AGRICULTURAL INTERESTS.

To the great agricultural interests of the country the Democratic party does not find it necessary to make promises. It already is rich in its record of things actually accomplished. For nearly half a century of Republican rule not a sentence was written into the Federal Statutes affording one dollar of bank cred ts to the farming interest of America. In the first term of this Democratic administration the National Bank Act was so altered as to authorize loa. s of five years maturity on improved farm lands. Later was established a system of farm loan banks, from which the borrowings already exceed three hundred millions of dollars and under which the interest rate to farmers has been so materially reduced as to drive out of business the farm loan sharks who formerly subsisted by extortion upon the great agricultural interests of the country.

Thus it was a Democratic Congress in the administration of a Democratic President which enabled the farmers of America for the first time to obtain credit upon reasonable terms and insured their opportunity for the future development of the nation's agricultural resources. Tied up in Supreme Court proceedings, in a suit by hostile interests, the Federal Farm Loan System, orginally opposed by the Republican candidate for the Presidency, appealed in vain to a Republican Congress for adequate financial assistance to tide over the interim between the beginning and the ending of the current year, awaiting a final decision of the highest court on the validity of the contested act. We pledge prompt and consistent support of sound and ffective measures to sustain, amplify and perfect the Kural Creats Statutes and thus to check and reduce the growth and course of farm tenancy.

Not only did the Democratic party put i to erect a go at Farm Loan system of land mortgage banks, but it passed the Smith-Lever agricultural extension act, carrying to every farmer in every section of the country, through the medium of tra ned experts and by demonstration farms, the practical knowledge acquired by the Federal Agricultural Department in all things relating to agriculture, horticulture and animal life; it established the Bureau of Markets, the Bureau of Farm Management and passed the Cotton Futures Act, the Grain Grases bill, the Cooperati. ▲ arh. Administration Act and the Federal Warehouse Act.

The Democratic party has vastly improved the rural mail system and has built up the parcel post system to such an extent as to render its activities and its practical service indispensable to the farming community. It was this wise encouragement and this effective concern of the Democratic party for the farmers of the United States that enabled this great interest to render such essential service in feeding the armies of America and the allied nations of the war and succoring starving populations since Armistice Day.

Meanwhile the Republican leaders at Washington have failed utterly to propose one single measure to make rural life more tolerable. They have signalized their bite no ths of Cong: essional power by urging schemes which would strip the farms of labor; by assailing the principles of the Farm Loan system and seeking to impair its efficiency; by covertly attempting to destroy the great nitrogen plant at Muscle Shoals upon which the government has expended $70,000,000 to supply American farmers with fertilizers at reason ble cost; by ruthlessly crippling nearly every branch of agricultural endeavor, literally cramping the productive mediums through which the people must be fed.

We favor such legislation as will confirm to the primary producers of the nation the right of collective bargaining and the right of cooperative handling and marketing of the products of the workshop and the farm and such legislation as will facilitate the exportation of our farm products.

We favor comprehensive studies of farm production costs and the uncensored publication of facts found in such studies.

LABOR AND INDUSTRY.

The Democratic party is now, as ever, the firm friend of honest labor and the promotor of progressive industry. It established the Department of Labor at Washington and Democratic President called to his official con eil board the first praetical workingman who ever held a cabinet portfolio. Under this administration have been established employment bureaus to bring the man and the job together; have been peaceably determined many bitter disputes between capital and labor; were passed the child-labor act, the workingman's compensation act (the extension of which we advocate so as to include laborers engaged in loading and unloading ships and in interstate commerce), the eight-hour law, the act for vocational training and a code of other wholesome laws affecting the liberties and bettering the conditions of the laboring classes. In the Department of Labor the Democratic Administration established a Woman's Bureau, which a Republican Congress destroyed by withholding appropriations.

Labor is not a commodity; it is human. Those who labor have rights and the national security and safety depend upon a just recognition of those rights and the conservation of the strength of the workers and their families in the interests of sound-hearted and sound-headed men, women and children. Laws regulating hours

of labor and conditions under which labor is performed, when passed in recognition of the conditions under which life must be lived to attain the highest development and happiness, are just assertions of the national interest in the welfare of the people.

At the same time, the nation depends upon the products of labor; a cessation of production means a loss and, if long continued, disaster. The whole people, therefore, have a right to insist that justice shall be done to those who work, and in turn that those whose labor creates the necessities upon which the life of the nation depends must recognize the reciprocal obligation between the worker and the State. They should participate in the formulation of sound laws and regulations governing the conditions under which labor is performed, recognize and obey the laws so formulated and seek their amendment when necessary by the processes ordinarily addressed to the laws and regulations affecting the other relations of life.

Labor, as well as capital, is entitled to adequate compensation. Each has the indefeasible right of organization, of collective bargaining and of speaking through representatives of their own selection. Neither class, however, should at any time nor in any circumstances take action that will put in jeopardy the public welfare. Resort to strikes and lockouts which endanger the health or lives of the people is an unsatisfactory device for determining disputes, and the Democratic party pledges itself to contrive, if possible, and put into effective operation a fair and comprehensive method of composing differences of this nature.

In private industrial disputes, we are opposed to compulsory arbitration as a method plausible in theory but a failure in fact. With respect to government service, we hold distinctly that the rights of the people are paramount to the right to strike. However, we profess scrupulous regard for the conditions of public employment and pledge the Democratic party to instant inquiry into the pay of Government employes and equally speedy regulations designed to bring salaries to a just and proper level.

WOMAN SUFFRAGE.

We endorse the proposed Nineteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States granting equal suffrage to women. We congratulate the legislatures of the thirty-five states which have already ratified said amendment and we urge the Democratic Governors and legislatures of Tennessee, North Carolina and Florida and such states as have not yet ratified the Federal Suffrage Amendment to unite in an effort to complete the process of ratification and secure the thirty-sixth state in time for all the women of the United States to participate in the Fall election. We commend the effective advocacy of the measure by President Wilson.

WELFARE OF WOMEN AND CHILDREN.

We urge co-operation with the states for the protection of child life through infancy and maternity care; in the prohibition of child labor and by adequate appropriations for the Children's Bureau and the Woman's Bureau in the Department of Labor.

WOMEN IN INDUSTRY.

We advocate full representation of women on all commissions dealing with women's work or women's interests and a reclassification of the Federal Civil Service free from discrimination on the ground of sex; a continuance of annropriations for education in sex hygiene; Federal legislation which shall insure the American women residents in the United States, but married to aliens, shall retain their American citizenship and that the same process of naturalization shall be required for women as for men.

EDUCATION.

Co-operative Federal assistance to the states is immediately required for the removal of illiteracy, for the increase of teachers' salaries and instruction in citizenship for both native and foreign-born; increased appropriation for vocational training in home economics, re-establishment of joint Federal and State employment service with women's departments under the direction of technically qualified women.

DISABLED SOLDIERS.

The Federal Government should treat with the utmost consideration every disabled soldier, sailor and marine of the world war, whether his disablility be due to wounds received in line of action or to health impaired in service; and for the dependents of the brave men who died in line of duty the government's tenderest concern and richest bounty should be their requital. The fine patriotism exhibited. the heroic conduct displayed by American soldiers, sailors and marines at home and abroad, constitute a sacred heritage of posterity, the worth of which can never be recompensed from the treasury and the glory of which must not be diminished. The Democratic Administration wisely established a War Risk Insurance Bureau, giving four and a half millions of enlisted men insurance at unprecedentedly low rates and through the medium of which compensation of men and women injured in service is readily adjusted, and hospital facilities for those whose health is impaired are abundantly afforded.

The Federal Board for Vocational Education should be made a part of the War Risk Insurance Bureau, in order that the task may be treated as a whole, and this machinery of protection and assistance must receive every aid of law and appropriation necessary to full and effective operation.

We believe that no higher or more valued privilege can be afforded to an American citizen than to become a freeholder in the soil of the United States and to that end we pledge our party to the enactment of soldier settlements and home aid legislation which will afford to the men who fought for America the opportunity to become land and home owners under conditions affording genuine Government assistance unencumbered by needless difficulties of red tape or advance financial investment.

THE RAILROADS.

The railroads were subjected to Federal control as a war measure without other idea than the swift transport of troops, munitions and supplies. When human life and national hopes were at stake profits could not be considered and were not. Federal operation, however, was marked by an intelligence and efficiency that minimized loss and resulted in many and marked reforms. The equipment taken over was not only grossly inadequate, but shamefully outworn. Unification prac tices overcame these initial handicaps and provided additions, betterments and improvements. Economies enabled operation without the rate raises that private cortrol would have found necessary, and labor was treated with an exact justice that secured the enthusiastic co-operation that victory demanded. The fundamental purpose of Federal control was achieved fully and splendidly, and at far less cost to the taxpayer than would have beeen the case under private operation. Investments in railroad properties were not only saved by Government operation, but Government management returned these properties vastly improved in every physical and executive detail. A great task was greatly discharged.

The President's recommendation of return to private ownership gave the Republican majority a full year in which to enact the necessary legislation. The House took six months to formulate its ideas, and another six months was consumed by the Republican Senate in equally vague debate. As a consequence, the Esch-Cummins bill went to the President in the closing hours of the time limit prescribed, and he was forced to a choice between the chaos of a veto and acquiescence in the measure submitted however grave may have been his objections to it.

There should be a fair and complete test of the law and until careful and mature action by Congress may cure its defects and insure a thoroughly effective transportation system under private ownership without Government subsidy at the expense of the taxpayers of the country.

IMPROVED HIGHWAYS.

Improved roads are of vital importance not only to commerce and industry, but also to agricultural and rural life. The Federal Road Act of 1916, enacted by a Democratic Congress, represented the first systematic effort of the Government to insure the building of an adequate system of roads in this country. The act. as amended, has resulted in placing the movement for improved highways on a progressive and substantial basis in every state in the Union and in bringing under actual construction more than 13,000 miles of roads suited to the traffic needs of the communities in which they are located.

We favor a continuance of the present Federal aid plan under existing Federal and state agencies amended se as to include as one of the elements in determining the ratio in which the several states shall be entitled to share in the fund, the area of any public lands therein.

Inasmuch as the postal service has been extended by the Democratic party to the door of practically every producer and every consumer in the country (rural free delivery alone having been provided for 6,000,000 additional patrons within the past eight years without material added cost), we declare that this instrumentality can and will be used to the maximum of its capacity to improve the efficiency of distribution and reduce the cost of living to consumers while increasing the profitable operations of producers.

We strongly favor the increased use of the motor vehicle in the transportation of the mails and urge the removal of the restrictions imposed by the Republican Congress on the use of motor devices in mail transportation in rural territories.

MERCHANT MARINE.

We desire to congratulate the American people upon the re-birth of our Merchant Marine which once more maintains its former place in the world. It was under a Democratic administration that this was accomplished after seventy years of indifference and neglect, thirteen million tons having been constructed since the act was passed, in 1916. We pledge the policy of our party to the continued growth of our Merchant Marine under proper legislation so that American products will be carried to all ports of the world by vessels built in American Yards, flying the American flag.

PORT FACILITIES.

The urgent demands of the war for adequate transportation of war material as well as for domestic need, revealed the fact that our facilities and rate adjustment were such as to seriously affect the whole country in times of peace as well

as war.

We pledge our party to stand for equality of rates, both import and export, for the ports of the country, to the end that there may be adequate and fair facilities and rates for the mobilization of the products of the country offered for shipment.

INLAND WATERWAYS.

We call attention to the failure of the Republican National Convention to recognize in any way the rapid development of barge transportation on our inland waterways, which development is the result of the constructive policies of the Democratic administration. And we pledge ourselves to the futher development of adequate transportation facilities on our rivers and to the further improvement of our inland waterways; and we recognize the importance of connecting the Grat ik sch the sea by way of the Mississippi River and its tributaries, as well as by the St. Lawrence River. We favor an enterprising Foreign Trade Policy with all nations, and in this connection we favor the full utilization of all Atlantic Gulf and Pacific Ports, and an equitable distribution of shipping facilities between the various ports. Transportation remains an increasingly vital problem in the continued development and prosperity of the nation.

Our present facilities for distribution by rail are inadequate and the promotion of transportation by water is imperative.

We therefore favor a liberal and comprehensive policy for development and utilization of our harbors and interior waterways.

FLOOD CONTROL.

We commend the Democratic Congress for the redemption of the pledge contained in our last platform by the passage of the Flood Control Act of March 1 1917, and point to the successful control of floods of the Mississippi River and the Sacramento River, California, under the policy of that law, for its complete justification. We favor the extension of this policy to other flood control problems wherever the Federal interest involved justifies the expenditure required.

RECLAMATION OF ARID LANDS.

By wise legislation and progressive administration, we have transformed the Government reclamation projects, representing an investment of $100:300,000, frori a condition of impending failure and loss of confidence in the ability of the Govern ment to carry through such large enterprises, to a condition of demonstrated suc cess, whereby formerly arid and wholly unproductive lands now sustain 40,000 prosperous families and have an annual crop production of over $70,000,000, not including the crops grown on a million acres outside the projects supplied with storage water from Government works.

We favor ample appropriations for the continuation and extension of this great work of home-building and internal improvement along the same general lines, to the ed that all practical projects shall be built, and waters now running to waste shall be made to provide homes and add to the food supply, power resources, taxable property, with the Government ultimately reimbursed for the entire outlay.

THE TRADE COMMISSION.

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The Democratic party heartily endorses the creation and work of the Federal Trade Commission in establishing a fair field for competitive business, free from restraints of trade and monopoly, and recommends amplification of the statutes governing its activities so as to grant it authority to prevent the unfair use of patents in restraint of trade.

LIVE STOCK MARKETS.

For the purpose of insuring just and fair treatment in the great interstate livestock market, and thus instilling confidence in growers through which production will be stimulated and the price of meats to consumers be ultimately reduced, we favor the enactment of legislation for the supervision of such markets by the National Government.

MEXICO.

The United States is the neighbor and friend of the nations of the three Americas. In a very special sense, our international relations in this hemisphere should be characterized by good will and free from any possible suspicion as to our national purpose.

The administration, remembering always that Mexico is an independent nation and that permanent stability in her government and her institutions could come

only from the consent of her own people to a government of their own making, has been unwilling either to profit by the misfortunes of the people of Mexico or to enfeeble their future by imposing from the outside a rule upon their temporarily distracted councils. As a consequence, order is gradually reappearing in Mexico; at no time in many years have American lives and interests been so safe as they now are; peace reigns along the border and industry is resuming.

When the new Government of Mexico shall have given ample proof of its ability permanently to maintain law and order, signified its willingness to meet its international obligations and written upon its statute books just laws under which foreign investors shall have rights as well as duties, that Government should receive our recognition and sympathetic assistance. Until these proper expectations have been met, Mexico must realize the propriety of a policy that asserts the right of the United States to demand full protection for its citizens.

PETROLEUM.

The Democratic party recognizes the importance of the acquisition by Americans of additional sources of supply of petroleum and other minerals and declares that such acquisition both at home and abroad should be fostered and encouraged. We urge such action, legislative and executive, as may secure to American citizens the same rights in the acquirement of mining rights in foreign countries as are enjoyed by the citizens or subjects of any other nation.

NEW NATIONS.

The Democratic party expresses its active sympathy with the people of China, Czecho-Slovakia, Finland, Jugo-Slava, Poland, Persia and others who have recently established representative government and who are striving to develop the institutions of true Democracy.

IRELAND.

The great principle of national self-determination has received constant reiteration as one of the chief objectives for which this country entered the war and victory established th's principle.

Within the limitations of international comity and usage, this Convention repeats the several previous expressions of the sympathy of the Democratic party of the United States for the aspirations of Ireland for self-government.

ARMENIA.

We express our deep and earnest sympathy for the unfortunate people of Armenia, and we believe that our government consistent with its constitution and principles. should render every possible and proper aid to them in their efforts to establish and maintain a government of their own.

THE PHILIPPINES.

We favor the granting of independence without unnecessary delay to the 10,500,000 inhabitants of the Philippine Islands.

HAWAII.

We favor a liberal policy of homesteading public land in Hawaii to promote a larger middle-class citizen population, with equal rights to all citizens.

The importance of Hawaii as an outpost on the Western Frontier of the United States demands adequate appropriations by Congress for the development of our harbors and highways there.

PORTO RICO.

We favor granting to the people of Porto Rico the traditional territorial form of goverment, with a view to ultimate statehood, accorded to all territories of the United States since the beginning of our government, and we believe that the officials appointed to administer the government of such territories should be qualified by previous bona fide residence therein.

ALASKA.

We commend the Democratic Administration for inaugurating a new policy as to Alaska as evidenced by the construction of the Alaska railroad and opening of the coal and oil fields.

We declare for the modification of the existing coal land low. to promote development without disturbing the features intended to prevent monopoly.

For such changes in the policy of forestry control as will permit the immediate initiation of the paper pulp industry.