THE DEMOCRATIC TICKET. A SCORCHER. F/om the Great West. I was present at the democratic state convention held Aug. 3*in Min neapolis, and the following reflections occurred to me: We congratulate Mr. James J. ITiTI, president of the Great Northern railway, on the fact that he has got both the republican and democratic tickets just to suit him. He has just put up Knute Nelson at the head of the republican tivket and Daniel W. Lawler at the head of the democratic ticket. Mr. Lawler is an unknown young lawyer of St. Paul, a member of the court house ring, corporation council of the city of St. Paul, and sou of the celebrated John D. Law ler, late of Prairie du Chien, Wie.. a famous railroad lobbyist and stock holder in the great Milwaukee aud St. Paul Railroad company—tbe democratic candidate having inher ited his railroad stock and affilia tions. John D. Lawler was for years the agent employed by the M & St. P. company to look af er legislation in different states. When the people of the territory of Dakota, for in stance, desired to reduce rates of transportation on the railroads of that region Mr. Lawler was the man who appeared on the scene to dine and wine the legislature and prevent tlie passage of the bill, and it is needless to soy he succeeded in doing so. It was these well known facts in the history of the father that doubb -1» ss recommended tbe son to the friendship and support of Mr. James J. Hill; for that gentleman desired us to fix things so that no mutter whether the republicans or democrats won the railroad corporations would be in no danger. But Mr. Hill, and bis right bower, Mr. Michael Doran, have not the slightest idea that by any freak of fortune Mr. Law er should wiu. He is almost unkuown to the voters of the state; he has never held any legislative office or any position higher than that of cor poration attorney; and the demo cratic leaders well knew that his nom ination would precipitate the public school tight into the canvass, and that he would not poll one-half its ucual democratic vote; they knew all this and intended it, and the object is to drive these disgruntled demo crats in the towns and cities over to the support of Knute Nelson, and therefore the St. Paul Globe repeats, every day, that Nelson voted for the Mills bill and is really a low-tariff man. At the same time while they are driving the American democrats of the citi/s into the republican camp they will make religious appeals to the Irish farmers to stand by Lawler and not vote the peoples party ticket, to which they are flocking in great numbers. It is a veiy pretty game, -very-eun aipgly setup, -but it will not work. The democrats will “get onto it’ and t jluse to be turned over to the plutoc ycy. It amus ing to see the Pie /er Prcsc ,ng Lawler, and the .iobe proving that Knute Nelson represents democratic principles! In its issue of the 4th of August the Pioneer Press said: “While we cannot wish to Mr. Law ler the success that he has earned and won in other walks of life, and must symathize with him in the fate to which he is dt stined, it is a pleas ure to offer to him congratulation upon an honor so distinguished as the leadership thus conferred.’' And one can see the grin of the devils as the young man walks to as sured destruction, breaking through the polite congratulations. Tbe Pio neer Press concludes its article thus: “It is not a Domination that means victory, or even the hope of victory, but it is so far the superior to the average practice and selection of the democracy as to give rise to hope that the party is not yet beyond pos sibility of regeneration. The demo crats of Minnesota must now look to the youthful Daniel as their prophet, while the republicans get the lions’ den ready for him by next November with lions that will bite.” And that there should not be any question as to Hill’s control of the democratic state convention, the Pioneer Press, of the same date, in its report of the proceedings of the democratic convention said: “The democratic state convention held yesterday was a miracle. There was a visible result and no apparent cause. A ticket, of a kind, was nom inated. after a fashion. Tliere prob ably has never been a similar gather ing held in this state which was so loosely conducted, on the surface,and at which the wire pulling was more cleverly conducted.'” And again the Pioneer Press makes the significant statement: “The d legates commenced to re assemble at 3 o’clock, but it was clearly apparent that there was some hitch in the arrangements. Henne piu’s 118 delegates were not in their seats, and it was 3:30 before they *d into the hall, looking very cross nd sore. They had been trying to . ork up a boom for E. T. Champlin, jf Blue Earth, and the Doian men had been doing their best to whip them into line for Lawler , it being conceded that Wilson’s candidature *>*»d been abandoned. Hennepin was greeted by cries of ‘Lawler! Lawler!’ m'/Tn the Ilamsey delegates, and this did not improve their temper.” Every well informed democrat in Minnesota understands perfectly well that Jim Hill’s hand was in that convention and regulated its every movement, except in the case of the endorsement of Canty and Buek, the peoples party nominees for justice of the supreme court. Mr. Dor*n,~ the st“ v ifporttAl, baligetfhis desk a..w swore, by all the gods, that these men should not be endorsed, but that the subservient republican judges should be re elected; but the personal popularity of Judge Canty and Daniel Buck was too much for even his power. It was “on the slate” to nominate the republican candidate, Dickinson, in place of Buck, but this was too much even for that servile democratic convention, and Buek was endorsed and the howling of the railroad ring could be heard for half a mile. Minnepolitab. Wl I O UTC !■ O l/\f L I USL m. p° R YRARS the people of Minnesota have not had a free market. A man at Minneapolis is paid *O.OOO a year to fix, every day, the V/l «i • 1 pr ce of the farmer s wheat From this man’s decision there is no appeal, for all competition is stumped out. The farmer has to take Just nhat is . given him. or drive his load home aarain. ESTABLISH FREE MARKETS. . alliance raised a fund of several hundred dollars to prosecute these robbers and their associates the railroad companies; but they then decided at — ■ • L. Party ■ Convention, to use that fund in the present campaign, and Elect a Gorv.rnor. Lieut. Governor, and Attorney poor farmers. Are you ready to help in this work? Do yon want to eeonre a Free Market? The Pioneer Press a T e?”* 7 °f f ro *®° wti on the name, and at the expense r.f the whole State, instead of a few takea everyyear,rom z Thirty tq .Thirty-three Cts. a Bushel, T "” iP ™ E r BBERY Sixteen Million Dollars a Year, is Sixteen times more than all our state taxes and five million dollars more than all the tax’s of the people, state, school conus v i>itr »mi tn»n . .~. . , „ REMEMBLR, THIS IS YOUR FIGHT! the first cost of the books for which our people have paid $250,000 during the year was but $125,000, and that we should have saved, had they been supplied to us at cost, an annual tax of $125,000. “I apprehend theie is no good reason e to suppose that we shall receive any better terms in the future than the past, without a radical change of policy. The prices are irrevocably fixed by a convention of the craft, and it matters not whether the publishers are few or many, the cost to the people Is the same. ‘Where combination is possible, competition is impossible.’ ” Governor Donnelly’s own experience confirmed these views of the Gov ernor of the State. He knew that the evil complained of was a great one. It was not ODly the increased price of the book, but many of the county superintendents of schools were in the habit of combining with the publish ers and receiving a large commission on all sales made in their county. The result was that every few months the books were changed, and those which the scholars had been using were thrown aside, and the parents bad to buy complete sets of new ones. This became an onerous burden on the poor, and as a result children were in many instances kept away from school and grew up iu ignorance, because their parents were unable,” out of their small earnings, to purchase the necessary text-books. . With Mr. Donnelly, to hear of an abuse was to move for its correction, and so he set to work to relieve his beloved popular education of this heavy burden. He first proposed that the state should employ scholars to pre pare arithmetics, grammars, etc., and set the boys in the Reform School to learn printing and print them; and then furnish the books to the people free or at cost. But to this scheme the friends of the Book Ring made a hundred objections. It was impossible; men could not be found learned enough to prepare a spelling-book, etc. The struggle lasted through two or three years. Twice Mr Donnelly secured the passage of a bill through the Senate, of which he was a member, only to have it defeated jn the House. At last, 1877, a bookseller of St. Paul, Mr. D. D. Merrill, came for ward and offered to furnish the necessary text-books for one-half the then prices, to furnish equally good books of the same sizes and quality, if the State would make a contract that he should have the furnishing of all the books used in the state for fifteen years Such a law was passed, and it stated, in the very law itself, that the book that had cost 20 cents should be furnished by Mr. Merrill for 10 cents, tbe book that had cost 45 cents should be had for 20 cents, the book that had cost 90 cents should be fur nished for 40 cents, etc. And a contract was entered into with Mr. Merrill that he should furnish his books at these prices for fifteen years The School-book Riug of the United States had entered into a combination to control the book trade of the whole country, and had given bonds to each other not to cheapen prices; but the Minnesota legislature broke the back of the ring, and the next year the prices of school books fell all over the United States. The number of scholars entitled to apportionment in 1878 was 157,470; in 1890 the number was 221,186. If we will average this for the fifteen years during which the law has stood, we wiil have 189,331 scholars per year. According to Governor Austin’s estimate, the book ring took from the people each year $ i 25,000. If we will multiply this by 15, for the fifteen years of the contract, then the saving to the State has” been sl,B7s,ooo—that is to say, there are $1,875,000 left in the pockets of the people of Minnesota that would not have been there but for the passage of this act; and this on the basis of the number of scholars seventeen years ago. But as the text-book act reduced the cost oi the books one-half, and as there have been an average of 189,331 scholars during the life of the contract, we have but to call the saving to each scholar SI.OO per year (a very moderate estimate), and the text-book act has saved the people of Minnesota the great sum of $2,839,965 in fifteen years. In other words, the state is that much better off from Governor Donnelly having lived in it. This is practical statemanship. But it was not accomplished except after a dreadful fight. The Book Ring of the United States sent unscrupulous agents,'with plenty ot money, to St. Paul, to kill the measure. The follow - ing amusing story is told, as happening at one stage of the contest: THE INDIGNATION OF AN HONEST MAN. A necessary amendment to the act was pending in the House. The Book Ring had bought just enough votes to kill the bill. To kill that amendment was practically to kill the whole reform. Their representative stood in the lobby checking off the names of members as they voted. Just at this point a member who had not yet voted, and was about to vote against the bill, turned to hiß neighbor, and said, in a whisper: “How much did you get for your vote?” “Twenty-five hundred dollars,” was the reply, also in a whisper. “You did?” said the party. “Why, I only got $500.” “Oh” said the other “there is no use of lying to me; you got $2,500. I was in the headquarters of the Ring and saw the list of names, and got $2,500 for you.” “He did?” said the first member, thoroughly aroused. “Why, that d d rascal has pocketed $2,000, and given me but SSOO. ril show tbe ring that 1 can’t be bought in that wayl” And when his name was called he voted for the bill and it was carried, by one vote! Mr. Donnelly was in the hall of the House at the time, and he saw, by the consternation of the Ring, that something unexpected had happened; and so he got the clerk of the House to return the hill to the Senate at once; and he had the Senate to act upon it at once, and he hur ried it instantly to the Governor, who was ready to sign it. In a few min utes the agent of the Ring had “fixed” things to the satisfaction of the in dignant member; it was moved to reconsider the vote by which the bill passed; and the House requested the Senate to return the bill; and the Sen ate politely informed the House that the bill was in the hands of the Gov ernor and refused to recall it. And so this man’s honest (!) indignation had saved Minnesota $2,839,965. Let us give something of the history of this Cheap School Book legis lation. Mr. Donnelly had been agitating the matter in his Anti-Monopolist newspaper for years. On Jan. 14th, 1876, (p. 35) Senator Lienau intro duced a resolution for the appointment of a special committee of five to en quire into the expediency of printing and publishing school books bv the state. Adopted. On Jan. 18th, 1876, (p. 44), the President of the Senate appointed as such committee Messrs. Lienau, Wheelock, Conkey, Knute Nelson and Donnelly. On Jan. 26th the Senate authorized the committee to “employ an expert in the matter of computing and ascertaining the act ual cost of printing and publishing” text books, the expense not to exceed fifty dollars. The expert employed was David Ramaley. The committee subsequently reported that the prices of school books “are more than double what they should be;” and the whole committee, including Mr. Nel son, signed that report. The plan was to hire scholars to prepare the books, the state to print them, and sell them to the scholars, at one half the current prices. An immense fight followed on this proposition. The committee introduced a bill, S. F. 316, (p. 220), to carry out this plan; and on Feb. 24, 1876, (page 205), the bill was passed by a vote of 30 yeas, and 5 nays, Mr. Donnelly voted yea, and Mr. Nelson was one of the five nays! He had signed the report of the committee—then voted against the bill. The bill was defeated in the House and so the reform fail ed for that session. In the next session, (1877), Mr. Lienau, as chairman of the committee, introduced the same bill which had failed to pass in the previous session, and it was referred to a select committee of which Mr. Donnelly was again a member. The committee finally reported a bill, (S. F. 183), to give Mr. D. D. Merrill, of St. Paul a contract for fifteen years, to furnish the schooi books, at about half the previous prices. This bill passed the Senate Feb. Bth, 1877, yeas 30, nays 8, and Mr. Nelson and Mr. Donnelly both voted for it. It passed the House and became a law. But it subsequently turned out that the State Superintendent of Public Instruction was op posed to the law, and the school book ring were buying up county super intendents and teachers and every body else that had influence to defeat the law; and some amendments were necessary to make it effective. And consequently, in the next session, (1878,) one of the biggest fights ever seen in the state occurred in the effort to amend the bill to meet the objections of its cunning enemies. Mr. Donnelly bore the brunt of the battle; one of his speeches was printed in pamphlet form and had great circulation and influence. The record will show that although Mr. Nelson had voted in the last session to pass the bill, he was, in 1878, opposed to perfecting it, so as to make it effective. When it came up in the Senate, (p. 99), on Feb. 7th, Senator Healey asked leave to propose an amendment which would strengthen the bill and enable him, Mealey to vote for it. Mr. Nelson ob jected; and to get around his objection Mr. Michael Doran moved that the .bill be referred to Mr. Mealey for amendment, which was done. Mr. Don nelly moved that Mr. Mealey’s amendment be adopted; carried, yeas 23, K>, Me. Nelson, voted nay. The question (p. 100), then came on Mr! Donnelly’s motion that the bill be read the 2d and 3d time and put upon its final passage. The yeas were 23, the nays 14. Mr. Nelson again voted No. Mr. Nelson in fact led the fight against the bill in the Senate. Mr. Donnelly then moved that the Senate go into committee of the whole on the bill, which motion prevailed. The committee reported in favor of the passage of the bill. Mr. Nelson excepted to the report. The question came shall the bill be engrossed for a third reading? Carriet* yeas 23,nays 16; Mr. Nelson voted no. The same day the bill passed the Senate; yeas 22 nays 16. And again Mr. Nelson voted no. The bill went to the House, where as shown in the extract from Mr. Donnelly’s Biography, given above, the School-Book-Ring of the United States had their agents at work to kill the bill by bribery. Over #20,000. it was claimed, were paid out, to defeat this great reform. One of th “strikers” for the Ring got Hon. Charles C. Brandt, a member from Biov\u EFFORTS TO STOP A RODBERY. defending bribery county, a worthy German, into his room and paid him $50.00, as a bribe uce to vote against an amendment necessary to make the act ol • o P? ra * lve . Brandt took the money solely with the purpose of ex posing the means by which the Ring were trying to accomplish their ends; u walked straight to the House, rose in his place, at once, ami sent up tbe money to the speaker and stated how he received it. The friends of the •mg jumped upon” Mr. Brandt and denounced him savagely, and even proposed to expel him from the House. The Ring had all the lawyers of ie House on its side and it looked as if the poor German was about to Oio badly. In this extremity Mr. Donnelly came to his defence with the *?,P e could give him. W r e quote from the Senate Journal, (p. 225), r eb. 20, 1878: “Mr. Donnelly offered the following resolution: >\ hereae. The Hon. Charles C. Brandt, a member of the House of Rep resentatives from Brown county, ascertaining that corrupt means were be ing used to control the action of the Legislature upon an important meas ure now pending 1 , did, for the purpose of proving the existence of such cor ruption and exposing the same, receive the sum of fifty dollars, given him as a bribe, and did at once deliver the same to the House ami denounce the sard corruption; and Whereas, It is only by such radical and extreme measures that the ex istence of bribery can at any time be ascertained and demonstrated, and toe interests of the people protected from the insidious acts of those who seek to control legislation by corrupt means for their own profit Therefore be it resolved by the Senate (the House concurring) That the thanks of this Legislature, and ot the people of this state, are due to the Hon. Charles C. Brandt, for his bold, honest and resolute course iu expos ing said bribery and corruption, at the cost to himself of abuse and mis representation, and the life-long hostility of those whose criminal practices he haf Journal), Mr. Donnelly offered the follow ing resolution which was adopted: “Whereas, a considerable part of the onerous burden of taxation now resting upon the people of the state is due to the expense of holding pro tracted terms of the district courts in the several counties of the state to enforce the collection of petty claims or to adjust disputes where the amount in controversy is oftentimes less than the expense imposed on the taxpayers in trying the same; therefore, Resolved, That the committee on the Judiciary is hereby instructed to enquire into the expediency of amending the statutes of the state so as to assess, in whole or in part, the expense of such litigation upon the party or parties obtaining judgment therein, the same to follow the judgment; and to report by bill or otherwise.” This system has been adopted in part, by the law fixing a $3.00 jury fee in each case. It should be extended still further. There is no reason why peaceful and industrious men should be taxed to enforce tfie claims of money-lenders, perhaps non-residents; or settle the disputes of litigations and quarrelsome neighbors. Another burden borne by the grain-raisers of Minnesota is that they have no certainty if they deliver a given quantity of grain, to any wi re houseman, for shipment, that they will ever get back the same amount. They are completely at the mercy of the elevator men and railroads, a* as Mr. Donnelly once said, “there had been enough money stolen fi tiie farmers of the northwest, by this rascality alone, to pave hell v* gold!” On Monday Feburary 28th, 187 G, (page 343 of Journal), we read: “S. F. No. 131. A bill to regulate the inspection of grain and weights and measures, and to establish a department of agriculture, railroads ,uui forestry, was read the third time. On motion unanimous consent was granted to Mr. White to make the following amendment, which was adopted: Add at end of section twenty-five: ’‘Any wa.reho!we:aftr, wfp. r : - any load or quantity of grain, and refuses to account for the actual weight thereof, shall be subject to a fine of fifty dollars for each and every iffense to be recovered by the party in interest before a justice of the p.-ace »» r ,. vided that the party delivering and the party receiving wheat for storage may agree upon such reasonable amount as ought to be deducted for shrink age and cleanage. The question being taken on the passage of the bill as amend* ..ana the roll being called, there were yeas 24, and nays 8.” Mr. Donnelly voted yea; Mr. Nelson dodged. He is recorded ns pres ent and voting on other questions, on pages 342, on page 344, (th same page), and on page 345; hut he could not vute on this very imp riant question, in which all his farmer constituents were so deeply interest !. THE DEMONETIZATION OF SILVER One of the great questions of to-day is the silver question Silver had been one of the money-metals of the world for thousands >v years. In 1873,—0n February 12th,—the congress of the United States wa« corrupted, by $500,000 sent over by the bank of England, in the hands .» a banker, named Ernest Seyd, and induced to demonetize silver. Th e was done so secretly that the president of the United States, Ulysses S. ( rent, protested two years afterward that he did not know that anything of the kind was in the bill when he signed it. When it was discovered* an uni s-rsal outcry went up for the repeal of the bill demonetizing silver. At the pres ent time both the republican and democratic parties are opposed to such repeal, because the money-powers of the whole world demand that money be rendere i more valuable, by reducing its amount; thereby reducing the value of all kinds of property belonging to the people. And Hon Knutb Nelson will either have to ignore the whole subject, in this campaign, or defend Plutocracy’s scheme to impoverish the people, 1>3 T arguing that that law of 1873, demonetizing silver was all right and should stand, and that, silver must not be remonetized, and cannot be without ruin to the country. Our readers will therefore be astonished to learn that,in 1878, fourteen years ago, and five years after silver had been stricken down in Congress, not only Hon. Kntte Nelson, and Hon. lunatics Donnelly, but all the republican and democratic members of the state senate, (except one demo crat and two republicans), voted in favor of the repeal of the net of con gress of 1873, demonetizing silver. Here is the record:—it will be found on page 8, of the Senate Journal of 1878 —Wednesday 7 , January 9th,1878: “Mr. Donnelly offered the following resolution: Resolved; by the Senate of the State of Minnesota, (the House of Represen tatives concurring,) that our Senators in the congress of the United States, are hereby instructed to support by their votes and influence, the bill now pending in the United States Senate, known us the “Rland Silver Rill;” and that they are requested to oppose all amendments to that bill, which will prevent silver coin, of the standards used in 1870, becoming again full legal tender for all debts public and private, in the United States. Mr. Nelson gave notice of debate. Mr. Nelson was opposed to this resolution, but the party leaders cau cused together and agreed that they could not defend anything so outrag eous as the demonetization of one of the money-metals named in the consti tution of the nation; and when the resolution came up again, nine days later, Jan. 17th, 1878, (page 20 of Journal), Senator Edgerton, republi can, now a judge of the United Sta tes Court in South Dakota, appointed by a republican president, offered a substitute for Mu. Donnelly's resolution. Here is the record: “Mr. Edgerton offered the following substitute for the resolution of Mr. Donnelly: ‘Resolved, That our Senators in Congress be instructed, and our Rep resentatives requested, to vote for a bill repealing the act of February 12, 1873, demonetizing silver.’ The question being or the adoption of the substitute submitted by Mr. Edgerton, and the roll being called there were yeas 34, and nays 3, as fol lows: Those who voted in the affirmative were: Messrs. Ahrens, Armstrong, Bailey, Clement, Clough, Deuel, Donnelly, Doran , Drew, Edgerton, Ed wards, Finseth, Goodrich, Hall, Henry, Ilersey, Houlton, I.angdon, Lienau, Macdonald , McHeuch, McNelly, Mealey, Morehouse, Morrison, Nelson, Page, Pillabury , Rice, Shaleen, Swanstrom, Waite, Waldron and Wheat. Those who voted in the negative were: Mressrs. Gilfillan, C. D. Morton and Remore.” Senators Gilfillan and Remo"'' T'jr*.republicans, while Senator Morton was a democrat. I thr With what face can Mr. Nelson* cloth-clare against the full remonetiz ation of silver, when, fourteesryears &s*'■ voted for the repeal of the act of 1873? Does it not show that he is subordinating Ins honest judg ment to the demands, of Wall Street? What has occurred since 187*8, to change the merits of this controversy? Is not the popular demand and necessity for the remonetization of silver greater in 1892, than it was in 1878? And if Mr. Nelson is ready to yield his conscience, for party success to the Plutocrats, on the silver question, what assurance have the people that he will not be the mere slaye of the corporations and money-power il elected governor? Is it any worse to be the tool of Jim Hill than it is to be slave of Jay Gould? It will be noticed that besides Mi. Donnelly and Judge Macdonald oi the peoples party—the following leading republicans, Clements banker ol Faribault, Clough, the present republican candidate lor Lieutenant gover nor Judge Edgerton, Finseth, now State Dairy Commissioner,*Col. Ed< wards, a leading republican federal office-holder* Langdon of Minneapolis, Gov. Pillabury, Gov. Rice, etc., voted to remonetize silver, while such prom< REDUCTION OF SALARIES THE WEIGHING OF GRAIN HOW NELSON VOTED IN 1878