All these abuses, wrongs, and crimes, the product of sixteen years’ ascendency of the Republican party, create a necessity for reform confessed by Republicans themselves; but their reformers are voted down in convention and displaced from the Cabinet. The party’s mass of honest voters is powerless to resist the eighty thousand office-holders, its leaders and guides. Reform can only be had by a peaceful civic revolution. We demand a change of system, a change of administration, a change of parties, that we may have change of measures and of men. _Resolved_, That this convention, representing the Democratic party of the United States, do cordially endorse the action of the present House of Representatives in reducing and curtailing the expenses of the Federal Government, in cutting down salaries, extravagant appropriations, and in abolishing useless offices and places not required by the public necessities; and we shall trust to the firmness of the Democratic members of the House that no committee of conference and no misinterpretation of the rules shall be allowed to defeat these wholesome measures of economy demanded by the country. _Resolved_, That the soldiers and sailors of the Republic, and the widows and orphans of those who have fallen in battle, have a just claim upon the care, protection, and gratitude of their fellow-citizens. Business and trade were very much depressed in 1876, as the country was then approaching the panic and industrial troubles of 1877, which convulsed the country from Eastern to Western sea, and the Greenback or Independent National party, as it was called, exhibited formidable proportions in the contest. It held its national convention at Indianapolis on the 18th of May, with Thomas J. Durant, of Washington, D. C., as permanent president. Peter Cooper, the noted philanthropist of New York, was unanimously nominated for President, and Newton Booth, then a California Senator, was in like manner nominated for Vice-President, but he declined, and General Samuel F. Cary, of Ohio, was substituted. There were 19 States represented by 239 delegates. The following platform was unanimously adopted: The Independent party is called into existence by the necessities of the people, whose industries are prostrated, whose labor is deprived of its just reward, by a ruinous policy which the Republican and Democratic parties refuse to change, and in view of the failure of these parties to furnish relief to the depressed industries of the country, thereby disappointing the just hopes and expectations of the suffering people, we declare our principles, and invite all independent and patriotic men to join our ranks in this movement for financial reform and industrial emancipation.