CANDIDATE HARRISON AND THE CHINESE

Benjamin Harrison

The Cortland Democrat, Friday, July 13, 1888.
Harrison and the Chinese.
(Cleveland Plain Dealer.)

   The Chicago Tribune of the 23d said that the Chinese plank in the platform precluded the possibility of the nomination of General Harrison. Ben Harrison was in the United States Senate and voted against Senator Miller's bill for the regulation of Chinese emigration. General Harrison, besides opposing the anti-Chinese legislation in the Senate, spoke against it freely in public. "He took," as Rev. Dr. Bartlett and other prominent Republicans of Indianapolis testify, "the most radical position on the subject and argued that there would be precisely as much justice and propriety in excluding Germans and Irish as in excluding the Chinese. He criticized in the strongest manner the action and sentiments of the people of the Pacific slope in their opposition to the influx of the Orientals."
   He said he “was in favor in of admitting the Chinese,” and he took the broad ground "that America should extend to them a welcome hand and that humanity demanded that they should be allowed to come under our benign civilization."

A New Cry.
(Pittsburg Post.)

   The Chinese continue to rally around the Harrison banner. Heretofore the Celestials had taken but a passive interest in American politics, but the cry of "Harrison, Molton, monopoly and cheapee labol" is too much for even the almond-eyed sons of a non-progressive race to withstand. "Plenty Chinee, washeewashee Lepublican dlirtly linen, dam Melican man," is the campaign cry.

THE CHINAMEN PLEASED.
Kingston Laundries Illuminated in Honor of Harrison’s Nomination.

   The court house was not the only place in town that was illuminated last night. While the Republicans were yelling themselves hoarse at their ratification meeting, the Chinese contingent of the city, grateful to the man who had voted against the bill to abolish the emigration of Chinese cheap laborers, lighted all the lights in their laundries and hung out strings of lanterns.
   The one on Main street presented a pretty sight, and called forth much admiration from the guests at the Eagle hotel. The firing of the big fire-crackers, together with the distant strains of music at the court house meeting, caused the Chinamen to grin with unbounded pleasure. It was a keen satisfaction to the Celestials that they were not the only ones who were enthusiastic over Harrison's nomination. At the laundry on Union avenue, near Abeel street, fireworks were set off and Chinese crackers exploded.
   A Leader reporter inquired of Chin Sing on Main street why he was illuminated.
   ''Because I am a Republican,'' he answered.
   "Would you have illuminated if Blaine or Depew had been nominated?" asked the reporter.
   "No, sir."
   "Isn't it a fact that you illuminate because Harrison is a friend of the Chinese?" persisted the reporter.
   "Well, yes—it is," he reluctantly answered.
   Chin Sing is a Chinaman of unusual intelligence, speaks English fluently, and has lived in this country thirteen years.—Kingston Register.

A Stormy Record.
(San Francisco Examiner.)

   Mr. Harrison’s motto is: ''Free trade in labor and protection for the trusts.'' That this Chinese matter was not an exceptional thing with the Chicago candidate has been proved by his whole career. He has always opposed the efforts of workingmen to better their condition. In 1877 he organized a militia company to shoot down strikers. Other distinguished Republicans advised moderation, but Mr. Harrison insisted on force.

Harrison and Labor Men.

   The remarks of Mr. E. F. Gould, a leading Knight of Labor, who attended the Chicago convention, should be studied by the workingmen throughout the land. He thus speaks of Harrison, the Republican candidate:
   The working men are opposed to him for many reasons. They are against him because of his avowed sympathy with leading railway corporations and his position upon Chinese emigrations. When the Chinese restriction bill first came before the Senate, he spoke against it. When it came to a vote he cowardly dodged it. It passed the Senate, however, and was vetoed by the president. Subsequently it came to another vote, with a view of passing it over the president's head. In this ease, Mr. Harrison voted to sustain the veto. Later on, during the same session of Congress, the same bill was again introduced, except that the prohibition of Chinese emigration was restricted for ten years instead of twenty, as in the original bill. On that occasion Mr. Harrison voted against the bill restricting Chinese emigration. In defending his position upon this subject among his republican associates at Indianapolis, he argued that the Chinese ought to be enfranchised, and if the republican party would do this it would give them the Chinese vote. Then, by allowing unrestricted emigration from China, the party could populate America with Chinese votes to suit any emergency, so long as they were true to the party that granted them the right of suffrage.
   As an indication of his loyalty to railroad companies in times of emergency, it is only necessary to refer to his course pending the railroad strike of 1877, on which occasion be implored the governor to order out the troops and shoot down the strikers. Governor Williams stoutly resisted his influence, claiming that the men were peaceable and that there was no necessity for such action. At this he mustered up a company of his own and drilled the men, so as to have them in readiness in ease of an emergency. Upon the same occasion he made a speech from which the following is verbatim and substantiated by affidavits:
   "Were I the governor, I'd force those men back to work or shoot them down on the spot." And upon another occasion, during the same trouble, he declared in a speech that "A dollar a day and two meals are enough for any workingman."