis dutv to us bv its continued neglect in tins rerd The speedy opening of the Columbia to tree commerce isauuestion of auch par amount importance that I felt impelled lour years ago to recommeud that the state should move in the matter. I had then no hoe that the United States en gineers wutild recommend arrv other im provement than that by cunaf and locks. Hut a board of engineers was Bent out here two years ago to examine the oh Htructionsot the Columbia between The Dalles and Cclilo and repert to congress the most feasible means of overcomaig them. That board rewrted in Decem ber, 1888, recommending the building of portage railroad at a cost of $431,500 as the cheapest and quickest solution of theexiw.ng difficulties." Htrange and unaccom.uble as it niav seem, Senator .Mitchell, in the face ol this very report introduced and had passed in the senate a bill appropriating $.Mi0,000 for a boat railway, which scheme the board had refused to adopt. The tenor and purport of the recommendation of the board in favor of a potraiw railway was unknown to the people of Orenon, but it certainly must have been known to our delegation in congress. Without having any inti mation of such recommendation on the part of the board, but doubtful of the practicability of the boat railway scheme, I addressed a letter to the chief of en gineers urging him to recomment to con gress a portage insteadiof a boat railway, and I addressed letters to our delegation in congress urging them to co-operate with me. Senator Dolph in bis reply to to me made the statement that the board had recommended the build ing of a portage road, This was the Brut intimation I had received that such a report bad been made. I then wondered why our delegation did not at once seize the opportunity offered by the board for securing a epeedy open ing of the river by procuring the small appropriation required, and I have been wondering ever since. Did our dele gation in congress really desire the Columbia river opened for commerce? If so, they ought to have seized the op portunity offered; But Senator Mitchell had committed the senate to the boat railway scheme, and engineers were sent to Europe ' to examine boat railways there. They returned, and probably in view of the fact that the senate was al ready committed to the boat railwav scheme, they reported that, "it is Buited to a considerable commerce ;" but they still insist iu their last report, aa in the first, that a portage rail road is, "a cheap and speedy solution, adequate, in the opinion of the board ; to meet existing requirements." But in the very face of this report our delegation in congress persist in pushing the boat railway scheme, the full completion of which, the board estimates, will cost $3,576,366 35 (within $200,000 of what a canal and locks would cost), which would require $275,000 annually - to operate it, and which will consume a period of about thirty-five years in its construction, provided congress makes oppropriations for it as it has for the locks at the Cas cades. Under these circumstances is it not the imperative duty of our delegation in congress to secure an appropriation for a portage road, as it undoubtedly could? Senator Dolph in his reply to my letter stated that "congress had never entered npon the work of con struction of such railroads, and I do not believe it possible to secure an appro priation for a portage railroad." Neither do I if our solid delegation oppose it. A Washington dispatch to the Oregonian of March 17 says that "members of the river and harbor committee have in timated that they would support the portage railway scheme on account of the small appropriation necessary," and that "it may be possible to compromise on a portage railway if the people of Oregon would prefer that now rather than take the chances of delay, which the improvement of The Dalles by other methods may cause." Let then the people of Oregon declare for it by giving their sunport to the candidates standing upon a platform which declares in favor of a portage , road, providing the whole amount for a boat railway cannot be secured at once, and our success would be instructions to our delegation in con gress, to carry out the recommendations of the board of engineers, by securing during this session an appropriation for a portage bridge, which, as the board declares, could be built in one year, and which would be a solution "adequate to meet existing requirements." Let this be done and within a few years the Columbia river- would bear a fleet of steamers, its corarueree would expand beyond all conception, and Eastern Ore gon and Washington would awaken to new life ' and energy. No . more im portant issue was ever presented to the people of Eastern Oregon than is now presented to them by the two parties, upon ; that iBiimrtant 1 question of the speedy opening of the Columbia river to (roe commerce. Let the people declare for it. . THE WILLAMETTE LOCKS AND CANAL. TV,o l.malntivfl RSS llllllv of til 6 State of Ooregon, in 1870 passed ' an act to ap- urounan) lunus iot we consiruuuim m r.- . i t .,l ol II, u UMIumutLff falls." by which act $200,000 was appropriated out of tbe 6 per cent, of the net proceeds of the sale of public lands within the state, and out of the sale of the 500,000 acres of land donated to Oregon for in ternal improvements, for the benefit of the company building the locks. The ... oi,ino. tliia hnff('tion stiuulated Kl Ulwfe that at the expiration of twenty years Iroin liie urue m im-aiu iuu !...,! th- a ata nf Of Hion uhal hare the right and privilege to take and ap propriate to Its own use lorever mo T . t 1 Inka nnnn lh DRV men t tO Cmittl "u "I - - r-J . said corporation the actual value thereof, at tbe time of taking anu a iprvinuu the same, which value shall be ascer tained in such manner as me ieKimuc li .riiy" The twentv vears will expire at the close of the year choose, eitheir leave the locks in the possession of the private corporation how owning them, on coudition that the -wv m it ah 1 be returned to the school fund, where, by the con etitution it properly belongs, and on Ihe the further condition that the toll shall be reduced fully one-half, or it may take the same to ita own use at the actual value thereof. What is the actual value w of Ucnal .nd locks?' It .such a sum as at 10 per cent, interwd twill bring sn amount equal to the net profits ariaing from the toll collected. Wbal are those net profits? The law declared that the sum of $200,000 waa appropri ated "upon the e i press condition that ssid corioratiiin shall pay to the state of Oregon 10 per centum ol the net prof.ts arising from the toll collected for passing freight and paseengers Uirough the said canal aud locks, which sum of 10 per centum of net profits shall be paid into the common school fund ol the alula." Now, by aitcertaining the sum so paid ' by aaid company to the state, we can I correctly arrive at the present value of I the locks aa determined by that com- J nany ltseit. .ow, what sum has so been paid by the company into the state treasury? , Not etie cent has ever been paid. The locks are worth, there fore, nothing to the company, and would nut the state, therefore, be justified in taking them off from its hands, without any compensation, and so open the Willamette river to free commerce? The company nave, thus placed them selves bv their dealing with the state in a dilemma. If there have been no net profits, the locks and canal are valuless, and the state aould he justified in taking them without compensation. If there bas been net protits, the company bas been defrauding the Mate. The canal j and locks company will be compelled to stride one or the other of the horns of that dilemma. And the voters of the state should see to it that the state and not that company should dictate - the terms of the settlement of that im portant question. Mr. D. P. Thompson is a stockholder in the electric company j a credit mohilier arrangement which Owns a controlling interest in the locks company. Mr. Thompson, of that com pany is nominated (or governor an able captain and Mr. Easthan, of Clackamas and Mr. Morey, of Multuomah, of tliat oompany are nominated for the legis laturemost efficient lieutenants. The peculiar combination of uuh remark able ability at this particular time, is well calculated to arrest the attention of the people of Oregon by its significance, and they should see to it that no inter ested parties should be placed in official positions where thev can act as umpires in the settlement of this question, so im portant to the people of the Willamette valley. ' me. Thompson's official betokd. It is proper, when a candidate aspires to fill so high an office aa that of gov ernor, to suhj'Tt his actions while hold ing either official positions or respon sible places of trust, to thorough in spection, iu order to ascertain his tuiiess to the office to which he aspires. The cold record alone should be difrloMtd and nothing else should be sanctioned In referring to Mr. Thompson's ivcnl, I shall waive all allusions to hlssii'vey ing or mail contracts or to his private business, but shall simply red-r to his record as it appears in thesupieiue court reoorta of Oregon and the recnled or dinances of the city of Portland, In 15 Oregon reports, page 34, the Mipreme courts of Oregon held that Mr. Thomp son could not lawfully, while acting as receiver of the llolladay estate, to which important office he had been appointed by the court, take a mortgage aa he had done from a party in the pro ceeding, upon property in his custody as such receiver, and the court declared to allow it "would sanction a contra vention of public policy and lead to the establishment of a pernicious precedent." Again, on page 004 of the same volume is a decision in another case in which he claimed, in addition to bis salary of $500 per month, aa such receiver, $250 more per month as president of the saw. mill company, which salary bad been paid to Ben Hollady.: Thompson, as receiver, held Holladay's siock in the mill and he wanted Holladay's salary piled on top of bis own salary as receiver. The court very justly held that when such services as (president) were rendered to the the defendant's corporation, be rendered them, not in his own title, but by a title derived from the estate, and as it were, standing in Holladay's shoes, and consequently lie could have no claim for such service or for the salary, in his individual right, or for his individual benefit the right in which he has sued for. bo much from the record of the court. Now let us look at the records of Portland. In the year 1881 Mr. Thompson wa mayor ot the city of Port laud. In 1879 a wharf line had been es tablished by ordinance along the river front. During his occupancy of the mayor's office an ordinance was passed to amend the previous ordinance and it became tbe law of the city by securing approval. It made no change in the wharf line of the city from one end of it to the other wharf in front of tbe block that had recently been purchased by Mr. Thompson, commonly known aa the Starr block. Tbe amended wharf line de flected from the old one two blocks south of the Starr block out into the river, until it took in forty feet of the river in front of that block and then again re turned to the old line, alxmt two blocks to the northward. Mr. Thompson, by signing that ordinance, sa mayor of the city of Portland, took from the city's highway the Willamette river forty by two hundred feet, and appropriated it to his own private use without one cent of compensation to the city. That strip of property is now richly worth $100,000. His salary as mayor waa only $1500. The river at that point was before this seizure, alreadv too narrow. This made a bad matter still worse. It ia a grave inconvenience to commerce. On tlie 25th of July, the officers of the Board of Trade of the city of Portland and some visiting statesmen, including Congress men Hermann and Burrows, Governors Uoff and htewart, boarded the steamer Potter which lay just below the Starr block, for arip to the government jetty at tbe mouth of the Columbia river. Tbe Oregonian of the next day saysthtt "while the Potter was turning round in the harbor, the rudder stuck in the mud on the eaat side, and when the hydraulic pressure was applied to guide it, the tiller rope snapped. Over one boor waa consumed in repairing the break. Our distinguished guests were delayed and perhaps disgusted with our narrow har bor, but what matter as long as D. P. Thompson had enlarged the borders of his block. Citizens of Portland and East Portland crossing the Stark Street ferry or the Morrison street bridgt can easily see Mr. Thompson's real estate bav window protruding into the river by looking northward. A public office ehould be a public trust and ought not to be used for a private snap. There is a provision in both the state and Feder al constitutions, that no private property shall be taken for public use without just compensation. If the framers of those revised instrumenU had ever imagined that V. P. Thompson would ever hold office they would most undoubtedly have added that other neceaaary restriction that "no public property should be taken for private use without due compensa-1 tioo." . , . , , i 1 TBE LA BOB (tl'XSTlON. ' Both partiea prufesa devotion to the cause of the laboring classes in their re cent platforms. But record evidence is mightier Limn professions, and both par lies should be judged by it, , It was 4 re publican administration that fastened the convict contract labor system on the slate. Two years ago, aa you may re member, trouble was anticipated at Cor vallia because a railroad contractor, after having received a payment from the company, had tied the state, leaving the laborers unpaid. My attention was then called to tbe fart that while we had lien law for laborers on boats and buildings aud other structures, there waa no law protecting laborers on railroads. To se cure, therefore, such protection by the invention of law, my last message to tlie legislature recommended "an addition to our lien law, giving to laborersemployed by corporations of any and every char acter, a first lien for their wages upon whatever property of such corporations they may have lalstred." A bill was in troduced embodying this recommenda tion, but it did not become a law until after it was emasculated In the senate of all its force and virtue. It waa so changed aa to deprive it of affording the security to laborers on railroads that Is afforded to laborers on buildings, aud the law, aa it now stands, is merely an empty mockery. Again, at the legisla tive session of 1887, a bill waa paused granting to a railroad corporation the right to bnild a bridge across the Willam ette river at the lower end of the oity of Portland. The bill was vetoed on ao- count, mainly, of the objection urged by the United btates engineers against its location at the point desired. The veto message closed as follows: "All the re striction that I would wish beyond what is already stipulated in the bill would be one preventing the collection ot fares from foot passengers. bile granting favors to railroad corporations, it would not be amiss if the legislative assembly should grant for once one small favor to the poor wan. The wear of foot passen gers on the bridge is not really percept ible and their free passage would work no other injury to the owners of the bridge than the loss of the toll. . For about thirty years past all legislation In this country, state and federal, has been entirely in the interest ot the rich, and if now, the legislative assembly of Ore gon, in one single instance. Should make one small provision in the inturest of tbe poar man, it would shine out in the midst of the legislation of the country like a lurid torch in Uie millet of cavern ous' gloom. Every charter for every bridge across the Willamette onght to have contained such a provision, And yet Mr. Thompson, tke opposing candi date for governor, came np to the capi tal to help lobby the bill through over the veto, and it was so passed, and now every laborer, as he crosses the bridge to and from his daily lalior, is compelled to pay tribute to a neb corporation. , But there is one other very noticeable instance besides this in which Mr. 1). P. Thompson has arrayed himself against the laboring men. Allusion bas beeu made, in the record evidence of tbe su preme court reports, that he claimed not only his salary of $500 a month as re ceiver of the llolladay estate, but desired tn have i'JM) more ner month aa presi dent of the sawmill company. If he had been successful in that suit be could have claimed Holladay's salary as presi dent of some other corporations, which would have made bis monthly etipend to exceed $1 100. Now while Mr. Thomp son was looking out for himself, how was ha Innklnif nut for the emnloveea of the mills? The answer ia found in tbe fact that about the first thing that be did after being appointed receiver was to scale down the wages of an employes of that mill ten percent. This shows the Interest he had in Uie laboring men of the city of Portland, But there is one other instance in which he did the worklr.gmen of Oregon a far more grievous wrong than this He advocates a protective tanu in order to protect American labor. Now we all know that the Chinese who works like a beast and lives like a hog has been of the greatest injury to the laboring men of the Pacifio coast, who have bad fami lies to rear and who wished to rear them respectably, because they have entered into competition with' our American laborer and have thus degraded his calling and reduced his compensation The large influx of these Chinese here was the result of that infamous Burlin game treaty, which, while openingtoth citizens of the United States only six cities of China, allowed in return the Chinese to come over here in swarms and overrun our land a worse pest than the frogs and lice that overrun r.gypt In the legislative assembly of the slate of Oregon in 1870 a joint memorial to congress asking for the abrogation ol that most unfair and Infumous treaty waa passed. Mr. I), r. 1 hompson was in the senate and voted against the memorial. No comment on that vote is needed by the workiogmen of Oregon. It speaks for itself. A CAMPAK1E or DOODLE. The people of Oregon have entered upon a campaign the like of which has never before been witnessed. The nom ination of my competitor was prooured by a most disgracuful debauchery of the primary election in Portland. - That nomination was secured, hot by the free expression of the party will, but by a shameful purchase ot votes and equally as shameful a stuffing of the ballot tioxes, Money waa freely used, and the Orego nian next day reported that in one pre cinct In South Portland 852 votes were cast where two years ago the total vote of both partiea was only 650, while in one precinct in North Portland JBO votea were cast where two years ago the total vote of both parties was only 231. The free expression of the popular will was stilled by the influence of the sack. And now the open announcement baa been made by the person his own nomination was procured in this manner mat nn win he elected if he ha to spend $100,000. No greater humiliation ever befell a party than when its candidates are elect ed not npon their merits but bv coin, and no greater disgrace could befall the people of this state than his election to office after having made this statement so insulting to their intelligence and I heir intelligence and their manhood. The party upon which he baa foisted himself as a candidate owes It to itself to rebuke the manner of bis nomination and the free and unpurchaaable people of the state owe it to themselves that this im plied insinuation as to their corrupti bility should be censured by bis stinging and overwhelming defeat at the polls. Tbe office of governor of tbe great state U Oregon is indeed s very high honor when it is bestowed as the free expres sion of the. popular will, but when the time comes, if it ever does come, when it is auctioneered off to the highest bidder for cash, paid at the primaries in proeuriug the nomination, and more cash pan I at elections in Be ing the suffrages of the people, lis honor is lost Bud its dignity is perished. It was a scandal of tho Koman empire, when a horse was declared to be a con sul by the Imperious will of the Imperial master, and mould it not be equally as great a scamnu u a man ehould be chosen aa governor of the free commonwealth of Oregon alone bv the potency of his boodls? ' . i . ' , A TARIFF FOR BEVESl'E. Perhaps it is not amiss, although the leading issues before the poople of this coming election are state issues, to say one word or so In regard to the one great question ot national iuiorUiire. There Is now no free trade party In the United States. A free trader ia one who would do away with all tariff re strictions entirely. Because one party favored free wool and the other free hides aud sugar does not make either an absolute free trade party. The peo ple of the United States are divided on the tariff question; some favoring a tariff for revenue while others favor a tariff (or protection and the advocates of both systems, to a greater or less ex tent, are found in lxth of the politicul parties. , Tbe difference Mweeu these two systems can best be shown by illus tration. Suppose that a particular kind of cloth cau be manufactured in (ireat Britain fur $1 60 a yard, while the cost of its manufacture in the United States is $1 75. i The cost is greater here than there, for several reasons among which is the higher price paid for lalior. Nor is the high price of labor here the re suit of protection, because in Italy one of the highest protected couutries of Europe as Mr. 1 houieon, m v opponent stated in one of his letters from there two years ago tbe wages are of the very lowest rate. High wages here are mainly the result of a comparatively spare population and an undeveloped country. But this Is a degression. We will further suppose that the tanu on the cloth is ,25 cents. An importer writes to tbe British manufacturer: "Your cloth cost $1 50 a yard; the duty is 25 cents the doth sells here at $2 a yard. If you will be content at 10 cents profit. I will pay the freight and duty, aud handle your goods." The propo sition is accepted, and British cloth is cloth is Imported, from which the gov ernment receives a revenue, una is a revenue. At the next session of Con gress the American manufacturer im plores protection from cheap foreign labor, and congress raises the duty to 75 cents a yard. The American manu facturer at once raises the pric ot the cloth to $2 25, w hile the British goods are shut out of the market, as a cents dutv added to the cost. $1 50, leaves nothing for profit, freight or payto im porter. This is a protective tariff. The consumer pays an enhanced price, but the government gets no revenue. A revenue tariff aflords incidental pro tection and yields revenue to the governmeul. A protective tariff en riches the manufacturer at the expense of the consumer, and lust in the piupor- tion that it is protective just in that same proportion it fails to yelld any reveune to the government. Tho one is conducive of revenue and favorable to the consumer, and inimical to the purVose of revenue. Every farmer of Linn county, every fair-minded man, upon this statement of the difference between a revenue and a protective tariff, cannot fail to choose which vsLvm be will favor. The people along the lower Columbia river will have an Impressive object lesson aa to the value and effect of a protective tariff. A Ban Francisco .limiati'h to the Oregonian of March 4. stated in substance that B. Campbell, general Northwest freight agent of the Union Pacific Kailroad Company, had asserted that three steamers would be nlacedon the route between Portland Or. and Japan, that they would be of English build and would carry the Japanese flag." Thirty years ago! was at Hoeton, when tne ureat jtepuouc, the lsnrest merchantman ever built by man, .was launched. At that time, under a revenue tariff, when the average per cent, of customs duties waa 20 per cent., The United States was tlve great shipbuilding country of the world, and its : merchant marine the best and most extensive government carried the ensign of the republic upon every sea and in every zone. To-day after thirty years of a protective tariff, averaging 47 percent., our ship building has neiirly become a , lost art and our merchant marine has been driven from the high seas. And now when - an enterprising company wishes to engage In Ocean commerce, it is compelled to buy shifis qf English build, ami adding Insult to injury, it is compelled, by the behest of the protectionists ho have controlled legislation in congress, to throw aside the flag of our country and raise at the masthead of its steatr.ers the square breecbclout of sn effete Mongolian monarch. Protectionists claim that a protective tariff builds up domestic in dustries. ' This Is theory. But the practical result can beat be seen when in a short lime on the Columbia river will sail these steamers of English build and carrying the Japanese flag. The pro tection which a protective tariff has af forded to our ship building, as well as to agricultural interests has been of that character which the boa-constrictor af fords to its victim agaiust all beasts of prey by inclosing it in his colls and crushing the life out its body. And now after having taxed our shipbuilding in dustry out of existence by a tariff op pressive to our people, they come forward with a prosaiiion to tax it into life again, by granting subsidies equuny as oppressive to onr people. Never before but once in the history of all mankind has such a wise procedure been adopted and that was by the man whoie valient deeds are recorded, as follows in Mother Ooosee melodies; Thar wm a man In onr town ' Ann he waa wiin.lrroua wlaa. H )ume4 Into bramble biuh Ann acraU'htxl out butu hlaeyca, Aud when be saw tola ejes were out, ' HpJmniMl wllh nilaht and malu Into aii'Shw brain tne biuli Andtcratcbed 'em Iu agalo. THE WATEB BOND QUEBTIOK. I need not recapitalate to you the cir cumstances attending the efforts of the lat leirlalatnre to pass s bill providing for the issuance of municipal bonds to be exempted from taxation after they bad passed into the bands of private nartla ami had become private property. They are familiar to you all. Nor need the reasons why such a bill waa once vetoed dining the session three years ago be again repeabvi. They are reas ons founded upon those provisions of the constitution which requires the assess ment of all private property Nand the equality of all taxation. Under .the sol emn oath of office taken by the cnief ex ecutive of Oregon there waa luit one course to pursue and that waa to obey its behests by the veto of anv bill ex empting auy private proerty from taxa tion. The issue upon this ipjeMion be tween the groat political pkrt.es is a plain issue. The convention which nom inated Mr. Thompson (or governor m ide the following delphiu declaration , "We are in favor of a fair and equal distribu tion ol taxation and we believe that all property not exempt by law, should con tribute its due proportion in payment of the legitimate expenses of tlie govern ment." Does that favor or oppose ex emption from taxation of municipal wa ter bonds? The hut is, it is it palter in a double sense. It was intended to be read in one way in one locality and an other way in another locality. When it ia known that at the extra session ot the legislature iu 1885 $700,000 of those water bouds were authorized to be issued, anl when it is further known taat the loyalty and constitutionality of that issuance has been affirmed by the courts you can then read that plank ot this platform above quoted aa declaring n substance that such water bonds, are Exempt bv law. and therefore are not subject to taxation. In contradiction to the equivocal expressions, of that plat form, the platform upon which I stand is plain and unequivocal. But it must be satd, in justice to Mr. Thompson, that his position is more definite than that ot tlie platform npon which he stands. At a ratification meeting held at I'ortiand.on the 24th of last month be aaid . "The Bull Run water bill as in troduced Iu the last legislature, bas some objectionable features, which I attempted to have removed. 1 said then if I, was successful In my efforts I would vote for tlie bill anyhow. 1 did vote for it and I voted lor it six times. I was present at every meeting and voted, and all knew how I , voted.", The issue, therefore, between the two parties and the two can didates is a plain issue before tlie coun try.' It is tlie paramount issue of. this campaign and transcends in importance all other issues. The equality of taxa tion ia tlie very corner stone ot all. just governments, and when once that is re moved the fair fabric will sooner or later fall Upon that issue 1 Invoke the sup port of every freeman of the state ot Or egon. If the eople of this state were III: .1.... .! '. f ... wining to hi a certain species oi propeny, which would mainly be held in the coffers of the rich, should be exempt by law, thus throwing an increased burden npon themselves,' then they should give .their supiiort to Mr. Thompson, who voted six times to secure such a result; but if iney uo noi. men iney ougnt ooi w sup iiort him, The issue has passed from the legislative, executive anu judicial , halls to the forum of the people. Their de cision will be final sue and 1 believe a just one. : . . ' . f I 1 conclusion.: I 1 ) The Issues the present campaign have now been fairly placed befare you. ' You are to decide at the ballot box ' whether those who have administered the affairs of this state with a record unquestioned shall be retained in office ; whether the extravagant expenditures of the legis lature in tlie creation of useless sinecures shall be approved) whether a method of opening tlie Columbia river between The Dalles and Celilo which may occupy more than a third of a century (or Its completion, or one adequate to existing requirements which can be completed in one year shall be pressed upofi our representatives In congress for adoption ; whether men whose pecuniary interests are adverse to those of the state.' shall be placed Iu power while the settlement of tbe Willamette canal and locks ' ques tion is pending, in which Is Involved $200,000 of money which rightfully be longs to the school fund of our state; whether a party shall be retained in power that has shown Itself ooosed to the interests of the laboring classes by its sctiou In the legislature, and which In that same body, showed Ha opposition to ballot reform by smothering In 4 com mittee of the senate a bill providing for tlie Australian ballot system. Whether a man shall be selected as chief, mag istrate of tbe state by Uie free nse of boodlo, Is3th at the primaries and at the election; whether the per nicious system of boss rue) shall be perpetuated in Oregon; whether the ieople of the nation shall be taxed for the purpose of revenue, or for the pur pose of enriching certain Industries fos tered either by tariff tax or subsidies at the expense of the whole people; and lastly, whether the people of this state shall favor an exemption from ' taxation of a species of n.-operty, or whether on the other hand they will adhere to the doctrine of the constitution that all pri vate propertry shall be assessed, and that all taxation shall be equal. These are all iuiiwrtant questions, amf mure especially the last one, as Its decision at the ballot-box involves the great princi ple of "equal taxation," which is a doc trine greater and more sacred than any which bas ever been contended for at the hustings, in legislative halls or on the battle-Held, since the time onr fathers struggled for that other, as sacred a doc trine, that there fhould be "no taxation without representation." ' The readers,' from the extracts on " tariff," which we publish in this issue, will probably be astonished at the remarkable change which seems to , have overcome' the Oregonian in bo short a time, es pecially when we take into view the fact that II. VV. Scott, was the editor of that paper at the time the Oregonian was so oulApoton against tho robber tariff as well as at' pres ent. His position now may be re garded as rather inconsistent, yet it is no more so than his present subserviency to the Mitchell ring, and ' his . humble . submission to boseisin. IIavb the friends of Col. T. R. Cornelius forgotten the treachery of D. P. Thompson and his advocale the Oregonian? 1 1