REPUBLICAN PARTY OF TEXAS 
 The First 50 Years

HOUSTON, August 14

Members of the faction, opposed to the leadership of State Chairman Cecil A. Lyon, met at Dallas, July 4, 1906, for the purpose of perfecting a separate and independent party organization. A plenary committee was appointed, composed of G. B. Clark, of Hillsboro, Dr. A. W. Acheson, of Denison, E. C. Griscom, of Houston, and W. E. King of Dallas, whose duty it was to appoint a State executive committee and to pilot the organization until the State convention, August 14, 1906. About 200 delegates attended the convention; of this number about twenty-five were white.

Officers: Chairman pro tempore, Dr. J. M. Mosely, of Tarrant; permanent, J. C. Gibbons, of Lamar. Secretary pro tempore, Dan Quill, of Kaufman; permanent, Lee S. Simmons, of Falls.

Nominees for State Offices: Governor, 1 E. H. R. Green, of Kaufman; Lieutenant-Governor, James C. Gibbons, of Lamar.

Committee on Platform and Resolutions: W. M. McDonald, of Kaufman, chairman; Dr. W. M. Nagle, of Graysou; Charlie Beck, of Hill; A. J. McCauley, of Dallas; J. W. A. Clarke, of Navarro; M. H. Broyles, of Harris; G. G. Newell, of Anderson; J. C. Cain, of Washington ; A. Z. Wheeler, of Falls ; J. M. Chelvia, of Bexar ; S. W. Houston, of Walker.

PLATFORM

The reorganized Republican party of Texas, in State convention assembled, appealing for the popular and historical justification or their claims to the matchless achievements of the past forty years of National Republican rule, earnestly and confidently address themselves to the awakened intelligence, experience, and conscience of their countrymen in the following declaration of principles:

[1] We reaffirm our allegiance to the principles declared by the founders of the Republican party and indorsed by the administrations of Lincoln, Grant, McKinley, and our peerless and fearless President, Theodore Roosevelt.

[2] For nearly forty years the people of Texas have witnessed the calamitous consequences of full and unrestricted Democratic control of our State government. It has been a record of unparalleled prejudice, incapacity, dishonor, and disaster. In administrative manage ment it has ruthlessly sacrificed patriotism, indispensable revenue, entailed an increasing deficit, eked out ordinary current expenses with money obtained from the Federal government, piled up the State's obligations, forced capital to seek other fields of investment, kept a perpetual menace hanging over the State in the form of "trusts," fostered nepotism and graft, and filled the statutes of Texas with class legislation.

[3] In the broad effect of its policy it has precipitated business panic, blighted industry and trade, reduced work and wages, halted enterprises and crippled Texas productions, while stimulating foreign productions for Texas markets. Every consideration of public good

and individual interest demands that the State government shall be rescued from the hands of a party who has shown itself incapable, too narrow, and too prejudiced to conduct it without disaster at home and dishonor abroad, and should be restored to the party which for forty years has administered the affairs of the Nation with unequaled suc cess and prosperity, and in this connection we heartily indorse the wisdom, patriotism, and the success of the administration of President Roosevelt.

[4] We reaffirm our opposition, as declared in the National Repub lican platform of 1904, to all combinations of capital organized in trusts or otherwise to control arbitrarily the conditions of trade among the citizens of Texas.

[5] In a republic like ours, where the citizen is the sovereign and the official the servant, where no power is exercised except by the will of the people, it is important that the sovereign the people should possess intelligence. The free school is the promoter of intelli gence which is to preserve us a free people; therefore, the State should support free institutions of learning sufficient to afford every child a good common school education, and to this end we favor compulsory education for all children between the ages of seven and sixteen.

[6] We favor the enactment of a law by which all mechanics and day laborers employed by or on behalf of the State government, whether directly or indirectly, through persons, firms, or corporations, contracting with the State, shall conform to the reduced standard of eight hours a day, and also for an amendment to the acts of incor poration for cities and towns by which all laborers and mechanics employed at their expense shall conform to the same number of hours.

[7] We believe that the enlightened spirit and sentiment of the age demands the abolition of the system of contract labor from prisons by individuals and private corporations, throwing them in competition with free labor, and that all convict labor should be utilized by the State in erecting good public roads.

[8] We congratulate the State that lynching, whitecapping, and peonage are on the wane in our State, and we proclaim unqualified condemnation of the uncivilized and barbarous practice well known as "lynching" or killing of human beings suspected or charged with crimes without due process of law.

[9] The pledge which the State has given to her Confederate sol diers and sailors must be fulfilled, and a grateful people will always hold those who imperil their lives for the State's preservation in the kindliest remembrance, and we pledge to those old veterans a watch ful care and a just recognition of their claims upon the State.

[10] We favor ample and full provisions for the accommodation of our unfortunate insane.

[11] We favor improvement by the Federal government of all navigable streams to tide water, and the building and maintaining of all public highways.

[12] We indorse the exercise of that foresight, prompt decision, and undaunted public duty of the administration that President Roose velt has brought to an actual beginning, a project that the world has anticipated for 400 years, and which is of the most stupendous importance to the country, and especially to the State of Texas, as it has already attracted a trunk line of railway to our Gulf, which has made Galveston the second export city of America, and when said canal is completed, will make Texas the greatest commercial center and in dustrial State in the Union the gateway to and from the Orient.

[13] We favor the enactment of laws so constructed that the bur dens of taxation may be equally and impartially laid, to the end that all persons and corporations may bear their due proportion of the expenses of the State government.

Confiding in the justice of our cause, and the necessity of its success at the polls, we submit the foregoing declaration of principles and purposes to the considerate judgment of all Texas people, and we appeal to them to hold in abeyance for the moment all other questions, however important and even momentous they may appear, to sur- render, if need be, all former party ties and affiliations, and, united in one supreme effort, free themselves and their children from the domi- nation of a party which is local in extent, incapable in statesmanship, and negative or objective in all great measures which affect the material growth and prosperity of both the people of the State and Nation.

We invite the support of all citizens without regard to past party affiliations, who can approve of the principles herein set forth, and who desire to have them made effective through legislation for the relief of the people and the restoration of the State's prosperity.

State Executive Committee: Dr. Alex W. Acheson, of Gray son, chairman; 1st Senatorial district, C. Alexander, of Bowie; 2. J. Stonewall Jackson, of Red River; 3. T. W. Trupe, of Lamar; 4. M. 0. Sharpe, of Grayson; 5. H. Wagner, of Hunt; 6. W. E. King, of Dallas; 7. W. L. Dickson, of Upshur; 8. P. F. Dennis, of Harrison; 9. Roy Kennedy, of Navarro; 10 blank; 11. M. M. Patton, of McLennan; 12. H. J. McDonnell, of Lime- stone; 13. H. L. Price, of Anderson; 14. W. M. Sanders, of Nacogdoches; 15. G. K. Collins, of Walker; 16. E. C. Griscom, of Harris; 17. John Richards, of Brazoria; 18. J. R. Morris, of Colorado; 19. J. C. Cain, of Burleson; 20. J. W. Burke, of Travis; 21. T. H. Taylor, of Gonzales; 22. H. C. Adler, of Vic- toria; 23. blank; 24. J. W. Sansom, of Bexar; 25. to 29. blank; 30. J. M. Mosely, of Tarrant; 31. Dr. 0. L. Grayson, of Mon- tague.