cost of production which may exist in consequence of the higher rate of wages prevailing in this country. Sufficient revenue to pay all the expenses of the Federal Government, economically administered, including pensions and interest and principal of the public debt, can be got under our present system of taxation from custom-house taxes on fewer imported articles, bearing heaviest on articles of luxury and bearing lightest on articles of necessity. We therefore denounce the abuse of the present tariff, and, subject to the preceding limitations, we demand that Federal taxation shall be exclusively for public purposes, and shall not exceed the needs of the Government economically administered."

THE PLATFORM ADOPTED.

Secretary Pettit, during the reading of the report of the Committee on Resolutions, was frequently compelled to stop for several seconds while the convention applauded significant passages in the platform. There was a moderate volume of applause when the opening sentences which reaffirmed the utterances of the tariff plank in the platform of 1884, but when he followed endorsing the President's message and declaring that it correctly interpreted that plank, the convention fairly rose to its feet and cheered wildly for a full minute.

PROHIBITION PLATFORM.

[Adopted at Indianapolis, May 31, 1888.]

The Prohibition party, in National convention assembled, acknowledging Almighty God as the source of all power in government, does hereby declare:

1. That the manufacture, importation, exportation, transportation and sale of alcoholic beverages shall be made public crimes, and prohibited and punished as such,

2. That such prohibition must be secured through amendments of our National and State Constitutions, enforced by adequate laws adequately supported by administrative authority, and to this end the organization of the Prohibition party is imperatively demanded in State and Nation.

3. That any form of license taxation, or regulation of the liquor traffic, is contrary to good government; that any party which supports regulation by license or tax, enters into an alliance with such traffic and becomes the actual foe of the State's welfare, and that we arraign the Republican and Democratic parties for their persistent attitude in favor of the licensed iniquity, whereby they oppose the demand of the people for prohibition, and through open complicity with the liquor cause defeat the enforcement of the law.

4. For the immediate abolition of the internal-revenue system, whereby our National Government is deriving support from our greatest National vice.

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5. That an adequate public revenue being necessary, it may properly be raised by impost duties, but import duties should be so reduced that no surplus should be accumulated in the Treasury, and the burdens of taxation should be removed from foods, clothing and other comforts and necessaries of life, and imposed upon such articles of import as will give protection both to the manufacturer, employer and producing labor against the competition of the world.

6. That civil-service appointments for all civil offices, chiefly clerical in their duties, should be based upon moral, intellectual and physical qualifications, and not upon party service or party necessity.

7. That the right of suffrage rests on no mere circumstance of race, color or nationality, and that where, from any cause, it has been withheld from citizens who are of suitable age and mentally and morally qualified for the exercise of an intelligent ballot it should be restored by the people through the Legislatures of the several States on such educational basis as they may deem wise,

8. For the abolition of polygamy and the establishment of uniform laws governing marriage and divorce.

9. For prohibiting all combination of capital to control and to increase the cost of products for popular consumption.

10. For the preservation and defense of the Sabbath as a civil institution without oppressing any who religiously observe the same on any other day than the first day of the week.

11. That arbitration is the Christian, wise and economic method of settling National differences, and the same method should by judicious legislation be applied to the settlement of disputes between large bodies of employes and employers; that the abolition of the saloon would

remove the burdens, moral, physical, pecuniary and social, which now oppress labor and rob it of its earnings, and would prove to be the wise and successful way of promoting labor reform; and we invite labor and capital to unite with us for the accomplishment thereof.

18. That monopoly in the land is a wrong to the people, and public land should be reserved to actual settlers, and that men and women should receive equal wages for equal work.

13. That our immigration laws should be so enforced as to prevent the introduction into our country of all convicts, inmates of dependent institutions and others physically incapacitated for self-support, and that no person shall have the ballot in any State who is not a citizen of the United States.

14. Recognizing and declaring that prohibition of the liquor traffic has become the dominant issue in National politics, we invite to full party fellowship all those who, on this one dominant issue, are with us agreed, in the full belief that this party can and will remove sectional differences, promote National unity and insure the best welfare of our native land.

Resolutions were adopted by the convention favoring the payment of pensions to ex-soldiers and sailors; indorsing the work of the Prohibition army of the Blue and the Gray; condemning the Democratic and Republican parties for denying the right of self-government to the 60,000 people of Dakota, and upon motion of a colored delegate from North Carolina, a resolution declaring "that we hold that all men are born free and equal and should be secured in their rights."

PRESIDENT CLEVELAND'S MESSAGE

TO CONGRESS.

[From the "Congressional Record," December 7, 1887.]

To the Congress of the United States:

You are confronted at the threshold of your legislative duties with a condition of the national finances which imperatively demands immediate and careful consideration.

The amount of money annually exacted, through the operation of present laws, from the industries and necessities of the people, largely exceeds the sum necessary to meet the expenses of the government.

When we consider that the theory of our institutions guarantees to every citizen the full enjoyment of all the fruits of his industry and enterprise, with only such deduction as may be his share towards the careful and economical maintenance of the government which protects him, it is plain that the exaction of more than this is indefensible extortion, and a culpable betrayal of American fairness and justice. This wrong inflicted upon those who bear the burden of national taxation, like other wrongs, multiplies a brood of evil consequences. The public treasury, which should only exist as a conduit conveying the people's tribute to its legitimate object of expenditure, becomes a hoarding-place for money needlessly withdrawn from trade