Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 19.djvu/850

UNITED STATES. from the Senate of the treaty for the annexation of Hawaii to the United States, which had been negotiated in the closing days of the previous administration. He also sent James H. Blount, ex-Congressman from Georgia, to Hawaii as a special commissioner to investigate the circumstances of the overthrow of the royal Government, and, on his report, took the ground that the United States Government had through its representatives committed a grievous wrong against the kingdom. See.

The legislation on the tariff was the most important domestic incident of this term. A new bill, bearing the name of Chairman Wilson, of the House Committee on Ways and Means, and providing for free raw sugar, free wool, free coal, free lumber, and free iron ore, and reducing the duties on many articles in the existing schedules, was introduced December 19, 1893. In the following month a measure providing for an income tax was presented in the House, and that and others concerning the internal revenue were incorporated in the bill during the subsequent debate. When the bill reached the Senate it underwent radical alterations, many amendments being made, notably those imposing a duty on sugar, coal, and iron ore, and the House at first refused to concur in the Senate amendments. Finally, however, it withdrew from its position of non-concurrence and the bill was passed. (See .) The President allowed the bill to become a law without his signature. On an appeal to the United States Supreme Court, that body, April 2, 1893, declared two provisions of the income-tax law unconstitutional, and upheld the remainder by a tie vote, and on May 20th, on a rehearing, declared the whole measure unconstitutional.

Early in the term occurred the great commercial panic of 1893, which was followed by a long period of depression. President Cleveland was determined to maintain the gold standard, and in the summer of that year called an extra session of Congress in order to secure the repeal of the Sherman Act of 1890. This he accomplished in the face of great opposition. In January, 1894, because of the heavy withdrawal of gold coin from the Treasury and the large reduction in the gold reserve of $100,000,000, Secretary Carlisle, of the Treasury Department, invited proposals for the purchase of $50,000,000 of 5 per cent. bonds, and this sale resulted in the acquisition of $58,660,917 in gold, which was added to the reserve. The drain on the reserve, however, continued, and in November following the Secretary issued a second call for the purchase of $50,000,000 bonds, when the subscriptions aggregated $178,341,150 and the sale yielded $58,538,500 in gold, which brought the reserve to $111,142,021. In about two months after this sale the reserve declined to $41,340,181. The President, in a special message to Congress, January 28, 1895, recommended that authority be given the Secretary of the Treasury to issue bonds bearing a low rate of interest, to maintain the reserve and redeem outstanding notes issued for the purchase of silver: but Congress did not approve the recommendation. Secretary Carlisle then signed a contract with New York bankers to supply the Government with 3,500,000 ounces of standard gold coin, at the rate of $17.80441 per ounce, for 30-year 4 per cent. bonds,

on condition that one-half of the coin should be obtained in Europe, and that if Congress should authorize their issue, bonds payable in gold and bearing 3 per cent. interest might within ten days be substituted at par for the 4 per cent. bonds. The President again urged Congress to authorize the issue of low-rate bonds, declaring in his message that more than $16,000,000 in interest would be saved thereby, and Congress again withheld its sanction. Under the contract the Secretary sold $62,315,000 in bonds for a little over $65,000,000 in gold. The subscriptions to this loan aggregated $590,000,000 in London and $200,000,000 in New York. Under the continuance of the business depression, Secretary Carlisle was forced early in 1896 to sell $100,000,000 of 30-year 4 per cent. bonds.

The silver question came up again in Congress, February 7, 1894, when the House Committee on Coinage, Weights, and Measures reported a bill directing the coinage of the silver held in the Treasury. A substitute by Congressman Bland providing for the coinage of the seigniorage was adopted, and passed in the House by a vote of 168 yeas to 129 nays, with 56 not voting, and in the Senate by 44 yeas to 31 nays, 10 not voting. This bill was vetoed by the President, and it failed of passage over the veto. In December, 1895, the House passed a bond bill prepared by the Republican members of its Committee on Ways and Means, and when it reached the Senate the Finance Committee reported a free silver coinage substitute, which the Senate passed, February 1, 1896, by a vote of 42 yeas to 35 nays. The House refused to concur in the substitute, and rejected it by a vote of 215 yeas to 90 nays. A few days afterwards the Senate defeated the Emergency Revenue Bill, prepared by Republican members of the House Committee on Ways and Means, and passed by the House by a vote of 205 yeas to 61 nays, the Senate vote being 22 yeas to 33 nays.

A long-standing dispute between Venezuela and Great Britain, over the boundary line between Venezuela and British Guiana, was the cause of a Presidential message to Congress in December, 1895, recommending the appointment of a commission to determine this boundary line. This message, on account of its sharp and determined tone toward Great Britain, created a great sensation. Both Houses unanimously concurred in the recommendation, and a commission was appointed January 1, 1896. (See .) Among other events of President Cleveland's second administration were the World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago, the settlement of the (q.v.) in 1893, the signing of treaties with China and Japan, in 1894, the extension by the President of (q.v.), the calling out of Federal troops to protect Government property and the mails against strikers at Chicago in 1894, the admission of Utah into the Union, in 1896, and the arbitration by the President of disputes between Brazil and the Argentine Republic, Colombia and Italy, and Brazil and Italy.

The Presidential campaign of 1896 turned principally on the Democratic demand for the free coinage of silver at the ratio of 10 to 1. There were seven tickets in the field, viz. the Republican (sound money), William McKinley, of Ohio, and Garret A. Hobart, of New Jersey; the