Official proceedings of the National Democratic convention, held at New York, July 4-9, 1868.: Reported by George Wakeman, official reporter of the Convention.

NA TIONAL DEMOCRATIC CONVENTIONV.
statute books of the nation the laws which invite the citizens who borrow
coin to force their creditor to take debased paper, and thus wrong him of a
large share of his claim in violation of the most solemn compact? (Cheers.)
If repudiation is a national crime, is it no crime to invite all the citizens of
this country thus to repudiate their individual promises? (Applause.) Was
it not a crime to force the creditors of this and other States to take a currency at times worth no more than forty cents on the dollar, in repayment for
the sterling coin they gave to build roads and canals which yield such ample
returns of wealth and prosperity? (Applause.) Again they say, "It is due
to the laborer of the nation that taxation should be equalized." Then why did
they make taxation unequal? Beyond the injustice of making one class of
citizens pay for another their share of the cost of schools, of roads, of the
local laws which protect their lives and property, it was an unwise and hurtful thing. (Cheers.) It sunk the credit of the country, as unusual terms
are always hurtful to the credit of the borrower. They also declare, " The
best policy to diminish our burden of debt is to improve our credit, that capitalists
will seek to loan us money at lower rates of interest than we now pay, and we
must continue to pay, so long as repudiation, partial or total, open or covert, is
threatened or suspected." Then why have they used full five hundred millions
of the taxes drawn from the people of this country to uphold a despotic military authority, and to crush out the life of the States, when, if this money
had been used to pay our debts, capitalists would now seek to lend us money
at lower rates of interest? (Cheers.) But for this "covert repudiation" our
national credit would not be tainted in the markets of the world. Again,
they declare, " Of all who were faithful in the trials of the late war, there
were none entitled to more especial honor than the brave soldiers and seamen who endured the hardships of campaign and cruise, and imperilled their
lives in the service of the country; the bounties and pensions provided by
the laws of these brave defenders of the nation are obligations never to be
forgotten; the widows and orphans of the gallant dead are the wards of the
people, - a sacred legacy bequeathed to the nation's protecting care. How
have these sacred duties been performed? They pay to the maimed man, to
the widow, or the orphan, a currency which they have sunk one-quarter below
its rightful value by their policy of hate, of waste, and of military despotism. The pittance paid to the wounded soldiers is pinched down twentyfive per cent. below the value of that coin which he had a right to expect.
(Loud cheering.) Is there no covert repudiation in this? (Applause.)
Again they say, "Foreign immigration, which has added so much to the wealth,
development, and resources and increase of power of this lRepublic, the asylum
of the oppressed of all nations, should be fostered and encouraged by a liberal
1and just policy." Is this foreign immigration fostered by a policy which, in
cruel mockery of laws just passed, declaring eight houirs to be a legal day's
labor, by the cost of government and of swarms of officials, so swells the
costs of living that men must toil on to meet the exactions? (Cheers.)
The time was when we could not only invite the European to share with us
the material blessings of our great country; but more than that,- we could
tell those who fled from oppression that we lived under a government of laws
administered by the Judiciary, which kept the bayonet and the sword in due
subordination. (Cheers.) We could point to a written constitution which
not only marked out the powers of government, but with anxious care
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