1 VaillsB&ffijx-Ar/ISzcBiffii. mm^zmmmw^ m wwmmmfM> THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES -*»=S I . If. /// THE HANDWRITING ON THE WALL • • • vJr* ••• Revolution in 1907. Being a Revelation of Startling Facts Concerning the TefTibk Influences That Are at Work Destroying the Nation, With the Sober Conclusions Drawn From These Facts by An Ex=Congressman, a A\an Who Loves His Country and lis Idlou Man, and Would Give Warning of Perils That Threaten the Very Life Of Our Republic. SSS6S Published by The P, 1-1. Roberts Publishing Co., ST. LOUIS, MO. COPYRIGHT, 1903. F. A. Schlueter. P. H. Roberts Publishing Co., St. Louis, Mo. TABLE OF CONTENTS. TAGE Announcement m P raonal Experience of an Ex-Congress- man -j ■. [L— Trusts 19 HI.— Th,- Railroads and the Trusts 3G I [V. — Legislation 59 •rruption, Bribery and Perjury 82 ^L— T Unions 106 VII.— Strikes 127 ' VI II.— Ma. Inn. -rv 147 I LX. — Child Labor 157 S. — The Unemployed 178 \l— The Aristocracy 196 KII.— I 220 I apter XII L— Female Labor 239 Chi xiv.— Th ce Struggle 249 Chi £V.— Education 259 el, \ vj._Thr Church 274 Chi KVH.— The Farmer 284 JCVIII. — Plutocracy 304 I MX.— Panics / 331 XX.— l-'inis 345 (5) 1524877 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PA I Frontispiece The Birthday Party Child Labor The Forerunner of the Army of the ReTolutioD I The Aristocracy Newport Society A Child Beggar Colleges Endowed by Trusts The Farmer Fleeced by the Trusts Plutocracy Enthroned Why Not Have Postal Savings Bank- Staving Off a Financial Panic An Industrial Panic AUTHOR'S ANNOUNCEMENT. and prophecies have failed, that "® ,,( --'- this book a fraud or » inspirati To which I prompt- ly 1 Wm there will be a revolution in the year 1907, just ran will rise and sel ai that time. D »f prophecy are not required in either ease. B >Hshed scientifically. If you play m can prophecy an i A< mining a consumptive can tell with- ul.ai is i„ st( ttient. Were ift with the current above Niagara Falls, the asily be predicted, the political, social and industrial signs of ilution arc plain and easily read; and having brought them before you, ask you to read, think and diagnose for yourself. anger ahead. So do many, many others. I may not be heard duty compels me to raise my voice in (7) protest. It may be too late, (and I am < the case), yet I could not refrain if I would. I I must put forth my strongesl effort to be ! For that large number of earnesl r the noblest work man can engage in, em face of adversity to uplift mankind. I predi their attempt to prevent the revolution. I their efforts are wasted or lost far from seed they sow today will take root and bri abundant harvest. But not until after t! • Just a word to thoeund you Maud upon, sure in your opinions " t" any who may timidly suggest : have never heard of. Better investigate or will he rudely jarred. On the her hand, perha] ived your awakening; trough a glass darkly. radual. A trust began its tactics on me, which I hardly noticed at lir-t. If it cut prices I I did i; 'lien how it could hurt me. I I nie when freight rates took a jump up* ! more than trebled. I thought . when to my dismay 1 found the trust red theirs. This was dumbfounding. J was sure tin ml concluded to let them do so, • up my pric< s. Th' re8ul1 was that orders e in and I had to (lose up temporarily. . I thought I could hold out •ru«t who were selling at a cut rate. \ • ■ I and then worried. After a time tl). and 1 determined to take a bold i their prices and once more orders flowed in. 14 EXPEKIENCE OF AN EX-CONGRESSMAN. "But I was losing money heavily. One d of the trust called at my office. He Baid he torney employed merely to come and Bee me. H very unassuming and pleasant. He stated hia mia The trust would buy me out. I indignantly i ing I was an American citizen with well-defined I and could not be driven from the field lib the offer would remain open for forty-eight hou that time I accepted I might drop him a line. Ai picked up his hat to leave, he said if I were wise I would accept. It made no difference to him either had seen a number of men completely mined by fol the course I intended to pursue; that I waa again less proposition, and would surely regrel it if I fa follow his advice. "I told him that if I were losing money on account the present freight rates, the trust was infinii more, and that rates would probably be mncl before long. He looked at me a few moments and t! said only this, 'I see that you really haven't the least what you are talking about.' He was right [had heard of the rebate system. But I anticipa* "Of course I did not write him. But his remark manner impressed me. I began to wonder if th really had any method of doing business that I might not avail myself of. I studied and worried, and worried and studied. After several months I thought perhap uld be a good idea to write to some of my fellow comp EXPERIENCE OF A\ EX-CONGRESSMAN. 15 how they were faring, offer to confer with them and a-k whal they thought would be the outcome; and finally find if they were aware of any methods or means possessed by the trusts which we lacked. "I did bo. In answer to my letters I received several replies. < me man evidently did not wish to he frank. He d he did not care if the trusts were ten times as strong, they could not hurt him. This was a free country and he proposed to fight them back. "The second writer admitted the trust had played sad havoc with him. He did not know what to do. He would glad to hear from me again, and would himself write me very shortly. "The third letter said the writer was going to Cincin- nati in aboul a week and would be pleased to stop on the wa;. 1 wrote and urged him to do so. "In the meantime the trust had again reduced pri Freight rati a remained the same. For me to meet their prices meant ill. I did not want to give in, neither did I want to lose everything. But I was so en- jed I met the cut. "The prices were now about the same as before the :. 1 Btate this that the public may know that the trust was not a public benefactor. But with freight rates three times as high as formerly, it was a terribly losing _'.une for me. I had written and gone to the rail- id people in protest so often that I was tired. Further- more, it did no good. The officials gave no reason why 16 EXPERIENCE OF AN BX-CONGB the advance should be made. Th tions from their superiors. Meanwhile I * heavily. "My fellow victim and competil pped h one morning as he was bound for Cincil him warmly and took him to my | my first questions was this: Bow can the tr when freight rates are bo high? And how 1 keep on losing money this way ? " 'Losing money!' he exclaimed; "I- it : lieve the trust is losing money?' And hi few moments. "'Why, they are coining moi rich,' he said. 'Don't you know that the tr controls the railroads? 5 was his nexl quest money paid for freight charges monthly ?' "He said, 'I thought everybody knew thai I' "the rebate system." You are a hundred times. Have you never heard how the worked ?' "I frankly confessed I hadn't. I was 1 and sickened. Cold drops of perspiration started from forehead. Here I had thought the trust wa? paying the same freight rates (which in my bus: portant item) that I was ; when lo, and behold ; th- only paying one-third the amount; peril. . I EXPERIENCE OF AN EX-CONGRESSMAN. 17 had thought they were losing money as fast as myself, when in fact they irere coining it. "Reader, perhaps this is not new to you. If so, I trust it did di i as much to find it out as it did me. If not heard of it before, I'm glad to toll you about i one of the strongholds of the trusts. The rail- ormously at the instigation of the trusts and thru gi?e it back to the trusts in rebates; all be the trusts and railroads are owned and controlled apitalists. "I rent to law. I brought suit against both the rail- Is and the trust ■'!'• long another agent of the trust came to see me and offered to buy me out again. This oifer was about half of the first 1 refused again. ■■J lost both Buits and appealed to a higher court. It inld be tiresome to tell how the cases were continued and p ed and maneuvered in every way imaginable and ei This was kept up a long time. My lawyer-' fee- were very high. To make a long :t. 1 was finally and completely beaten at every it. ruined. All my money and real estate _:one, and 1 gave up the fight. I felt I could do no re. "But 1 took up the battle again in another and indirect way. From the beginning my case had attracted con- rable attention. The newspapers had taken it up (2) 18 EXPEBIENCE OF AN K and I received many Lettei m ent and condolence. In 188 run for Congress. I al first , statesman or lawyer, only a pi. insisted f was also an enem they were looking for. «My whole attitude changed. I might go to Cong against the cut-throat po was too late f or me to secur. justice being done to other intcn. had many friends assisj mi • finally won the election. "My experience in Congn the investigation which 1 have kepi u ' learned rapidlv because my heart things that once appeared -lull and i were of vital important-, failed to attract my attention I and revelations that every man a should try to understand and i- "But this will never be done. I America, though eonscion- that - pening and that they ought to I fail to think, agree, act or vote harmoniou good. They always seem to be divid divided against itself cannot stall CHAPTER II. TRUSTS. ' orruption and Oppres- al I'm .,.,1. I lost do time, but the trust question; (here was u that. I rrail. investigated and posi myself on the I - "D hand. The inci- through which T passed were !'■ .:* ite to the main _rh to me they were inter- a and investigation, ! soon saw and le workings of these institu- dreams of. And I fit of my discoveries. But rrow and mly my own all I jay by public and magazines and (19) 20 TBI newspapers, together with the opinio men, lawyers, business men, tc. "Before touching on the wri brief history and analysis of tl "The close of the Civil War found tl on great industrial and comrrn business opportunities presented th< mand for goods and labor was unlin horrible waste of war. "At this time the first large and projected, namely, the Standard Oil Trn-t. (I of many more, rich and powerful, which its footsteps. With almost un; have sprung up, flourished and g\ proportions that our entire industrial changed. "The trust is a perfect organization, with tern, that operates with the least frictii cause it makes use of a fundament* law is as follows: The larger the - distribution the less the friction and i "This single economic advant thing that gives them the least claim I for this it is possible they would h. existence long before tin,. Their nu: gross injustice would have more than warrant "Volumes might be written in regard ; of procedure, showing that almost every crim TRUSTS. 21 v ! mmitted by them to furthe? Iheir • deal might be added about the policy try, by absorbing and kill- g all competj and ruining thousands of business 1 a crime), besides throwing •:' work. But in this short here and there. "With trusts the day of small enter- prises ' .mil and elaborate schemes prevail. • r tlu- land, hand in hand, we find the tn. in-' and effect of each r the enemy of the people, doing the i privileged claai — the plutocracy. •• I -a t • r w< fin ! . thi •: mbining until the prospect f in tl future forty or fifty trust.- will eon- intry. Can any one deny 1th and power of the irter permits them to own and ad rolling mills, different lines of ind all kinds of shops and duel is manufactured. them the privilege of buying and ind, miii' .1. iron and all kinds of mi] thai grow on the land; to and absolutely anything anufactured. They have absolutely the 22 Tl; right to buy, sell or manufactui the railroad-. ships, ba i "What will be the resull become of the poor competitor railroads and bargi "Mr. Schwab, the Presided ol tl returning from abroad said : l thusiasm unbounded : we arc n to demonstrate thai thi bination, the greater the j consequently the r the p - tion of cost. With these obj< i our great plants equipped and mai no care or proper expense mu- plants modern and at the enterprise can reach.' "It is true that the Steel 're- production and distribution is ; attempted, but it is untrue when Mr. S be operated for the public good. u They are organized only for their and even to rob and defraud ffa stop at nothing. All sorts of evils ha, by them; but more about this later. might be made a blessing, and m very possible. That they are do _ Ws to be false; and all the effort. Trust Barons fail to convince an arom TRUS 03 "A - Trust, there are many others that it in tl. urice into many avenues of trade and : 'um.jiM completed, threatens to .m and lake Bteamer lines, barge ompani "I. iolidation of the Oil, Coal and 1 Don combine, and midable of these organizations is t, which began operations when the i on a boom. : ill.' well-, Lta production being in the trans- saw their opportunity and < >:l Trust. 1 1 .-ill (he road? e it precedence over all ighl rates were raised Standard Oil Co. paid the them in the form of rebal hed, l»nt their competitors were all ie by one. No one wa -!i and cruel avarice; and thou- Bul they willed to reign ind woe to any who dared op- • Who fought them u Tl:l 8TS to the bitter end. One «a- a Mr. B falo, N. Y. Once the Standard Oil Ti blow up Mr. Mathews' refinery. Th and several hundred workmen bai lives. But at the 1 rial, though thi - convicted of the crime, thej only fin I afterwards met Mr. Mathews, wh< whole thing. Beside.-, the courl open to everybody's inspection. ( I account of this incidenl and . Standard Oil Trust. Lloyd*- Wealtli ' monwealth.) "Another dastardly p work by thi at Fostoria, iO., on a quirt Sunday ii they tore up the pipes of a competing course nothing could be done the Sabbath no injunction could be Becui At Beaumont, Texas, the gri they are making the most Btrenuo oil wells by blocking transportation, facilities there already in existence ai leased as fast as possible, and everyth can do is being done to prevent the build "Some of the well owners have built tank own. But the railroads, upon getting hoi switched, sidetracked and sent them away witho . . rn- mg them, (claiming the law permits !U ] in . throwing obstacles in the path of the TRUSTS. 25 All at tlu- instigation of the Standard Oil Trn : the well owners wen! to law and demanded ih.it . an be -< hi them. The law .-ays that railroads must furnish il Trusl ? 1 do. I think it has become American Liberty, and that this prized ii danger unless the people are stirred !ii their apathy. ■•A trusi i- one existing in St. Louis, known Trai nized by combining all the street litalized at $90,000,000, which formerly the law of Missouri would not permit. But the Mure wa- bribed and the law changed. As the 26 Tl: State Legislature and G and the latter signed the bill, crats and Republicans alike yield to th fluence of the trusts. "They then bribed both the I gates in St. Louis to pass the mi count of which is given in "After securing the pass city and public completely al theii them to all manner of indignities. 1 enough cars, and night and mornii the passengers like bo man; I the time the cars were ii"i heate* ran at a terrific rate of speed, and the n i killed and injured was appal li: "The public protested in vain. T denounced the wholesale murder, but day added to the list, until it wa- a paper without being shocked bj I of school children, men and women I or killed by these modern engii one of the daily papers, (th< ther illustrate the point : ACCIDENTS THAT HORRIFY. To the Editor of the Post-Dispateh : Your paper is well known as a wide-ai sive journal and generally leads in ai: teresting to the public. 1 would thi THUS 27 you h. landing column daily — headed, say, "Transit * — under which will be recorded the daily d the various trolley lines. Many them i harrowing that sensitive readers, when itly come across them and commence their .1 turn from them with horror. If all were grouped an index for their non- They would very properly head G. - tin- long and bloody street car nteiders received incorrect S . Louisiana know the truth. or this murderoui :id of law bi i" blame may easily be de- . mil no worse than the hund: blood-sucking vampire- that infest the Bui quickly because raised ! quickly upon an indignant public. bad. but goes almost un- nlv indirectly upon the people. the audacity to ask the govern- vill probably get, does not for their money. rkhurst paid to the Coal Trust following word-: mpanii ombineB or coal trusts [raining off into their own 28 TR1 STS. treasury as much of the poor man' dare, to the impoverishment of the po of their comfort and to the sapping health and life, then such compao demon of theft and murder. Ami this is no in to dealers in coal than to the dealers in modity.' "While Rev. Dr. Parkhurst was denoun 'possessed by the demon of tin-It and mui New York preacher, Rev. Dr. Heber N pews and a millionaire Hock, praised the h sary and beneficent part of our advani "The 'Appeal to Reason" says: "'The official statement of the St its profits are $10,000,000 a month, jojt What the infant will do when it I conjectured. Xow this is bad enough for th it is nothing to what it will mean in a few vast sum of ready cash must find investments. '1 will absorb many other industri "'The Steel Trust has got po , of all the nick mines and refining plants of the world. Nickel* wi be worth $2. And thus the profits on iron will - trol other industries. "'The Steel Trust sells rails in England B pays $5.11 freight, and sells the rails here , how much better we are than the blawsted British ? 'The ship subsidy bill was designed to benefit princi- TRUSTS. 8g , : alh ' l!l 3 i,,an1 0li Company and the United States Corporation, each paying tens of millions of dollars ■ * dividend* now. But the Rockefellers and Mor- ns of the country must be protected. The more they aore they want. Someday the people will want l ,;m "' ,,! '"- enormous and ill-gotten wealth-and will take it.' "The Globe-Democral and Post-Diapatch printed the •1 low in L " A London paper atates that J. Pierpont Morgan mends a joint syatem of trnata as the best means to I Wendahip between England and the United Mr. Morgan's preference for this general remedy u ' ed.~ Globe-Democrat. -Wh,!,. Mr. Morgan is combining the big carrying lines be th< re are more than L000 ships— tramp ships —lying at Am, man porta unable to Becure cargoes. These beli -n.all fellows who do not control railways, hence not able to make the through rates the big fellows offer. When they have been Btarved out there will be none to Bay 'nay' to the mightiesl of mighty men.— Post-Dis- patch. "Hen It m article from The Chicago News': MKX AM) A MONSTER. •When the railways that run through the anthracite ! diatricts of Pennaylvania decided to own the mines from which they hauled the coal to market they put up the freight charges to a prohibitive price. It was a policy 30 TR1 - of confiscation and w- ful. M were sold by their owner- to thi forced .sales. " 'There are more mines thi I coal that is required by consumers at il • charged for it. The resuH i- thai mis mines is limited according to mine operating companies. M i : the year. Thai throw- the mil il of work. M encouragement of foreign immigration districts the coal companies Buppli< I more labor than they need. That mad I have paid low wages and have made m . their men, such as those for rent, po\t shameful overcharge), doctor-' or not), oil for lamps and provision!' fr In 1900 the United Mine Workers the anthracite coal miners and brought on a lasting forty-two days and resulting in D tory for the men. Some of the old, bitter righted. '"Other wrongs remain. Wages ar Work is precarious. The miner can barely he is permitted to earn. Meanwhile the pri< cite coal to the consumer has risen enormously. monopoly, working under an ironclad agr the great profits and hides them away under tr, keeping, by which 40 per cent or more of the TRUSTS. 31 disappears as Freight charges — paid by the mono] i itself. These charges are wildly unreason- Meanwhile the miner is permitted to dig when the iiii -hut down 1' nienl, making a bare liv- ; uit the coal monopoly does not h;i - method-. It can continue to use obso- lete ma< hinery and do it- work in a wasteful manner be- lieap. ■ul Trust pay- its men on the average $1.28 a da the miner- air employed only part id' the time, • i nut fairly represent what their wages is in rtion t<» their living expenses. Last year, which is I to h ar for miners, they were em- 1 only r.M davs, which means that their actual yearly by the day amounted to less than 80 In 1899 the a\ Dumber of working days was \ - the average earning ca- a mil: ar at $248. Out of this sum he mu-t pay the coal trusl for house rent from $37 to $72 a ir. mu-t supply his own powder at $14 a year and Ids :i oil ai $o a year, to say nothing of the fee to the coal an, which i- $6 a year whether the physician i- I or not. With what the miner has left he mu-t clothe and feed himself and his family, and this at a time when tin- i lies of life are unusually h. ""Recently the miners, through their union, asked 20 nt increase in v It was denied them. They 32 TBI STS are said to have offered to comproi vance, but the trust declined to tn miners have struck. The coal monopo best to defeat the miners and di wishes to thrust back into their fornn dom the men who ask a living nit'' of [i hard and perilous (oil. It i- a i monster — a sight to bring ti of any one who considers all tin it. These 140,000 workers ask merely a j they may make life a little less h those whom they love. Yet they an daring to dispute with this lawli on 'running its own busini "'The coal monopoly makes on, | business which it conducts in riols man's laws becomes the public's busi evil nature. It is the duty of th. I ; tr t- ment of justice to destroy this wicked tr "That is not all of their iniquity. With all their wealth and power, the trusts control politics and fessional politicians and lobbyist stand n to do their bidding. These men live at Washi, all of the state capitals and are known t< ing that way. I know hundreds of them, and they maku no secret of their business. Xay. they aim themselves to a disgusted public. Everybody k: and no one is surprised when a villainous TRUSTS. 33 ruption or bribery is exposed. All have grown used to it on account of its frequency. Through these agents the trusts control the legislative bodies and courts of the land. 1- it any wonder then that they go on doing just as they pl< 1- it remarkable that they defy the public, which :nl in fear ami awe of them? And how are thepeopl nli thnn? 1 f a different set of politicians • into power, the trusts proceed to corrupt and bribe them in the same way. "Who »an .'numerate the evils of the trusts? Thers do end of them. Aside from their rebate sys- a. the monopolization of industries, the ruin of com- petitor- and the corruption and bribery of courts and leg- -. they throw thousands of people out of work. fully 90 pel cent of their traveling men, drummers, agent-. . ;,rk~ and bookkeepers an- dispensed with. Then, when they -hut down Bome <>t' their plants and drive com- ;tor- from the field, many more people are deprived of work, with the result that a job is a thing to be prized and held to by all manner of means. It stands between him who holds it and want. And the bitter struggle to hold the.-e jobs giv< to another danger, which is this: ry man working for a trust will be obliged to vote as commanded or lose his position. And right here is a dan- gerous moral support given to this iniquitous institution — the control of vote . then we find that in addition to their corruption and bribery, they Becurely hold the reins of government by (3) 34 TR1 popular vote. Thus we find cnl not the will of the people, b strong and arrogant, dii public. And what cant] to be honest? The words forcibly in this cum.: 'Why, man. I: narrow world like a Col der his huge legs, and peep ^ honorable gra\ "Washington City has at la-t Plutocracy has fortified great American people aw;. themselves as completely enthrall' by the Egyptians under Pharoah. "What will be the result when tl What will happen when this for people — a people enraged by plund< r, : Only wisdom divine could prevent ful than anything this country hs a. "These are not the only facto about this end. When all are considi optimistic must fear and tremble at :he approaching storm. "During my two term? in Cot ned to that the public stood helpless to remed} have failed to pass laws for their own a ke the courts, the legislative bodies seem clogged v measures are attempted, but act freely and qu: TRUSTS. 5 for the benefit of plutocracy. All man- andeyaded by this terrible power at will. 1 ; • this is not only my opinion after my corroborated by an abund- : > ='" sides. I do no. ask anyone to ae- wman, but submit the evi- ICllt.*' CHAPTER III. THE RAILROADS THE SVM\ ANTS OF I Ml How They Arc Operated t ■ of for the Public Welfai .g te in Their II In delving into the secrete 11 • an -i in studying the subjecl m all . face to face with tht* railroad (ju< to find an intimate connection and i »oen the two. I had nol along this path, hut as it did. I took it up an investigated it also. And, furthermore, I had been it \\ little while before 1 became impn railroad interests are Looked afl lobbyists in the service of the d the legislative halls of C , men, Senators and officials « power whatever. There at the fountain I of power, they flock to advance their own or foul means. One need not the interests of the trusts and ra. an extraordinary degree. Yet the railroad L been, and | factor m modern civilization t, tninzation. Its imp.. RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 31 ■ I. Through the railroads far away been brought into touch pulation, and been made to blossom 'ion. brought the world together by annihilat Bringing the people together it of ideas, a broader conception humanity. Its practical and !i unlimited. With the railroad mine is no more. \ all times the pro- may 1. to market and ex- nan at will to summon the eom- POm the four quarters of In truth, the railroad plays an important part . part of our industrial organism. . building material, etc., must be n important factor in our industrial or- r it has assumed proportions of irding to the census reports, ipulatioo of the United States it. The capita] invested is inconciev- tD ] rative estimate. The rail- of land, most of which has b to them by the people. This ari . a j of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, I : \: d Kansas. Think of it! Six large gta the people. Over this terri- >f railroad. One can grasp 38 RAILROADS AND THE I II but a faint idea of the th and agency. And like every <>t I capacity for good, it has also the railroads have been a evil both. Its good is advertised, the coming revolution its power and : with terrible i This may appear to be a very little reflection will prove it is n is seen in fostering trusts, in supp legislative body in the country, and in 1m officials all over the land. Finally, when tl bursts upon us, a general Btoppage of the trouble, misery and starvation to tho dreds of thousands. It is estimat* .id* were to cease running entirely. Mar', hand on New York. Philadelphia and all hi pending on them for provisions, within tv "And this is what will happen during the i omii lution. Railroads will be more thi than 1 of this cataclysm. Take the great coal Btriki vania. The railroads and coal mines aw own< the same capitalists. How was this accomplished ? In I ginning the owners of the railroa to own coal fields and mines. They pureh; me of the mi and raised the freight rates. But to their own mini rebated the largest part of the money paid the freight. In this way they could undersell everyhod; RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 39 weaker ones were forced to sell their mines to the railroad.-. This war was kept up until all competition was driven from the field, and the owners of the railroads ntire coal fields. All of the terrible strikes are the resull i d and avarice in attempting to rob tie utting their wages to a point that :vly furnishes them a means of existence. The public blind I id and avarice of these immense rail- id cor] neither do they blame the poor working men for refusing to work for starvation wag 3. When the . with its strikes and riots, in railroad, mi ads will cease running, plung- ing all of the I. ities into a wild panic, resulting in chaos, miser} and starvation. ir Trusl and manj avored by the railroad- in just the same way as the mines and the Oil it Thus it may be seen that in addition to the widely-ad- , d gooe d by the railroads, a correspond- ing int of evil may be laid at their doors, which, of hide. Take even the amount of bn f which they ilty. The least observing end millions annually by keeping a mIv at Washington, but at every State Capital in ;. • I : »n, which corrupts everybody and anybody who will and can them to attain their ends, even down to officials and legislative bodies in the cities and towns. That public morals should thus be contaminated and iO RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. lowered is a terrible meanace to the well being of the Commonwealth. With their enormous wealth, bribes, in- fluence and fat positions, they are the making and unmak- ing of many politicians. They have the pow r er to ruin or promote the interest of thousands of citizens just as they see fit. Can you doubt that the railroad enters into our civil and moral life, as well as into our business and in- dustrial ? The railroads of the country may be likened to the arteries in the human body, a means of healthful circula- tion when in a healthy condition. When the blood flows easily through the body, life, health, usefulness, happiness, etc., are all promoted. But let the blood cease to flow properly; let some trouble arise and congestion set in. l"n less this be corrected, calamity is bound to result. Our great country, with its teeming millions of people, is an organism — a body economic. Heretofore the railroads have run freely to and fro, bringing plenty, peace, happi- - and health to society. As long as this continues the body economic will be edified and built up. But suppose all the railroads should be tied up at the same time — which is more than probable when the Railroad Trust con y by an universal strike? The facts stands out plainly that the stoppage would work infinite hardship and suffering upon all the people. In the first place, coal ild not be transported, and the direct effect would be hut down factories, foundries, mills, shops, etc. A •f this wras had when in 1895 the great railroad RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 41 strike took place, starting in Chicago and spreading over a large part of the country. In a few days the local coal supplies gave out and thousands of plants were compelled to shut down. Yet this strike was not universal or of long duration. But a general and prolonged tie-up would be different. Fuel would soon be so scarce and food so utter- ly impossible to secure that, as has been stated, the gov- ernment staticians estimate that in two weeks starva- tion would sieze the larger cities, and the distress and misery would be something unheard of before. "But/' some will say, "the government will order out the federal troops ; railroad traffic will be started, even if blood must be shed." Exactly. This is precisely what will happen. The fed- eral troops and the people will clash and blood will be shed. But, mark! This is not the only difficulty that will have to be contended with in the year 1907. The railroad question, like the trust question, is only one of many equally dangerous factors that will have to be con- tended with. On all sides will be strife and turmoil just as terrible. And while it is true that the government will send the federal troops to the various scenes of carnage, is it not true that a revolution is on when the people and government clash? "But," it may be said, "all of this may be averted. Peace and prosperity may spread its wings over the land once more, and the railroads begin to pursue the straight and narrow way, thus giving entire satisfaction to everybody. 42 RAILROAD They may cea way make themselvee po] America." To this I say Amen, and il bright prospects in the fut B appear can be ca-ily proven. L To begin wit li. the railr must earn dividends first else is secondary, even the pub] managers and officials who a but those that fail arc d stockholders. The aim, then, of all pi officials, etc., may readilj I the sole aim. Profits th( tions, abilities and salaries The owners ask no questioi icisms, save along this line. So then we lind it quite natural : the public welfare as a seconds crops, goods and product.- of a:;\ d< -< ripti n ... cidental considerations. The | that. Vanderbilt once said, "The public be dan. and that is about the sentiment of all the rai: But the practice of duping the peoph be- come habitual; and the public has learnt matter of course. Do the railroads succeed then in obtain. h large dividends? They do. Their profits are fabulou- RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 45 ■ncceed in hiding the fact from the public in a very declaring 50 or 100 per cent ji % theii Btock ten times its real value am l then 10 per cent dividend on this which looks like very modest earnings to the puhli A id of the practice of watering will only briefly tonch on the subject. ade of the United States, Mr. Van ide as Investments" (Xew P, Putnam's Son-. L893), estimates that the the in - over 67 cents on the dol- .ver l«» cents on the dollar. He i the - now in existence, the :• paid not more than $465,000,000, or 10 their and probably less. Hence »er cent per annum on the II icks on the ground that it , mi redncing railroad rates. which the watering of se- rried is surprising. Thus Mr. C. \\\ eral freight and passenger agent of one of the leading railroads, Bays: .,,. p.; mj the Kansas Midland, cost, including a t. but 10 per mile, of which 30 per furnished by the municipalities along its line. 44 RAILROADS Wl» TH Yet with construction profil r0 *d shows a capitalization o That is to say, deducting t! palities, the road coal the coii mile, and they issued stock- and I $53,000 per mile. The railroads could be rebuill present capitalization— possibly \oi I Union Pacific railroad proved Board of Equalization that the cost <>f I) Central was $7,298 per mile. Tl less than $10,000 jjer mile, ly taken a contract to build a 1 in. of ra $8,000 per mile. Even at $ value of the railroad.- of the Unit $3,622,660,000, while they are cap 923. Mr. Chas. B. Spahr, in his "Diatribe page 41, estimates that the railroads the original investors *:;.; 1 1,400,000. '1 debtedness, or watered stock, is noth extortion, which is in effect a mori g the country. I think every one is willing to coi a t railroad stocks are watered, and w&\ deal, and I think also it is apparent small dividend on the watered stock is an dend on the real capital invested. If, then, the railroads are making such enormous divi- RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 45 la and profits, how is it done? What do they resort erything. They stop at nothing. the [Jnited States government is robbed annually uns. In hauling the mails the greatest frauds im- ginable are practiced. We quote the Appeal to Reason in as article which explains this system of fraud very clear] HOW THE GOVERNMENT IS ROBBED. rnm.'iit refuses to Increase the pay of letter ri'T*. postal .lcrks and other government employes. "Mr. Load and others in charge of post office affairs ***** rl " extravagance as an excuse for overworking and underpaying men employed by the United States gov- ernment. ould lik.- wry much to know what Mr. Loud and ffice authorities have t«» say about the steady robbing ">' > : rnmenl BY Till': RAILROADS. "Wl the money paid out by the railroad lobby, that it- robbing of the government may go on? would he interesting to know why it is that no man in public office combines the ability and honesty necessary t the railroad thievi "Bead - me figures; bear them in mind when govern- nt ownership of railroads [s discussed. nator Vilas, of Wisconsin, in a speech in the Sen- I '.binary 13, 1895, supplied the following figures an: 4G RAILROADS AND THE TBI "The cost of building one ol th< averages $3,500. "The railroads charge tl for the use of these cars, in ad ernment pay for the hauling oi th( "According to the railroad Vilas, the following expe] postal cars, for each car: "Light, $2; 6 a year; heating a year; cleaning, $365 a year; total Bi taining each car in u- '■'>. "It is needless to point out thi estimates. But let them stand for 1 ment. "When Senator Vilas w.i appropriate $3,250,000 to be paid b) thi renting post office cars during th amount was to be paid for 790 in use, 180 cars in reserve, and .'>(» addi might become necessary. "According to the railroads' own figun - maintaining and operating these cars wi "Take that amount from the appropriatii 000 and you find that the railroads were paid l>v tl. ernment $2,314,840 for the USE of tl "To build those cars outright cost on "So that, after deducting a sufficient amount the cars and keep them in order, the rail RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 47 tli- rnment in one .war practically the total cost of building th J\ ADDITION", THE GOVERN- IfENT PAYS AN EXTRAVAGANTLY HIGH KATE I HAULING ALL THESE CA] orse instead of better since the fiscal year ended June 30, 101, th< \ paid to the railroad companies for th< car — as rental, independent of the • r hauling the cats — $4,638,234.03. Seven hun- dr. .sire used. Thus, as rental for nmenl paid an a\ of $G,0G3.05. •• 'I'., build a mail « the outside limit, as dlroads, of the »f maintaining and -a total of $4,856 for building r and keeping it in order for a year. •'I .ernim nt paid the railroads for each building the car, the cost of ntainii idditional. ••K. -v rear the railroad back from the govern- nt the entire < every ear, the entire cost of main- ind operating them, $1,207.05 besides, and the the mails, as the law provides— mtly high rate— over and above all the rest. -Individual railroads fare better than others. •Take, for example, the New York Central Railroad, which owna one of New York State's representatives in 48 RAILROADS AND THE TRI - the United States Senate, Mr. Di other, Mr. Piatt, through his expn "The New York Central i on the routes from New York government paid the New Xork ( the USE of 22 cars. "Therefore, the governmenl paid to I tral for one year $10,456.0? for each i "That is to say. each year it pays the building the car, and the total cos! TWICE OVER. "AND AT Till-] END OF THE VKAl; THE RAIL- EOAD STILL OWNS THE I AW. "In addition, the railroad company i government $1,288,080. 41 for transporting the un- der the regular weight schedule, bet Buffalo. "If you want to know how the railro he gov- ernment, through the connivance of S men and others influenced by the railroad Lol these figures, and compare the charges for tr. mg government mail matter and ordinan -o a New York Central station twenty miles from New York: "For carrying 200 pounds per day of mail matter, a- per mile per annum, the railroad is authorized to charge in one year $1,000. RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 49 "The express company carries a 200-pound package the me distance every day for $365 a year. 'in other words, the government pays $1,000 for carry- ing ".'00 pounds of mail matter twenty miles every day for a year, in addition to paying an enormous rental for the can. Express matter travels the same distance at the same speed for $365 a year, and both the railroad com- pany and the express company make a good profit on the transaction. "Poort Manual gives the Pennsylvania Railroad com- pany*- it was $4. Man\ similar in be given. Rates arc always kept up • possible. But the railroads through th< gans always try to carry the impression thai t! ducing rates, and such cases as th< of by the public." The Appeal to Reason say-: "The people of this country pay more for tl railroads and get less benefits than any country and the railroads exercise more despotic than in any other country. And in other countri roads, now owned by the public are not very j "The railroads in this section ha ;n - crease in freight rates. The consolidation « cut down expenses and give the public the benefit, you kr. How do you like the benefit of private consolidation? Local papers are silent. Afraid of ] The practice of overcharging in freight rate* ha* 1 RAILROADS AXD THE TRUSTS. 53 the cause of terrible hardships at different times. Not be farmers of Kansas had an abundant harvest of corn. The price it brought was low and it was ntiful that the farmers burned it for fuel, because tin- price of coal was wry high. But at the same time >al miners of Illinois were in a starving condition, l" a shut-down of the mines, there being an over- production of coal Here, then, was a Btrange state of af- fair-. The miners wanted the farmer-' corn to eat. The fanner- wanted th«' coal, but they could not effect an cx- might burn the corn, but the min- >uld doI cat the coaL All that was needed was an product-. The railroad- might have effected thi lid not. Instead they maintained an ex- orbitantly high rate on both corn and coal — a rate so high that there would be oothing left after paying the freight. The result was that the miners continued living in a Btarving condition, while the farmers suffered from cold. But the railroads have proven themselves heartless and n more than one case. I quote an article from tlie St. Louis Star, that describes an actual occurrence, though it is so heartless it i- hard to believe: BRUTAL INHUMANITY. "A circumstance occurred upon the platform of the iri Pacific depot Wednesday morning at Jefferson City that ought to serve as a lasting lesson to both the railroad and the Capital City authorities that the people 54 RAILROADS AND Till: TIM STH generally will noi put up with anythin bru- tality among human or bruti "About 9 o'clock Tuesday oi years of age was taken from the top parently fatally injured by Bomi "The boy was laid on a stretcher and the railw cian, together with the mayor and n notified, and, according to thi duty at the depot, the physician ca any examination, declined u> do anything in whereupon the mayor and marshal in to do nothing. In the meantime the seious, and at 2 o'clock in the morning stretcher, not having received any att< cept what the baggageman ei- could give him. ""As the returning del i the platform the condition of the injure.! around, and the facts being elicited, thi im- peratively given to understand that thi care of, and the promise wax made that inm. tion should be given the apparently dying younf it was not until the Hon. Richard Barthi that the boy should be taken to a hospital and ca: at his own expense that any action whatever was tak. :,. "The inattention to the boy perhaps grew out of a dis- agreement between the railway and the city as to which should assume the responsibility of earing for the unfor- RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 55 tunate, and in the meantime he was left to suffer, and for that matter, die. "No more heartless sight was ever witnessed, at least in a civilized community, than that which was uncovered the vi.'\v of the hundreds of people assembled at the of the l£i8SOuri Pacific Railway in the Capital City jouri at 2 Wednesday morning." But to go hark to the previous discussion; that is, as to tlv i' the railroads mending their evil ways and _ public servants, popular, just and fair. They would have to become this to be eliminated as a factor in the revolution. Will they do it? Reason says no. The in th< say no. For the railroads to become fair and just would mean to largely reduce their dividends, an ,l (J thing that never will be tolerated. Rather than cut down their prolits they will resort to anything. [1 i- more likely they will seek to increase their profits. In f ; |, rything points to that move on their part. The question is, how much more will the American peo- ple stand ? Bow long will they submit to the thumb screws ? The halt will be called when the general uprising takes place. In the meantime the railroads are doing their part to hasten that day. I quote the "Appeal to Reason" again: THE MORMAXIZATIOX OF THE W T ORLD. •■Napoleon's plot to secure control of all Europe— Rus- sia's plot to control the whole eastern coast of Asia— the plotting of all the diplomatists of the world, fade into the 5G RAILROADS AND THE pale colors of a departing rainbow i omp of three American financier ntrol tl world. "The plot, in its magnifii all the lands and seas of the Wi Btern b< posed. H. Gaylord Wilshire, edil zine and candidalr for parliamenl from V ada, gives the astonishing details in I Wilshire's Magazine. Advance - ] ■ 'na- tional article, fresh from the pi newspaper offices. "'Give me a lever long enough and , and I can move the earth,' has alwi ! a* an idealistic claim of a fanciful philosopfa "J. Pierpont Morgan. John D. R 'amen J. Hill are three financiers who have found a stand on, and the place is \. .. fork. 'I" long enough— the Northern Securities Com; by the United State? Supreme Court— and Mr. \Y. shows how they can move the earth. "With $100,000,000, these three men control $800,000,000 of stock?, being the who' the Burlington, the Northern Pacific and I ern Kailways. "They have actually invested % Ato\ the Northern Securities Company. But 1 mixing the First Morganization Company, as Mr. Wikhire calif control the Northern Securities Company, th. RAILROADS AND THE TRUSTS. 57 cure the whole capitalization of the latter company with »0 } 000,000 of stock in the Northern Securities tnpany, and then Bel] half of the First Morganization I impany's stock to the public — or 10 per cent of it — and I of theii capital back. lation published by Mr. Wilshire, Morgan further pro; two confreres to later float the lird and even the Fourth ^[organization < additional roads with each reorgani- until eventually the great ms such as the New y.,- | ntral, P Lvania, Union Pacific, Santa Fe, and in fa.t all the roada in tl ntry, will be controlled by these tbr while the amount invested by them wil' ••■[•,, r ha1 lei tinned division of stock issues into majority and minority holdings can be carried has pointed out. The natural consumma- te, n Securities decision has never before ! and the Morganization of the industries of the world, along this line, is made not only clear, but very, -v near, in this wonderful exposition of the great finan- cial han-^ low ..ver the heads of the public." The Denver News hat following item: WHAT WILL THE HARVEST BE? "The I States Supreme Court not only decided in favor of the Hill-Morgan railroad trust, but barred Minne- rom bringing any further cases against the merger in any court. The trusts are sowing the seed and the 58 RAILROADS AND THE I i: courts arc raking it in. Wnai will I E. in Denver New-. All of these nefarious pracl roads can have l>ul one eff< ci ,; indignant public Big strikes wi I sympathy will be with the strikes will lake plai ins< tin result and the militia, federal part. This phase, the railroad q h many other agents at work toward thi CHAPTER IV, LEGISLATION. Fraudulent Elections; National, State and City — Kevela- tions of Appalling Corruption — The Courts; the [njunction and Other Desperate Measures. "Bui to go back to my work at Congress. I had made up my mind to fighl the trint< right from the beginning, ami to raise m) test against them at every op- irtunity. This 1 did. At the same time there were many oth I mm doing the same thing, of whom quite a number wrere in earnest, and just as anxious to linsl these institutions as I was. I had intro- duce] an anti-trust bill, but it was tabled with a number of otl I'ln' first year had almost passed, and it had not D taken up yi I tfi true a leal oi" work must be done and Con- ry busy. However, there always seems to time enough for other work, such as appropriation bills, railroad and corporation bills, etc., but very little time for anti-trust bills. The reason is plain enough, for ery member of Congress is a holder of stocks and bonds in railroads, mining, oil or other interests that must (59) 60 LEGISLATE be looked after fust, and the anti-trust legislation. 5Te8, and even ma gressmen work hard and openl; enterprises. That is the wi} many years. This is the wra; "Fourteen thousand five hundred ! ported to the House of Representativ< less than 2,000 have been favorably various committees through whose ; must pass, before the people's repn them. Of this number doI a singh labor other than adversely. The entire loi ai the financial interest of a few in tions. Here are some of the suli have been introduceil on these sul age, 38; public buildings, 304; cha monuments and statue-. 59; tru- churches, 168; bankrupt ey. 18; bri constitution, 42; Chinese, 9; D pure foods, 8; Indians. 102; interstati im- migration, 12; irrigation. 18; mines and min In a little pamphlet entitled "Id Bell BJ Out," a number of indictments are broughl on- gressmen, Senators and the different ra- tions. They are not exaggerated at all. I quot< them: "The persistent refusal of Congress to - a l LEGISLATION. 61 •anka in the tare of an almost Universal demand for them. andals in which Senators, Congressmen ■1 other officials, including the President, have been chi with boodle transactions in deals with the Sugar net, mail contracts, Chicago Gas stock, bond syndicates, rporation attorneys, like Senators Thurston, Vilas, Hill and others, being allowed to hold public and corpor- is- time. e encouragemenl by Congress of the militia, and the effort to keep Btationed large detachments of regulars ir the manufacturing centers— making it manifest that any movemeni againsi plutocratic Bpoilation will be in- t!v crushed. " TI thai the political bosses go to the Whitneys, - and Pullmans for their heavy rruption campaign funds is certainly presumptive evi- dence that the old parties are mortgaged to wealth from the beginning. (Vide Senator Chandler's charges against Mark Eanna.) "Rep al of laws in the various legislatures in the inter- alth, which regulated the employment of child female labor. Note also the recent increase in the • United States marshals to $4,500 a year — more than the average pay of governors. "The investigation ordered by the 48th Congress of the •rrnous defalcations under the Grant administrations 6 g LEGISLATION. shows that more than H million dollan tween 1869 and 1883, and only aq ■ ""I 1 "" 1 « recovered. This occurred in the Bigot! bursing office of the Btate department aloj Senator Davis, of West Virginia, goi acomm ed to investigate the condition of the I the testimony laid before this committe< ritlj the examination of the ledgers of the shown that 2 > 52 I S erasures and alteratii and that $247,768,341 had been Btolen, oi m un- accounted for.'' Why spend time trying to prove Eacta thai everyb aware of? All of these chai Q be pi half cover the ground. At the annual din "Southern Society." recently ex-Justice A Wyck said: "The sale of the law is the crying evil day." Of course. And everybody agrees with him. II is the statement of an ex-judge saying thai la\. in this country. But we all know it. None i But Plutocracy has other ways of attaining , in addition to those cited. When a lobby and ion fails to secure its wants, Plutocracy resort aother pediency, and that is the injunction. The injunction in most cases is not only wrong, but absolutely illegal. 1 the acme of modern rascality, and one of the greatest vio- lations of American Liberty. Never in the history of America has there been anything to favor the ( 'ike the Injunction. LEGISLATION. 63 Take the injunction issued by Judge Jackson, for- bidding anyone to help the striking coal miners in any way, shape* or manner whatever. Xo one even should be permitted to give them food. Business men go to each other's aid in panics and reverses, and arc many times tided difficulties. But according to Judge Jackson, working men arc to be denied this same privilege, and casl into jail if caught doing it. Class Legislation ha- become unpopular, so the Class Injunction is substi- tuted. But the broken-spirited miners, their weeping wives and Btarving children, together with the thousands of poor that will suffer this winter, will -end a wail and prayer to heaven againsl these injustices thai shall echo in the ears and hearts of all Americans that shall not die but shall increase until it ends in the roar of the great Revolution. I quote the St. Louis Star in part: "Press Dispatch to The St. Louis Star. "PARKEBSBUBG, \Y. Va., July 24.— There was the nm-t intense interest in the crowded room of the United States district court this morning, when Judge Jackson began reading his lengthy decision declaring 'Mother' Mary Jones, angel of the miners, and seven other organ- izers of the United Mine Workers, and four Hungarians, t ) be guilty of contempt in disregarding his injunction of ae 10. against holding a meeting or creating a demon- it ion at or near the Pinnickinnick mine of the Clarks- 64 LEGISLATION. burg Fuel Company, or near the residence of miners at work there. "Judge Jackson's huge frame shook with emotion ;i> he dramatically emphasized portions of his decision. "He sentenced the defendants as follow "Thomas Haggerty, 90 days in jail; Win. Morgan, Bernard Kice, Peter Wilson, W. A. Blakely, George Ba- con, Thomas Laskavish, 60 days each. "Judge Jackson stated that the defendants would not he sent to the same jail. "District Attorney Blizzard sprung a sensation by im- mediately filing an affidavit that W. B. Wilson, secretary of the United Mine Workers of America, had violated a restraining order at Clarksburg and Fairmont, by making inflammatory speeches. His arrest was asked. .Indge Jackson made an order that Wilson be brought within the jurisdiction of the court. Wilson is said to be in Indian- apolis. " 'Mother' Jones, it is said, will receive a stiff fine and will not be jailed. "'Mother' Jones was the center of interest. She was surrounded by the other defendants and Vice President Lewis, of the United Mine Workers. The defendants were surprised at the decision and are bitter. The miners agree that this is the most effective blow that could be struck against the men's cause in their attempt to get out the 12,000 miners in the Fairmount coal fields. LEGISLATION. 65 "Press Dispatch to The St. Louis Star. "Parkersburg, W. Va., July 24. — Mother Jones gave out the following signed statement: " 'I have been asked what I would do in case I am fined. I have no money myself to pay a fine, and will not allow anybody else to pay it for me. There shall be no compro- mise in my case. I shall not surrender any of my Ameri- can principles. I want the people to understand that I will not surrender any of my rights to courts. This is a fight for justice. Abraham Lincoln fought to have the slaves freed. The blood of 15 miners was shed in Illinois before we got justice there. Great battles are not won in a day. I'm not afraid to go to jail. " '(Signed) "MOTHER" MAEY JONES.' " So injunction will last for a time, but only long enough for the people to become aroused. Abraham Lincoln said, "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and you can fool all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time." Two or three days before the close of session, and about a year after I took my seat, the anti-trust bill I had pre- pared was taken up and read. I made a two-hours' speech, telling of my experience with trusts, and the experience of others, together with all the facts and data I could summon. A few short speeches were made in favor of it and a few against it. A vote was taken and it was lost. The attitude of the members during the proceedings was (5) 66 LEGISLATION. that of unconcern. Like proceedings had taken plfl many times before. Why should they can "It is hard to talk of clear, cold facte when the h< cries out against injustice. II is hard to refrain from tell- ing the many personal experiences through which [ passed. For the present I must hasten on to more important things than my being a member of Congress. I m I briefly pass over the rest of my term in Congrc^ election to office, and the two futile years -pent th< again. The second term was a repetition of thi -a failure of myself and others to strike a blow at trusts in any way, shape or manner whatever. It was ;i hard strug- gle — this two-year fight — and filled with many incident-. The same lobbying and enthusiastic interest in behalf the moneyed interests, and the same indifference as to the welfare of the people prevailed. After two terms had passed I began to doubt whether I ever would be able to do any good, but made up my mind to accept a third term if the people chose to re-elect me. And now comes the harrowing tale. I was renominated and began an earnest canvas to win the election. My op- ponent was the lawyer who first came to see me as an agent for the trust. I remembered his face well and still had his card, the one he gave me when directing me to write him in case I wished to sell out to the trust. To me the whole thing was clear as day. He had been a faithful servant of the trust; they had tried him and were now satisfied he was capable of representing them in Con- LEGISLATION. 67 gress. Furthermore, they would kill two birds with one stone. They would defeat and get me out of the way. I had had my eye teeth cut; knew how the trusts worked, and never for an instant doubted what their plans would be. And subsequent events proved me correct. And I knew more. I knew he would go to Congress. I would win, but victory would be his. And I was right again. But I made a hard canvass. Myself and friends worl like Trojans. I knew I would lose. But I intended to make my enemies do all they possibly could, and spend as much money as possible in defeating me. And this they did. They spent money like water. But it was an object lesson to the people. I called attention to the fact, showed the people that he was an agent for the trust that had ruined me, and showed how the trust wished to send him to Congress as a tool, while getting me out of the way. He denied he was working for anybody's interests save those of the people. He said if he ever came to see me on business it was a single visit for a single fee, such as lawyers are called upon to perform hundreds of timi My opponent, backed by the trust, had to resort to ev- ery trick and fraud conceivable in order to win. They stuffed the ballots, bribed the judges and clerks, used in- timidation at times, and by every hook and crook fought to attain their ends. Does the reader think this extraordinary? Does he think it unusual? Then he is mistaken. These thi] 68 LEGISLATION have occurred many times over. It has becor om- mon occurrence. I will quote the St. Louis Star in re- citing the Butler case of St. Louis in L901. However, I wish to say that because Butler was a Democrat. I do apt claim the Republicans are better than the Democi Not at all. They are both equally bad. However, the following account is very correct: '"Special to The St. Louis Star. "WASHINGTON, D. C, June 28.— The Beai in Con- gress from the Twelfth Missouri District will be decla vacant this afternoon, and James J. Butler of St. Louis will be ousted. "A new election will have to be held in the district to fill the vacancy. Butler will be ousted as a resull of the gigantic frauds, which were perpetrated under the in- famous Nesbit law. The contest was instituted by Wil- liam Horton, who was the Republican nominee. "Saturday's programme in the Horton-Butler contest includes an hour's speech by Mr. Butler, who will close the debate for his side. "Judge Taylor, chairman of the contest committee, will close the proceedings with a speech, and it is expected that a vote will be reached by 4 p. m. "During Friday's debate Congressman Bartholdt made a strong speech denouncing the gigantic frauds perpe- trated by the Democratic party in Missouri. Congress- man Bartholdt said in part: LEGISLATION. 69 GANGS OF REPEATERS. " 'Hundreds of citizens have seen these frauds perpe- trated with their own eyes. They have seen the repeaters as they were driven in wagon loads from polling place to polling place, they have seen them enter, they have seen the doors closed behind them, and they have seen them emerge after their nefarious work was done. In many places they saw how the Republican challengers and judges and clerks were ejected, and they saw how all this was done under the very eyes, with the connivance of, and in some cases, under the protection of the police. This is not circumstantial evidence, but what I have just re- cited are stubborn facts which the minority of the com- mittee by no amount of sophistry can explain away. There were about a hundred of those repeaters, or "Indians," as they are called in slander of our aborgines. On election day they were divided in smaller bands, and, each under the leadership of a chief, sent out to do the work for which they had been hired. The preparations for these election crimes had been so openly and boldly carried on that weeks in advance the Republican leaders were fully ad- vised of the plans of the Democratic bosses. We knew that the registration lists had been padded with thousands of fraudulent names, and that each one of those names was to be voted. They were registered in large numbers from stables, saloons, coal yards, bawdy houses and va- cant lots. From the stables of the Excelsior Hauling Company— an enterprise controlled by Edward Butler, 70 LEGISLATION. contestee's father— ninety-seven men wen though it is a notorious fact that not more than two 01 three men usually live there. To what extent fraudulent registration has been carried on was BhOwn later wl 19,900 names were dropped from the voters' lisi ELECTION WAS STOLEN. "'We were advised, I repeal it, of • letail o! the scheme to steal the election, but under the cireums! the Eepublicans were well nigh helpless. The elecl machinery and the police organization were completely under the domination of the Democratic party. Should the Eepublicans resort to force to prevent the perpetra- tion of the frauds? Fortunately calmer counsels vailed, and as the only alternative left this plan was finally agreed upon. That registered letters be ad' I t-> those suspected of false registration, and warrants be issued against all the persons who could not thus be found. These warrants were to be placed in the hands of deputy sheriffs to be specially appointed for that purpose. It was an honest and perfectly legal plan to prevent crime. Of course, but a small percentage of the 1,500 registered letters which were sent out could be delivered, but when the deputy sheriffs on the morning of the election pre- sented themselves at the polls with their warrants they were told by the police to move on. A State law which provides that all citizens except the election officials, the police and those who want to vote must keep 100 feet away from the polls, was enforced by the police even LEGISLATION. n against the officers of the law, in which capacity the deputy sheriffs undoubtedly acted. Under these circum- Btancee no arrests could be made, because a fraudulent voter could be identified only when inside of the poll he announced his alleged name. Had the presence of a deputy sheriff been permitted, he would have immediately arrested his man and prob- ably the whole conspiracy would have been nipped in the bud. It was for this reason that, as a result of a dark lantern conference at the Southern Hotel, orders were issued to the police to keep the deputy sheriffs away from the polls. These orders were carried out to the letter at each polling place. The last obstacle to the boldly ar- ranged orgies of fraud was thus swept away, and a new chapter was added to the election history of fair St. Louis, which brings the blush of shame and indignation to the cheek of every good citizen, irrespective of party affilia- tion. DEMOCRATIC TRICKERY. " 'Let me tell you something about that law. It is as neat a piece of partisan legislation as has ever been brought to the notice of this House or the country. It ap- plies to St. Louis alone. The reason for this is that the great metropolis of the Mississippi Valley, abreast with the best sentiment of the country, had dared to give to McKinley 15,000 majority, while most of the rural dis- tricts of Missouri had rolled up their old-time Democratic majorities. This was bitter, so the bosses went to the Leg- 72 LEGISLATION. islature and asked that SI. Louis In' made Democrat law. Troubled by their consciences and afraid <>f public opinion, some of the Democrat ic members balked, bui I were finally whipped into line. The Nesbil law \ and it was a great moment, because from the birth Nesbitism dates the decadence of the Missouri Demi It was giving notice to all the people of the State thai Democratic majorities were no longer the natural expi sion of public opinion, but must henceforth be maintaii by artificial devices. You see? But what air the j visions of the law? Well, the Governor appoints th Election Commissioners, not four, as in some Republican States, so that two might be appointed for each party. Oh, no, only three — two Democrats and one Republican — and the Eepublican, too, is one of his own choosing. No matter how good a man the representative of the minority party may be, you know that a pair always beats ace high. That is the secret of the law. "The rest is easy. The Commissioners have comph charge of the registration, locate the polling places and appoint the judges and clerks of election. It is true that the Eepublican judges and clerks shall be recommended by the City Central Committee of that party, the same as the Democratic election officials, but there is no pro- vision to prevent the Commissioners from arbitrarily sub- stituting other names for those recommended by the party committee. Wholesale substitutions of this kind were made in the Twelfth District. According to the law, LEGISLATION. 73 tht Be substitutes should have been Republicans, but what party they really belonged to was shown when the ballots were examined. Fifty-four of these alleged Republicans voted the Democratic ticket outright, three scratched Horton, and three voted for the Third Party candidate. Here we have the reason, too, why the election law of 1895, the passage of which had been forced through the legislature by public opinion and a Republican lower house, was supplanted by the partisan measure I am just discussing. It is because under the old law Republican judges and clerks were sure to be appointed. Why, this gave the Republicans an equal chance at the polls, there- fore would never do.' " This is but a single instance; perhaps the reader can recall other similar cases, for elections are carried on by fraud all over the country. Another well known case took place in Ohio. The State Legislature was to elect a Senator. A large corpo- ration wished to place their man in office, and in order to do so, took certain members of the Legislature aside to reason with them. A special room was secured, and the smooth and oily-tongued agents of the corporation in- vited the legislators, one by one, to come and be rea- soned with. Afterwards, when the scandal was brought up in court, some of the legislators testified that this room contained vast quantities of money. Shelves were stacked with paper and silver currency. Boxes stood around the room filled to overflowing. Tables were cov- u LEGISLATION. ered with package bundle* and bags, until • looked like a money vault. However, none of these legislator.! adr, ceived any of this money or were paidal all tor tin- But it was noticed that after the election, and thi poration had put its man in office, these differ* lators seemed to be very flush with money. 8 pecially, who had been very hard up; others who had gages on their home,; all Beemed prosp bought houses, paid off their mortgagee and bout in carriages. But there was no doubt in the mind of the public who paid for it. Who has not heard of Tammany Hall, N. number of election frauds it has perp ■! is appall The name has become a synonym for fraud throi Ihe land. To specify or enumerate its Iniquities would be wearisome. So then my defeat by fraud was only one of many, and nothing remained but to accept it. However, the bittei thing about it all was that the whole community to a man did not rise up in indignation and take action in the mat- ter. They were being wronged, the ballot violated and American rights and liberties trampled upon. Yet with the great mass of people it ceased to be thought of after a few weeks. Still there were quite a number who real- ized the enormity af the whole thing, and foresaw what such things portended. Several of the good citizens wept and one friend actuallrtook sick, so much was he wrought LEGISLATION". 75 up about it. All of this, however, can do no good. The voters must rise up together and with one accord hurl iniquity from the high places. Will this ever be? Some day, perhaps. But not before this country sees terrible times. Some day the people may think, act and correct these evils, but it will be after the shoe has pinched hard — woefully hard. I had saved some of my salary during the two terms I served at Congress, and so felt I had better take a little rest, think over the strange events of the past few years and carefully lay my plans for the future. As time passed I was siezed with a desire to move away. Perhaps my luck would change and I might yet be useful to society in some way. Wife did not like the idea, but said she would acquiesce if I thought it for the best. I really did think it for the best. I was born and raised in Ohio and had lived there all my life. Perhaps a change would do good. Even if I did not move very far away, to go at hast into another state might be a wise move, and possibly make me contented. The result was I determined to move my family to St. Louis. Some of my friends laughingly said I selected St. Louis to get rid of the bad company I was in and be- cause I believed St. Louisians were saints, as the name im- plied. However, St. Louis was decided upon, and we soon were ready to go. I had some friends in that city to whom I nad written and who had made arrangements for me. 76 LEGISLATION. The change was made and before long I had a a*uglittl< home among the people with whom! had cast i I have since learned to love this city and all o pie. I live here still and exped to the real of mj And yet it is like all big cities in on< tiie hands of boodling rascals. I moved there j some of the most sensational frauds thai of were perpetrated. The thing that naturally interested me mod «a- the spring election of 1901. 1 thought 1 knew something aboul fraudulenl electioi but this St. Louis election surely musl have bui thing previously attempted in the United 3 The sights witnessed by me were witnessed by hundreds <»f other citizens and no doubt were published in paper in every town and city. Some of the things d were so flagrant and bold that citizens rubbed their i as though to make sure they were awake and in their right mind. And yet all of these people could testify under oath as to what they saw, though all had belie before this that such things were impossib But to briefly describe it. The Democrats had passed the Nesbit Law, which gave the Governor of the Btate power to appoint the three election commissioners who had complete control of all elections. Of cour>e be ap- pointed two Democrats and one "Republican. These three fixed the polling places and appointed all of the jui and clerks. Further, the Governor has the appointing of LEGISLATION. 77 the Police Commissioners, and of course he sees to it that they are Democrats. Thus it will be seen that the Democratic party was well equipped to carry out any plan whatever, by controlling both the Election and Police Commissioners. Their plans were deep and cunningly laid and boldly carried out, for the black record of that day will scarcely be equalled again. They began operations early and kept them up late. Wagon loads of hoodlums and thugs were driven about the city as repeaters, others were marched in gangs of forty or fifty from polling place to polling place and voted again and again, using names given them on slips of paper. These ballot staffers were called "Indians." They even referred to themselves as "Indians." To carry this joke further, a wagon load of these thugs were dressed up like Indians and driven through the heart of the city. A painted sign bore this legend, "Butler's Indians." As they rode about the city they discharged their revolvers in the air and shouted and whooped like real Eed men. They were so secure in their boldness that it was fun. However, this latter wasn't the worst feature. It only showed their confidence and scorn of secrecy. The real work they did, and for which they should have been sent to the penitentiary, was the desecration of the ballot and the theft of the election. I drove about the city in a buggy during the day, following different gangs and watching different polls. There was something horrible 78 LEGISLATION. and morbidly fascinating in thi hts, especially W to me. It made me feel as though an icy hand were clutch- ing at my heart. In the first place, these hoodlums and tl oked like ex-convicts. Vice and sin were depicted on their com nances and in their every movement. And yel I tho these are only the tools. In the sight of I ook no Blacker than the well-dressed, well-kempl rascals wh< will they are executing. Oul of harm's way, drinking and smoking good wine and cigai 'it be found tin- real criminals; the real cause of this day's work. I would not be surprised if a number of thugs had been brought from the workhouse and penitentiary, to execute this diabolical task. As they slouched aloi actually saw them hold up citizens and go through t! pockets. Why were they not afraid to commit th robberies in broad daylight? They knew the police v. under instructions. When they reached a poll they entered and voted und.-r an assumed name. And this was repeated a number of times by each "Indian" before he left that poll. The name assumed was always one given them on a slip of paper, and was sometimes a legal vote of a man in that precinct. When that man came to vote he found his name had been voted. There was nothing to be done. If he telephoned the Election Commissioners he received answer that they were out. If he went down to head- quarters he was told that an investigation would be made. LEGISLATION. 79 That was all. He might fume all day, but it would be in vain. Sometimes the "Indians'' met with difficulties. At one poll one of these fellows took a name from his hat, and, studying the slip, went up to vote. However, the judges and clerks told him that voter was dead. Going back to the leader of the gang he said, with many oaths and the vilest profanity: "Give me another name; this man is dead.*' It was furnished him, and he went back and voted it. The police were right there and saw the whole occurence, but said nothing. In many cases honest voters were driven back to make room for these "Indians." The result was that in the morning many workingmen had to leave in order to get to work in time and come back in the evening to vote. But the evening was too late. Dur- ing the day their names were fraudulently voted. In another polling place a ballot stuffer presented a name to vote on. The judge said, "Why, that is my name; you can't vote on that.*' The repeater said it was a lie and insisted on voting the name. A fight ensued, in which all of the judges and clerks were driven into the street. The "Indians" then took charge of the poll and the books. It is needless to say that precinct went Dem- ocratic by a large majority. In every case they were upheld by the police. In many instances the police clubbed and drove back honest voters. In some precincts it was known that, with scarcely any exception, the voters were all Republican. They worked * 80 LEGISLATION. a different game here. Early in the morni] started, the judges, the clerks and challenger* *ere all arrested, and the polls closed up by the police. Ap- peals to the Commissioners were in vain. The pollfl v kept closed until late in the afternoon. Then tie opened. The Democrats and ballot Btuffere wire admit first, and, there being an immense crowd, only a Inn number could be admitted before closing time. The police were under instructions and had to do they were told or lose their positions. They in many cases deplored the injustice of it all, but knew thi to obey. It is well known that every police officer <>n the force must belong to the Jefferson Club or lose hia sition. This Jefferson Club bids fair to become a- str and notorious as Tammany Hall, New York. I wish the reader to understand that I do not pick out the Democrats to score and expose alone. Later I will show the Republicans up just as bad. 1 only aim to tell the truth, and go directly to the bottom in order to find why such things exist. And why is it? Why is the popular will defeated? Why these fraudulent elections? Simply because Plu- tocracy wishes to place its tools in office. Simply to have its servants in position and power to do its will, and where they can make laws at their master's bidding. After fraudulent elections place the tools of the corpor- ations in power, is it reasonable to hope they will legis- late for the public good? It is absurd to expect such a LEGISLATION. 81 thing. One might as well expect to gather grapes from thorns and figs from thistles. This condition of affairs prevails in every large city, in every state and in the na- tional legislative hall of this- country. Here then we have one more factor at work, and the result will be to hasten the Revolution. It is true the people might get together and in one or two elections place their own representatives in power. But it is too much to hope this will be done before the great disaster comes, because Plutocracy is careful to see that the peo- ple are always divided on some side issue, and if they can keep them divided they can keep themselves in power. . But the public is getting indignant and restless. Those thoroughly awake are arousing others. The alarm is spreading. The public, while long suffering and unneces- ,-arily slow to take action against any wrong, is also un- necessarily severe when it" does begin to act. Already the strain is telling. Something will have to give way. Is your ear to the ground? Do you hear the snapping, and rumbling, as the foundations of this Republic are being undermined ? But the clash between the people and Plutocracy: This will be reserved for future consideration. (6) CHAPTER V. CORRUPTION, BRIBERY AND PERJURY. primes of Public Servants: Their Brazen Effrontery and Contempt of All Oaths and Obligations. . .We have all listened to the honeyed promises of candi- dates before election, and been deceived again and again by their pledges. Our representatives are pat virtue and honor before election; but after, Buch ai and far between. Upon the strength of their promisee we place them in office; first one kind, then another. They arc all alike. But we don't learn. When in office the people arc usually forgotten, and only selfish interest- proniot- Very often the erstwhile virtuous politician does « iian promote his selfish interests. He becomes corrupt and criminal, ready to accept bribes and sell legislation with as little compunetion as though it were a commodity for that very purpose. Yes, and many cases have been known, where politicians have gone into politics with that avowed purpose in view, spending ten times as much as their years' salary to secure the office, knowing that more than that sum can be made back by the sale of their influence and votes. (82) CORRUPTION AXD PERJURY. 83 In Toledo, recently, the grand jury disclosed a frightful state of affairs. City and railroad officials were found guilty of corruption and bribery. The City Attorney, the Assistant Street Commissioner, the Secretary of the Board of Revision and others were indicted. Not many years since similar disclosures were made in Detroit, Mich. Gov. Hazen S. Pingree addressed the Nineteenth Cen- tury Club, of New York, on the subject "Ten Years of Municipal Progr. Among other things he said: ''Detroit was long ruled by the politicians until at length the leader- grew reckless. Streets were given away to car companies, to gas companies and other cor- porations. You could not drive without paying toll. The city was half-lighted and at exorbitant rates. What little paving there was cost twice as much as it was worth. The paving ring was powerful. Sewers built had no outlet. There were long tracks of unoccupied land in the middle of the city held by men for speculation. The cars drawn by horses were unhealthy and uncomfortable. Parks were given away for buildings. "In eight years all this has been remedied, and today Detroit is one of the most beautiful cities of the United States. "I was elected by the most influential people of the city. Directly after I was elected I discovered that the railroads were paying less than their lawful taxes. I said so, and the railroad support was lost to me. I found the 84 CORRUPTION AMi PERJ1 BY. gas companies charging exorbitant ra thus losing their support. I found bankei with the city funds. I denounced them, and tl d 1 was unsafe. I attacked the Burface railroads, and t ! called me an anarchist. I was fouT timi I lost a lot of old friends, hut I was elected b majority each time. It is something to be proud o the influential classes turn their backs on me and the com- mon people stand by me. I have come to leaD common people. They are the real foundation oi government." Chicago, New York, Philadelphia— all the Larg< cil have had similar experiences. The following editorial appeared in the Si. Joseph News: THE INEVITABLE: 1 1 ES I LT. (Editorial in St. Joseph News. Feb. L7, 1902 "In the course of a libel suit in the courts of Pennsyl- vania last week a legislative reporter, called as a win of the unlawful practices charged against the prosecutor, gave some evidence that ought to prove startling enough to call a halt on the methods of political bosses every- where. The following statement on the witness stand is quoted: " 'Many times marked roll calls were handed to me be - fore roll call was made and often I recorded the names of members as voting who I knew at the time were not pres- COfcRUPTIOX AND PERJURY. 85 ent. I knew it was not right, but I could not help it. I had to do as I was told or get out.' "Can any more daring abuse of the power of the boss be conceived than this? The official reporter testifies un- it- it oath, that not once or twice, but 'many times,' the roll call of the state legislature was a mere formality. The measure determined upon by the boss was declared passed by the speaker selected by the boss, and the names of men who had not even been consulted as to their senti- ments were recorded as voting for the biggest steals ever engineered through any state legislature. It was in this way that the ripper bill was passed. It was by this same method that the street railway franchise bills giving away franchises worth millions of dollars, in return for the two millions advanced by the boss's adherents to secure his last election to the Legislature, were passed. There was mi pretense at public decency, not even any pretense at allowing to the legislators a voice in the matter. They were merely regarded as so many pawns in the game whose names were to be recorded as voting for the selected measures, no matter whether they were present or ab- sent. '"Perhaps in no other state has political corruption reached this low level of unblushing fraud. And yet this is but one step beyond the practices that are common in Missouri and many other states. Moreover just such a state of affairs is the inevitable result of allowing bosses to control the votes of legislators. In Missouri the cor- 86 CORRUPTION AND PEBJUBY. porations and political contractors pay mone) into the campaign fund so called, and when the Jefferson City they are told by the | juat what bills they may vote for and what bilU they a oppose. The individual jndgmenl of the legislator count* for little. But he is still at liberty I • ith his own voice, and so preserve at leasl the form ol in- dividual judgment. Tiny used to do things in the MUM way in Pennsylvania and the present out the direct outgrowth of thai Bystem. "The United States is in qo danger from without, no power on earth and no combination of |»>u. i likely to be brought together could overthrow as. But within our own government and especially in our hells, are the seeds of our own unduniL'. S ivic crii as those of which the last Pennsylvania legislature guilty are bound to bring their own punishment, and ery other state that is submitting to the rule of any boss or set of bosses is making itself a pla pot f<>r the dissemination of corruption. The American people are strong enough and intelligent enough to end rils if they will. But the longer it is delayed the more difficult will the undertaking be. Let other Btates take warning from the fate of poor old Pennsylvania, wearing the collar of Quay, and end the corrupt rule of bosses before it reaches the stage of making laws without even the con- sent of the legislators." In the summer of 1897 one of the bi^est frauds in CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. 87 municipal history was attempted in St. Louis. A number of capitalists wished to buy all the street railways in the city, form a trust, and operate them under one head. To consumate this scheme a bill was introduced into the Mu- nicipal Assembly, known as the North and South bill. This failed to pass for the simple reason that not enough money was put up to pass it. It was only a feeler. However, it appeared again with a different name, and backed by a more determined effort and more cash. We quote tlic l ) o>t-Dispatch, which published all the facts at tile time: (From the Post-Dispatch of April 18, 1898.) "The Post-Dispatch herewith presents facts concerning the manner in which the Central Traction bill was passed over the mayor's veto. The facts are such as warrant im- mediate investigation by the grand jury, and the attention of thai body i> called to what follows. "The history of the Central Traction bill is a sequel to that of the old North and South bill. The scandal con- tained in that measure was fully revealed by the Post- Dispatch last summer. "At that time the men behind the North and South bill were not as influential or possessed of as much wealth as these who manipulated the second scheme— the Central Traction bill. "The North and South bill was introduced as a feeler. Such lobbying as was done in its behalf was conducted by John Hermon. No money was paid for votes, so far as 88 CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. could be found. There were frequent champagne suppi distribution of cigars, etc. This 'jollying* mi nol enough for the members of the House of Dele] and the Coun- cil, which accounts for the measure noi passing over the mayor's veto. "Now comes the introduction of the Central Traction bill, having behind it, as stated above, men oi in- fluence. The Post-Dispatch know* that those men w) names have been printed as being at the head of the Central Traction bill, only have a minor interest. The Post-Dispatch knows who the true promoters are, and when the facts are revealed, St. Louisans will be aston- ished to ascertain who really have seized control of this city. This information is another story and will b< when this question of bribery has been disposed of. "When the Central Traction bill came up nr.-t it was easily passed. It was then vetoed by Mayor Ziegenh« in. After that the promoters settled down to earnest, hard work in order to carry the measure over the mayor's veto. In order to be sure of a sufficient majority in the House of Delegates to influence the Council — of which they were afraid — they decided on securing 25 votes in the House oi Delegates, and did so. "Last Tuesday night the House of Delegates met to pass the measure over the Mayor's veto. Prior to the jneeting, a caucus of sufficient strength was held. A mem- ber of the House of Delegates, whose name is known by the Post-Dispatch, had in his pocket when he entered the CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. 89 caucus seventy-five $1000 bills. When the caucus ad- journed this member had but fifty $1000 bills left. The Delegates then went into session and the bill was passed. Twenty-five men voted for it. Their names are : "House — Joseph L. Schuler, W. H. Judy, Henry Wan- der, John P. Sweeny, Adolph Madera, Otto Schumacher, J. P. Hirth, Edmund Bersch, Emil Hartmann, Henry Hennig, Charles A. Gutke, John Helms, Louis Becker, John J. Burke, John A. King, Henry L. Weeks, Jr., Julius Lehmann, John J. Wilmore, William H. Ritter, E. E. Mur- rell, John H. Debrodt, George D. Schaefer, C. W. Watson, George F. Robertson, Henry B. Wittenberg. "The following did not vote for the iniquitous measure: F. C. Pauley, Harry C. Coudrey, Hiram Lloyd. "After the House of Delegates adjourned, the second caucus was held. All who had been in the first caucus were there with the exception of two — Messrs. Schuler and Lehmann. When this caucus was ended, the boodle middleman had no more $1000 bills in his possession; or, if he had, he only had six $1000 bills, which he intended for men who did not come to the caucus. "A similar deal was made in the council. The quota- tion of votes of councilmen was talked of around the City Hall as much as brokers talk of the rise and fall in wheat, or gas, or tobacco stock. Just how much was paid is not known. The lowest price was $3000 and the highest was $10,000. 90 CORRUPTION AND PEKJUBY. "At this time it is of interest to relate a scene which was akin to tragedy in the council chambers. "When it came to the turn of the Council to pass the bill over the mayor's veto the members of the House of Delegates filed in to watch. They were there to see that there was no backsliding and to give such 'moral 1 en- couragement as was in their power. "The name of Mr. Uthoff is the last on the roll of the Council. The President of the Council votes after the members have cast their ballots. In order to pass the bill over the Mayor's veto, one vote was necessary. Either Mr. TJthoff or President Meier could have cast that vote. Both were on record as being against the bill. Mr. Uthntf had solemnly pledged Mayor Zeigenhein that he would oppose the measure. The promoters had reason to believe that Uthoff would vote in favor of the bill. But Uthoir was not to be trusted. He had dealt double before. The promoters feared him. "Now for tragic scene. "When it came Uthoff's turn to vote, the silence in the chamber was such that heart beats could almost be heard. Uthoff hesitated a moment. President Meier turned white as a sheet. He bowed his head. Every muscle and nerve seemed to be in a tension. Uthoff coughed to clear his throat. Then in a low tone he gave the word that cast his vote for the steal. President Meier's face turned from white to red. He looked up in triumph. His features were indicative of great relief and joy. CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. 91 "Judge Zachritz, who impaneled the May term grand jury of 1898, in instructing the body to take up and in- vestigate these charges, said in part: JUDGE ZACHRITZ' CHARGES. (From the Post-Dispatch of April 25, 1898.) "Judge Zachritz, Monday morning, charged the grand jury as follows: " 'It has been charged by said paper that members of the House of Delegates and of the City Council have been guilty of bribery and the charge involves not only one or two members of the Municipal Assembly as now consti- tuted. A charge of this kind necessarily requires prompt action of some kind at the hands of the authorities whose duty it is to suppress crime * * * But not until now has a specific charge been made, and the time has come, gentlemen, and I speak advisedly, and in calm judgment when in my opinion determined action must be taken by a grandjury and the prosecuting officers of the judicial circuit for the purpose of ending, once for all, this un- fortunate condition. " 'The issue, in my opinion, is clear cut. Either the allegation of bribery against said officials is true and can be substantiated by legal and competent testimony, as averred by said paper, or such publication is entirely with- out foundation in law or fact, and is made through mo- tives other than those which tend to subserve the public good, and made designedly for some ulterior purpose, and in that event those who hold out such a charge to the 92 CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. public are, in my judgment, guilty of one of the most damnable crimes known to the law. viz., criminal libel. " 'In conclusion, gentlemen, the court indulges the bope that however unpleasant and laborious the work may be that necessarily will be entailed upon you by reason of this specific charge, the fruits of the same will be such thai for a long time to come this community may rest secure in the assurance that on the one hand no temptation, how- ever great, will be sufficient to induce public officials to become unmindful of their obligations toward the com- munity and the government whose laws they have sworn to obey, and, on the other hand, every citizen, whether in official life or not, may be secure in his possession of a good name and character against all unjust assaults made either by the individual or by the press." NO INDICTMENTS. "The May term grand jury adjourned May 18, having returned no indictments in the Central Traction case, af- ter an investigation covering a period of almost thirty days. This grandjury was composed of the following gentlemen. "BRUCE C. ALVORD, foreman, secretary Schultz Belting Co. "GEORGE L, ALLEN, president Fulton Iron Works. "CHARLES R. BLAKE, clerk Simmons Hardware Co. "AUGUST BRAUER, stove repairs. "MONROE R. COLLINS, JR., real estate. CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. 93 "ARTHUR A. EDDY, grocers' sundries. "WILLIAM H. ETTER, 900 Washington avenue. "ROBERT D. MARKHAM, insurance. "SAM M. PIPER, secretary St. Louis Coffin Co. "JOHN P. SMITH, business not stated. "GEORGE DAUSMAN, real estate. "CHARLES D. SMILEY, 3838 Westminster Place. "The Circuit Attorney, at that time, who had the di- rection of the grandjury investigations, was Theodore C. Eggers; his assistant was Samuel D. Hodgdon." However, nothing at all was done in the matter. For four years the thing rested, as no grandjury took up the case. But the public were well aware of the corrupt meth- ods of the Central Traction bill, and it was well known that the State Legislature had passed a bill to incorporate the company, and that this bill had been signed by the Governor. And yet the matter rested. Four years later, January, 1902, a grandjury investi- gated every phase of the scandal, and the report of the succeeding body corroborated the charges made by the newspapers four years back. But it was too late. The statute of limitation barred all prosecution of the offend- ers, with one exception— Robt. M. Snyder of Kansas City, whom it was claimed was not subject to the statute, be- cause he had been a resident of New York since that time. We quote the Post-Dispatch again: FEBRUARY INDICTMENTS. "The February grandjury of 1902 indicted Robert M. 94 CORRUPTION' AND PEBJUET. Snyder in the Central Traction case. It ie held by Circuit Attorney Folk that Mr. Snyder has maintained his place of residence outside of Missouri for a long enough period to make the statute of limitations inoperative in hii case. "Mr. Snyder is a capitalist who now Uvea in New York. When the offense alleged in the indictmenl is said to 1 been committed Snyder lived in Kansas City. The date of the alleged offense is 'on or about March 22, 1898.' At that time Council bill No. 451, otherwise known as tin- Central Traction bill, was pending. "It is alleged that Snyder negotiated with and paid Frederick G. Utthoff, then a member of the Council. $50,- 000 to procure the vote and support of that oliioial for the measure. "Judge Ryan will try the Snyder case. It has not yet been set. "Commenting on the Central Traction bill, the April grandjury said: "'Convincing documentary evidence was unearthed proving that the sum of $145,000 was placed in escrow in a bank in this city to be paid to the members of the Mu- nicipal Assembly of St. Louis upon the passage of a valu- able franchise ordinance. 'This ordinance failed and a second bill was intro- duced, upon the passage of which the sum of about $250,- 000 was distributed among its members. ' 'After the passage of this ordinance the franchise was CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. 95 sold for $1,250,000. The city realized nothing whatever for this franchise. RESULT DISAPPOINTING. "'We regret that the grandjury of three years ago, which made a fruitless investigation of the municipal scandal, was unable to secure the evidence which we found so readily and which could have been more easily ob- tained at that time. " 'We cannot but believe that if the officers whose duty it was at that time to prepare and present matters of this kind to the indicting body had discharged their duty faith- fully and vigorously the result would have been different. " 'No city,' continued the April body, 'has been so com- pletely at the mercy of faithless public servants. No municipal corporation has ever had its most valuable fran- chises so recklessly and scandalously disposed of for a consideration which found its way not to the city treasury, but into the itching palms of public pilferers.' " The Central Traction franchise was sold to the Transit Co. for $1,250,000.00. The Transit Co., born, as it were, in iniquity, corruption and crime, at once started out upon a most vicious and appalling career. To cut down expenses cars were taken off and the speed increased. Accidents became numerous and frightful. Scores were killed and hundreds maimed for life. In a short time they began to break up the Union of the conductors and motormen. The long bloody strike mentioned later took place. 96 CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. "Every line but the Suburban was owned by the Transit Co. The public used this line whenever it was possible, and gave it moral support and favor in every way. It was popular, but the Transit Co. was hated. But this popularity collapsed, when tbe Suburban Road was caught red handed in a villainous piece of bribery. I quote the Post-Dispatch again: THE SUBURBAN DEAL. "The Suburban franchise deal, though on a smaller scale financially, involved more prominent influences to father its passage than any ordinance ever presented for consideration. "The Suburban Railroad Co., according to the testi- mony of Charles H. Turner given at the Meysenburg trial, employed a legislative agent to see that $135,000 was paid for the valuable franchise privileges asked. ' 'Phillip Stock was our (meaning the Suburban Rail- way Co.) legislative agent,' testified Turner. "Stock, who is the secretary of the St. Louis brewing Co., and accounted wealthy, acknowledged the title on the witness stand. "The story of the disgraceful municipal chapter is fresh in the public mind. "Information reached Circuit Attorney Folk that a sum of money had been placed in safety deposit vaults at the Mississippi Valley and Lincoln Trust companies for dis- tribution among members of the Municipal Assembly. "One key, it was said, had been held by John G. Brink- CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. 97 meyer, representing Charles Kratz; another was in the possession of John K. Murrell, while a third was held by Stock, of the Suburban company. FOUND THE $130,000. In company with Circuit Attorney Folk, Foreman Lee and two other members of the grandjury visited the trust companies. "In the deposit boxes they found $135,000, and, with this confirmation of the report that the Suburban Rail- road Co. had placed that amount there for distribution among the members of the assembly in case the bill passed, the grandjury and Mr. Folk proceeded to probe the matter to the bottom. "Acting on the advice of attorneys, President Charles H. Turner of the Suburban Railway Co., and Philip Stock, his 'legislative agent/ appeared before the grandjury and related the details of the entire transaction. "They stated that the money was placed there in ac- cordance with an arrangement made by which the com- pany was to have one key to the boxes and Councilman Kratz and Delegate Murrel the other key to one of the boxes each, the money to remain there until the bill was passed. "The bill passed the Council, but was stopped by in- junction proceedings in the House of Delegates. The company then refused to surrender their keys to the boxes and it was the continued demands of the representatives (7) 98 CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. of the Assembly that brought the knowledge of the fund's existence to Mr. Folk's ears. THREE INDICTMENTS. "Within a week after the grandjury took up the investi- gation of the affair it returned indictments against Mur- rell, Kratz and Emil A. Meysenburg, another former member of the Council. Meysenburg was a member of the railroad committee which reported the bill favorably. Kratz was one of the councilmen who voted for the bill's passage. Murrell, as a member of the House, had no op- portunity to vote on the bill. "The bench warrants were served on Murrell, Kratz and Meysenburg Monday, January 27. "Each of these men was indicted for bribery. Bribery indictments were also found within the next few days against Ellis Wainwright and Henry Nicolaus, and.perjury indictments against Julius Lehmann and Harry A. Faulk- ner. "Wainwright and Nicolaus are directors of the Su- burban Railroad. Their indictment resulted from testi- mony before the grandjury that they jointly, with Presi- dent Turner, signed the note for $135,000 on which the money deposited in the boxes was secured from a St. Louis bank. "Wainwright was in Egypt at the time and has not since returned. Nicolaus, who is a brewery proprietor, admitted signing the note, but declared his ignorance of the purpose for which it was to be used. CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. 99 "Faulkner is a member of the present House of Dele- gates and Lehmann a former member. They were in- dicted because they told the grandjury they know nothing about the existence of this $135,000 fund, after the grand- jury believed, from other evidence, that they did know about it. INVESTIGATION CONTINUED. "W. H. Lee was foreman of this grandjury, which made its report to Judge Horatio D. Wood February 2. It recommended further investigation into municipal corrup- tion. The February grandjury, impaneled a few days later, was specially charged by Judge O'Neill Ryan, who succeeded Judge Wood in charge of one of the criminal divisions of the Circuit Court, to pursue this line of in- vestigation. William B. Dean was chosen foreman. "The first indictments resulted from investigations of the Suburban bill introduced in the Council in October, 1900, and passed by the Council February 8, 1901." The public and the press clamored for further investiga- tion. The grandjury kept up the good work, and indicted no less than fifteen men for bribery and corruption. I quote the Post-Dispatch again: BUTLER INDICTED. "Ed Butler was indicted by this grandjury a few days later on a charge of attempted bribery. His indictment resulted from investigations into the passage of the 'gar- bage bill* by the present Assembly. It was charged against Butler that he offered Dr. H. N. Chapman of the board 100 CORRUPTION AND PERJURY. of health a 'present' of $2500 and that he also attempt <■nd dose of injunc- tion. "Machinists and molders of Chicago given a second do of injunction. "Chicago union machinist pronounced guilty of violat- ing an injunction for saying to a Bcab, 'Say, may I talk to you?' "Printers injunctioned at Bammond, End., and later unionist imprisoned. "Iron and steel workers injunctioned at (anal Dover, 0. "Postal department rules that journals owned by labor organizations are not privileged to publish advertisement Amalgamated Association, miners and other union- some- what crippled. "Postal department suppresses Wilshire's Challenge, the Farmers' Advocate and is after the Appeal to Reason. "California Supreme Court cripples a referendum law. "Postal department forces President of Omaha C. L. T. to resign his office or leave the service. "Supreme Court of Pennsylvania declares injunctions against trade unions constitutional. "Court injunctions hurled, Pinkertons imported, and TRADES UNIONS. 135 police commit outrages against strikers in San Francisco. "Flint glassworkers of Eaton, Ind., injunctioned and sued for $10,000 damages. "More union printers arrested in New York for 'con- spiracy' for boycotting. '•Seattle unionist jailed for 'inciting to riot' in carrying a boycott banner. "Authorities move to wipe out organization of workmen in Tampa, Fla., and protect bosses who kidnapped strikers and imported contract labor and scabs. "Moklers at York, Pa., given a second dose of injunc- tion. "Buffalo unionist fined $560 for preventing six scabs from going to Cleveland to take strikers' places. •Custom clothing workers of Chicago injunctioned from writing or telegraphing name of unfair firm or pub- lishing the fact that said firm does not use the union label. "Iglesias arrested and sentenced to three years' im- prisonment in Porto Pico, where he was organizing work- ers, for having led strike two years ago. "Cincinnati earriagemakers given a second injunction. "Miners of Hopkins county, Ky., injunctioned, evicted and prohibited from camping on land they were given the right so to do. '•Philadelphia building trades unions injunctioned. "Zanesville carriage workers and metal mechanics in- junctioned. "What does this long roll of tyranny teach? This: 126 TRADES UNIONS. Capital controls the governing power and ogee it I Thi fore, Labor controlling the votes, they should be used to capture that power and muzzle it!" In the face of present conditions, then, it is folly to plead for harmony between Capital and Labor. As well try to harmonize fire and powder as these two elements. Capital is combining in trusts, with every promise of the strongest Plutocracy in the history of the world, and also Labor is organizing into Unions, stronger than at any time in the history of the world. Carroll D. Wright says the American Federation of Labor has 500,000 members, the Knights of Labor 150,- 000, and the American Railway Union 150,000. Other local and national unions have a total membership of 600,000, making a grand total of 1,400,000 ACTIVE, WORKING members of trades unions. Many hundred thousands of workers outside the union are influenced and controlled by them. They are popular with the working classes generally because they keep up the price of labor. The enormous power of Trades Unions, then, is only equalled by the enormous power of combined Capital. I believe heartily that some day these two giants will clasp hands in harmony and peace — but not until after the Revolution, and until they have clashed in a terrible struggle. CHAPTER VII, STRIKES. Their Cause, History and Kesults — Amazing Condition of Affairs in "Free" ( ?) America— Facts That Freeze the Blood. It is contended by many that there never will be any danger of a great clash between capital and labor; that the facts in the case do not warrant any such prophesies; and that before long all labor troubles will be settled by arbitration. But is this true? Let us look around us; let us see if there is any evidence to substantiate these optimistic views. In the first place, there is the great coal strike going on in Pennsylvania right now. President Roosevelt sent Carroll D. Wright, the United States Labor Commissioner, to investigate and make a report of the condition of things. Editorially the St. Louis Post-Dispatch says: A SUPPRESSED REPORT. "When the anthracite strike broke out the President di- rected Commissioner of Labor Carroll D. Wright to pro- ceed to the ground, investigate and make a report. (127) 128 STRIKES. "Mr. Wright made his report to President Roosevelt eight weeks ago. Mr. Roosevelt .-aid it would be made public. But since then nothing has been heard or seen of the document. "Why? "This question is being asked with considerable feeling in the regions directly affected by the strike. "It is reasonable to suppose that the report contains something pertinent and interesting. If it were a dull, routine paper its publication would not have been de- layed. Evidently Mr. Wright said thing "What did he say ? "The Post-Dispatch has called attention to the fact that in 1901 the output of anthracite coal exceeded by more than 9,000,000 tons the output of 1900. It can hardly be contended that the enormous increase — IT per cent — was in response to current demand. The question is, was it because the strike was foreseen, and if foreseen^ why? "Does Mr. Wright ask and answer this question ? "Let us have the report. The President will not deny the public right to it." Again, the same paper prints the following: "Special to the Post-Dispatch. "WILKESBARRE, PA., May 21.— Two regiments of the National Guard are already under orders in anticipa- tion of trouble at the coal mines. The Ninth Regiment of the National Guard, with headquarters here; the Thirteenth, with headquarters at Scranton, and the STRIKES. 129 Fourth are under orders to be in readiness for action. The men have been ordered to take home their kits and be prepared for a hurry call. "Armored cars, bullet proof, loopholed and bristling with rifle barrels and revolvers, are to be used by the coal barons in a war for the destruction of the miners' unions. "Barricades are being thrown up at the mines for the sheltering of uniformed guards, of whom between 3000 and 4000 have already been sworn in to shoot down the strikers if they threaten violence. "Two hundred men were sworn in today and at least 600 more are to be sworn in. "The armored cars have been sent to all parts of the anthracite fields." Another paper prints the following: "At Newport News, Va., the agent for the Pinkertons hired a lot of 'cow-punchers,' men who spend their time on the cattle ships which ply between American and European ports. These rough fellows have been supplied with rifles and will be shipped like any other cattle to the mining districts of Pennsylvania." Does this look like there is any great love lost between labor and capital? Does the millenium seem at hand when such things exist ? It is an idle dream to think that there will be any reconciliation between these two enemies in the near future. Labor has a grievance and is daily becoming less dis- cs) 130 STRIKES. posed to give in for the sake of peace. Afl long ai wide inequality prevails; as long as hardships are imposed: N long will the grievance last. And these inequalities and grievances will last. The Appeal to Reason Bays: "Every working day in the year, Mr. Schwab of the Steel Trust is paid a salary of $3,205. The average wag. of men who produce all that wealth is le^s than $9 per day. In other words, it takes the combined wages of 1,325 wage-slaves to produce the amount paid to one man be- cause he has the ability to prevent the laborers from get- ting what they earn." Bishop Potter says : "In railways and waterways we find men who have never seen their employers. And as you try to touch one of these lives with your own you have a sort of start, for you cannot but regard him as a mere cog in the great wheel of commerce; and so they say that some lives must be sac- rificed in the coal hole that the great column of commerce must move on. You may call the theories by what name you will, they are of the devil. It is a question whether wc ought to encourage the production of goods, with in- difference to the infamous methods of their production." As long as these conditions prevail, all hope of peace is useless. The very opposite will be the result. My purpose is to show that a Revolution is coming, and to point out and analyze each element that will take part. The labor trouble is one and has a most important bearing on the subject. I wish to point out briefly STRIKES. 131 and clearly how serious is the labor trouble, and how firm- ly each side is intrenched in its convictions and how stub- bornly they will oppose each other. Capital claims the working people are too arbitrary, and that they cannot permit Labor Unions to dictate terms, or run their business for them. That, having large sums of money invested, they have more at stake than the working people, who perhaps are only employed tem- porarily. And, further, they claim they have a right to employ whomsoever they will — union or non-union — and that labor is in the wrong when it demands that non- union labor be discharged. Further, they claim that Trades Unions are also trusts. In answer to all of this the working classes claim they have more at stake than those who have capital invested, because their daily bread; yes, their very lives, and the lives of their families, depend upon them having occupa- tion and wages enough to subsist upon; that capital in controlling and giving out work controls and gives out life to whomsoever they please. In other words, he who con- trols another economically virtually has that person en- slaved. No other control is necessary. The question then is lifted to a moral plane. The rights of property and statute law all fade into insignificance before the wrongs of slavery. If, then, labor is in the right morally, it undoubtedly will receive popular support ultimately, and will grow stronger and more aggressive. 132 STRIKES. At present organized labor is a sleeping giant, with scarcely a realization of its power. The strikes and dem- onstrations we have witnessed thus far are only the mut- terings and tossings of the sleeping Hercules, as though in troubled dreams. But let him awake. Then the real trouble will come. The strikes that have taken place will pale into insignifi- cance, compared to those that are destined to shake this government to its foundations. Yet, to gain an idea of what will take plaee, and what it will be like, we must look into a few of the present-day troubles and difficulties, and glance over a list of the number in progress now. Not long after I had settled in St. Louis the famous street car strike took place, whieh was one of the notable ones of history. The Transit Co., already referred to, undertook to break up the union of its employees. The latter struck and the citizens took sides with them. As has already been stated, this company had established itself by stu- pendous fraud and villainy; had defied the law after it was established; had watered its stock up to $90,000,000 and was now trying in every way to squeeze a dividend out of the public and its employees. In this half-year the St. Louis Transit Company carried 64,805,033 "revenue pas- sengers" in 2,442,178 trips, as compared to 55,924,587 pas- sengers in 2,531,388 trips in the first six months of 1901. The passenger patronage shows an increase for the six STRIKES. 133 months of 8,880,446 fares and a decrease of 89,210 in the number of trips. As has been stated, the ears were rushed at break-neck speed through the streets, killing and maiming the citi- zens in its wild desire to increase its profits. Never was a corporation more bitterly hated than this one. Yet the people were powerless, and stood completely at the mercy of this law-breaking trust. It was no wonder the people sympathized with the strikers. When the strike was declared, the public re- fused to patronize the cars, and the amazing spectacle was presented of cars on a score of lines being run to and fro without any passengers. The people walked to work; some rode in wagons, paying five times the price, rather than patronize this hated institution. It wasn't long before the company saw they would have to do something to make the strikers unpopular with the public. This they proceeded to do. They had hire- lings blow up street cars, cut and pull down wires, assault the scab motormen and conductors, and obstruct the tracks with rocks, lumber, rubbish, etc. Men were caught blowing up street cars, arrested and tried. In the trial it came out that they were hired by the company to do these things. Of course, many people were guilty of these offenses, under the mistaken idea that they were aiding the strikers. Of course they only injured the cause. I saw many acts of violence such as these, but not one of 134 STRIKES. them by the strikers. Never one did public .sympathy side with the Transit Company. The hatred of the people was further increased by the organization of the Posse Comitatus. The Governor had refused to send the militia to the city in aid of the police, and so this body was organized. Immediately they began to bully, beat and shoot at citizens on the slightest provocation. Many people were wounded and a number killed by these hirelings before the great and awful tragedy of June 10 was enacted. On that day the strikers gave a picnic across the river, at East St. Louis, with the object of raising funds. Re- turning toward evening, they marched across the bridge and straight out Washington avenue, which is a continua- tion of the bridge. The headquarters of the Posse Comi- tatus was at Sixth and Washington avenue, and only three blocks from the bridge. Headed by a brass band, the procession marched straight out Washington avenue, passed the headquarters, just as any parade would do, following the course of many a parade before, and along the path that many have taken since. As they passed the headquarters the bloody massacre occurred. It is a disputed question as to which side started the i rouble. The strikers claim they were not disturbing the peace. The Posse claim some one threw a piece of brick. Perhaps some bystander did. There is no proof. It is STRIKES. 135 almost a certainty that no one in the parade did. Every- body testified that the posse were more than anxious to begin firing, which they did with their deadly riot guns, for in an instant they brought these deadly weapons into play, and fired right and left into the crowd. Unmindful of the shrieks of the wounded, that lay scattered about, torn and maimed, and unmoved by the sight of the dead, they fired again and again. The bystanders said hundreds of shots must have been fired, and the spectacle was awful. The greatest confusion prevailed. A number were dead and a greater number were wounded. Many ^who had been shot were carried away by friends and were never counted in the list of dead and wounded. All told, during the spring and summer that the strike lasted, there were about 27 killed and nearly 100 wounded. The Transit Company won and completely broke up the union. Everybody remembers the terrible and bloody Home- stead Strike. The working people will never forget it, nor Mr. Carnegie and Mr. Frick. The detailed account of one bloody strike is the story of all of them. And there are so many! To give an idea of their number I give you several lists of strikes taken from different papers during the Spring and Summer of 1902. It cannot be contemplated with indifference: "Massachusetts averages fifteen labor strikes per month. "Gloucester, Mass., May 1.— Seven hundred quarrymen struck for a nine-hour day. 136 STRIKES. "Durango, Col., May 1.— Three hundred miners struck for more pay. "Rochester, N. Y., May 1.— Five hundred coal wagon drivers are on strike. "New Briatain, Conn., May 1.— Fifty carpenters were locked out in honor of May Day. "Barre, Vt., May 1.— About 500 granite workers struck for more pay and a shorter work day. "Port Huron, Mich., May 1.— About 500 men are out at this place in an effort to increase their wages. "Cape Ann, Mass., May 1. — Five hundred granite cut- ters struck for shorter work days and better pay. "St. Paul, May 1. — Three hundred carpenters went on strike for an eight-hour day and better wages. "Toronto, Ont., May 1.— More than 1,000 men of all trades celebrated May Day by striking for an increase in wages. "Providence, R. I., May 1. — One thousand teamsters struck for recognition of their union. No freight was handled all day. "A strike among Chicago teamsters has affected thir- teen mercantile establishments, and further trouble is ex- pected. "The American Woolen Company's weavers are nearly all out on strike. There are 20,000 of them demanding better treatment. "Sharon, Pa., May 1. — Three hundred structural work- STRIKES. 137 ers of the American Bridge Company went on strike May 1 for $4 and an eight-hour day. "Bridgeport, Conn., May 1. — Two hundred carpenters, plumbers and hod carriers struck for a minimum wage of $3 and an eight-hour day. "Youngston, 0., Mav 1. — Two thousand men in the building trades laid down their tools, making good their demand for an eight-hour day on May 1 "Reading, Pa., May 1. — One thousand carpenters, plan- ing mill hands and hod carriers quit work because the contractors refused to sign an agreement. "Coal miners at Springfield, 111., have struck because the operators refused to sign the agreement that would favor the men. About 2,000 are idle. "Jersey City, May 1. — Two thousand machinists and bench men in twelve moulding and saw mills went on strike for an eight-hour day and a wage of $2.50. "Portland, Ore., May 1. — Labor situation very unset- tled. About 750 men of all trades are on strike and others threaten to lay down their tools. Shorter work days and increased wages are the demands. "The street car men of Chicago are organizing. They will demand redress of grievances and a strike may follow. The labor organizations are supporting them, and a lively time is expected, if the men are not given their rights. ! "The coal miners of Michigan are striking for better conditions. 138 STRIKES. "Six different trades are on strike in Denver for ail eight-hour day. "Singer sewing machine workers are on strike They are getting prosperity wages— $1.25 and $1.35 per day. "Patterson, N. J., has lots of trouble. About 4,500 dyers are now on strike because their wages had been re- duced to the level of $6 per week. The employers pro- duce the causes that end in lawlessness, and then hurry to the press and lay the blame on the anarchists. "Buffalo, N. Y., May 1.— Five thousand men went on strike in Buffalo, including carpenters, plumbers and iron workers. They demanded an increase from thirty-seven and one-half cents an hour. Bricklayers and masons were granted an increase and did not strike. 1 "Pittsburg, Pa., May 1.— It is estimated that over 15,- 000 men went on strike May 1st in this one city. The de- mand is for shorter work days, and increase in wages. Carpenters, bricklayers, plumbers, hod carriers, bridge workers, icemen, etc., have determined to have more of the wealth they produce. "Paterson, N. J., May 1. — All the union hod carriers went on strike for an eight-hour day and thirty cents an hour. The electrical workers are all out. Carpenters have been out several days, and it is said that one of the largest contractors signed the men's agreement. The silk dyers may return to work at an early day. Suffering has compelled them to alter their demands, STRIKES. 139 'There is a strike of engineers in Helena, Montana, and three thousand men are affected. "Weavers in Nutmeg Silk Mills, South Manchester, Conn., are on strike against reduction of wages. "At Nashville, Tenn., there are 300 carpenters strik- ing for a nine-hour day and twenty-five cents an hour. "Two men injured and twenty-four arrested as a result of a strike riot among stone masons in New York City. "Wire frame makers of New York City are striking against reduction of wages. It was shown that some of them made as high as $12 a week, and the firm thinks $9 is enough for a wage-worker to live on. "Chicago firms affected by strikes are: Chicago Photo- Engraving Company, Franklin Engraving Company, Rog- ers & Wells, J. Manz & Co., George A. Reiman, Barnes- Crosby Company, The Osgood Company, P. Zacker & Co., Jurgens Bros., The Rosenow Company, Illinois Engraving Company, Chicago Engraving Company, Columbia En- graving Company and Blomgren Bros. "Two thousand wage slaves of the Coats Thread Trust are on strike against oppression at Pawtucket, R. I. Why don't they vote the same way they strike ? "Three thousand people are out of work as a result of strike of weavers in Camden, N. J. The weavers want an increase of 10 per cent to meet the increased cost of living. "Two men were discharged from the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Cmpany in The Dalles, Ore., the other day 140 STRIKES. for being workers for the United Brotherhood of Railway Employes. "There is almost a total tie-up in the building trades of Denver as a result of 5,000 members of the union going on strike in sympathy with the wood workers, who are de- manding an eight-hour day. "One thousand two hundred girls employed in cigar works at Detroit on strike because of their great prosperity. No civilized nation would have conditions that forced girls to work in tobacco. "The Western Federation of Miners' is planning to ope- rate a co-operative mine. Co-operation is in the air. It will sweep the world one fine morning like a pleasant breeze on a mid-summer day. "Paterson, N. J., bakers are planning a great strike. "Chicago bricklayers have struck for higher wages. "Painters in Dayton, 0., have struck for a nine-hour day. "Galesburg, 111., carpenters have struck for an eight- hour day. "There is a strike among the weavers in Fitchburg, Mass. "Lowell, Mass., is threatened with a strike in the textile industry. "Six different trades are on strike in Denver for the eight-hour day. "Marble workers are on strike for higher wages at New- ark, N. J. STRIKES. 141 "A strike is brewing in the soft coal fields of Virginia and West Virginia. "The strike of brewery workers in Cincinnati has reached large proportions. "Toronto painters were locked out for demanding thirty cents an hour. "Prosperity has hit Boston again, 1,600 brewery work- ers are striking for shorter hours. "Ten thousand miners are striking against the Roches- ter & Pittsburg Coal and Iron Co." This list does not comprise all of the strikes that have taken place in a year, but during a period of from 30 to 60 days. A year's list would be ten times as long. Compare the following different sentiments and you have the whole situation in a nutshell: "Judge Baker of Indiana, a federal judge, said that men who take strikers' places should carry rapid fire guns, which they had a right to do so long as they were not con- cealed. And that the complaint against strikers should be amended so as to include damages. They might not have any propertv, but the judgment would prevent them ever accumulating any property and that officers could take their clothing if they found them in bed ! And labor unions, the votes of whose members elect the Republican party that appoints such judges, should not go into poli- tics for themselves." And the following noble expression: 142 STRIKES. "I am wearv, weary, weary, of this talk about on getting up above his fellows. I have a thousand til more respect for the man who 'goes on strike" to lighten the burden of his fellow worker- than I have for the man who for his own selfish ends 'would lighten his emplo burden;' for the sake of getting to be a 'superior' himself, getting '$10,000 a year,' would see his fellow workmen trampled on and devote himself to 'never adding to the burden of his superiors.' "— Celia B. Whitehead. Arrayed behind these two sentiments are the forces of Capital and Labor. It is a fight of steel bank vaults against human stomachs. But the cause of the people and labor grows stronger every day. They are winning slowly but surely, inch by inch. At last Capital will make one desperate stand. It will have the wealth and power, ft will control the government and the army. All of this will be used against the people. To give an idea of the deadly weapons that may be turned against the people, we quote the Pittsburg Dispatch : MODERN IMPLEMENTS OF WAR. "A correspondent of the Pittsburg Dispatch writes from Washington, D. C. : " 'What a ghastly curiosity shop are the stores of arms and projectiles and warlike models of all kinds in various nooks and corners of the War and Navy Departments! They are scattered and meager by comparison, to be sure, but they are enough to set the most thoughtless a-think- ing as to what we are coming to, and what will be the end STRIKES. 143. of the wonderful impetus of invention in the direction of weapons for the destruction of human kind. All that we possess up to this time, in this our new country, in the way of examples of such invention, would hardly compare in interest or volume with a single room of the vast collection in the old Tower of London, but it is enough to tell the whole story. To look at all this murderous machinery one would think the governors of the world were bent on the extermination of the human race, instead of its improve- ment and preservation. " 'Along with the modern inventions which enable one man to kill 1,000 in the twinkling of an eye are the crude weapons of those simpler days when men fought hand to hand in battle. But we need not refer to them to illustrate progress in the art of warfare. Even the machinery used in the very latest of the great wars is now antiquated. Were a new Civil War to begin to-morrow in the United States, or were we to become involved in a war with a foreign country, we could as soon think of taking wings and battling in the air as to fight with the weapons of a quarter of a century ago. A few of the guns and ships which came into vogue towards the closing days of the war, remodeled and improved almost out of their original shape, might be employed under some conditions, but the great bulk of the murderous machinery would be sup- planted with entirely new inventions, compared with which the best of the ok 1 would be weak or wholly power- less. I never was more forcibly reminded of this progress U 4 STRIKES. in the domain of the horrific than yesterday when on an errand to the Navy Department I wu shown the mod.l and plans of the new Maxim automatic mitrailleuse. It (and the Maxim guns with other names) is certainly tl most ingenious and the wickedest of all the c-uriou- weapons of warfare recently invented. It is the intention to manufacture them up to the size of a six-inch cannon, which will automatically fire about 600 rounds in a minute. This, of course, has been exceeded by the Gatling and other guns, carrying very small projectiles, but these, com- pared with the Maxim, are cumbersome to operate, re- quire more attendants, are much heavier and far less accu- rate. One man can operate the Maxim gun, or one wo- man, or one child, for that matter, and after setting it going the gunner can stroll away for a quick lunch while his gun is engaged in killing a few hundred people. The gunner sits on a seat at the rear of the gun behind his bullet proof shield, if he desires to use one. When he wants to mow down an army in a few minutes he simply waits till the aforesaid army gets into a position favorable for his work. Then he pulls a crank which fires the first cartridge, and the work of the automatic machinery be- gins. The explosion of the first cartridge causes a recoil which throws the empty shell out of the breach, brings an- other shell into place and fires it. The recoil of that ex- plosion does a similar service, and so on to infinity. It is murder in perpetual motion. " 'One of Mr. Maxim's inventions is called the "riot STRIKES. 145 gun," a light little affair that can be transported in one's arms with enough ammunition to drive any ordinary mob out of the streets or out of existence. It is curious how all of the most recent inventions in this line look toward a certainty of riotous mobs. Since when did the inventor turn prophet ? Well, this "riot gun" can be worked at the rate of ten murderous shots a second, with the gunner all the time concealed, and in perfect safety, even from a mob armed with guns or even pistols, provided that same mob does not conclude to make a rush and capture gun and gunner. It seems to be expected by inventors like Mr. Maxim that modern mobs will stand in the streets to be shot down without acting either on the defensive or the aggressive, and that they will not stand around safe cor- ners with bombs, or blow up or burn a city in their frenzy. However this may be, he has done all he can in the way of a gun for mobs. This little weapon can carry enough am- munition with it to clean out a street at one round, and in a few seconds, and it can be operated from walls or win- dows with as great facility as in the open street. With a twist of the wrist it can be turned up or down on the point of its carriage, and made to kill directly above or below the gunner without endangering the life or limb of that de- votee of the fine art of murder.' " What will be more natural than for those in power to use these weapons upon the masses in revolt ? They will be bent upon holding the situation, and perhaps will be convinced they are in the right. Feeling called upon to (10) 14 6 STRIKES. preserve the institutions they think threatened, they will ston at nothing. We simply ask is it unreasonable to pre- dict that strikes will be one— only one— of the factor- in bringing on the revolution? CHAPTER VIII. MACHINERY. Its Development; Its Place in the Economic World— Its Eelation to Labor and Capital and the Part It Will Act In the Future. The introduction of labor-saving machinery into modern industry has been productive of both good and evil. Like fire, it is both a good and a bad agent. If con- trolled judiciously it is a blessing; if employed pro- miscously and recklessly, it may produce great havoc. It is in the latter way that machinery has been intro- duced — planlessly, and without any regard to its general and ultimate effect. This blindness and its result we will consider. How remarkable that such a powerful and good agent can become so perverted. How terrible to think of pos- sible great blessings turned into great plagues. Think of the immense wealth that might be produced; and that might add to the comforts, joy and happiness of the race. And yet there are many men who would gladly see ma- chinery abolished, and hand labor instituted once more. This, of course, will be attributed to ignorance and preju- (147) 148 MACHINERY. dice, and to a view that is so narrow that it has not taken in the whole problem. It will be said they never weigh the good against the bad that results from the use of labor-saving machinery. Maybe they don't. And yet can they be blamed? They get all of the bad and very little of the good. Into their lives have come more of the bit- terness and disappointments than the blessings and helps incidental to the employment of machinery. Their share has been reduced wages, uncertainty of work, loss of position, and worry, with a small per cent of the good things that go with it. , A brief review of the many labor-saving devices adopted becomes in order. So many have been added daily of recent years that we scarcely notice them. There are too many to pay attention to them all. During the last half of the eighteenth century there began a remarkable change in the methods of producing wealth which is still going on. This change was ushered in by a series of inventions. Kay's fly-shuttle (1739), Hargreaves' spinning jenny (1764), Arkwright's water frame (1769), Watt's steam engine, invented in 1769 and applied to the manufacture of cotton sixteen years later, Crompton's mule (1779), Cartwright's power loom (1789), and Whitney's cotton gin (1793). Since that time invention has followed invention with astonishing rapidity. The railroad, the steamboat, the telegraph and the telephone have come, and now to the power of steam is being added that of electricity. The MACHINERY. 149 story of the introduction of modem machinery is too long to trace in detail here. The first effect on the hand workers who were supplanted by machines was disastrous in the extreme. Later effects are little better. Not long since in Pennsylvania, within the brief space of six hours and four minutes a number of sheep were shorn, and the wool put through all the processes of man- ufacture necessary to turn it into a suit of clothes. A test was also made with shoes. A steer was killed, the hide tanned, turned into leather and made into shoes all in twenty-four hours. In an interview recently, a St. Louis shoe manufacturer stated for the Shoe and Leather Gazette that by the aid of new turn machines his concern can produce about 400 pairs of shoes a day; one operator doing the work former- ly requiring eighteen skilled mechanics. The new glass bottle blowing machine is pronounced a success by the trade. One of the Standard Oil Company's manufacturing concerns uses 10,000,000 bottles a year, and the president of the company says the machine-made bottle is entirely satisfactory. A lamp chimney machine is being operated in Birmingham, England, and a plant is being built in Toledo, O., to manufacture chimneys by machinery exclusively. "With one unskilled man or boy to work it this machine does the labor of four skilled men by the old process/' says a writer who describes its work- ings. A new electrical riveting machine, to be used in the 150 MACHINERY. erection of large buildings, etc., and thai can insert 1200 rivets in ten hours; a needle-making machine that revo- lutionizes the industry by destroying hand production and turning out 260 needles per minute; and a new sterotvp- ing process that operates automatically and displaces many skilled workers, are new labor-saving devices an- nounced as entering the market. The printing business is undergoing changes daily. The linotype is fast taking the place of type-setters. But that is not all. Inside of a year a new automatic type-setting machine will be on the market that will sell for $2,000. It will be run by electricity and set whole words at a single touch. A new web press will also be on the market soon which will print newspapers faster than they can be counted and is much simpler in construction than the presses now in use. The following is from St. Louis Labor: "A basket machine has recently been invented which will completely revolutionize the basket making industry and throw thousands of workers out of employment. The machine was invented by Mergenthaler, the inventor of the linotvpe, and is almost as wonderful in its make-up. "About fifty of the machines are in operation in various parts of the country, making grape baskets, berry baskets and fruit baskets of a strength and quality never ap- proached by hand work, and with speed and ease which makes these machines wonderful to all who watch their work. Fancy a single machine that will turn out com- MACHINERY. 151 pleted berry baskets at the rate of 12,000 per day of nine hours work! This is at the rate of 1300 per hour, or over TWENTY BASKETS A MINUTE. "When you take into account the fact that heretofore all baskets have been made by hand, and that one girl operator on one of these Mergenthaler-Horton machines accomplishes as much as twelve hand operators, the real efficiency and the money saving qualities of the machine become evident." Electricity is yet in its infancy, but where it once takes possession of a field it appears to be permanent, and delvers for the dusky diamonds will soon have to face the stern fact that where they have not been driven out by the cheap labor of Europe they have a more invincible foe to meet, and that in a few years, where thousands are en- gaged in mining, hundreds will do an equal amount of work by the aid of electrical mining machinery. The Olyphant Gazette says: "The wonderful strides of science, and innumerable de- vices of this inventive age, are fast driving manual labor out of many industries, and thousands of workingmen who found remunerative employment a few vears ago arc vainly seeking for something to do. Where hundreds of men were engaged in a mill or factory, now a score will do a greater amount of work, aided by mechanical con- trivance." Still another writer says: "In the tailoring business one man with electricity can 152 MACHINERY. cut 500 garments a day. In Carnegie's steel works, elec- tricity helping, eight men do the work of 300. One match- making machine, fed by a boy, can cut 10,000,000 sticks a day. The newest weaving loom can be run without at- tention all through the dinner hour, and an hour and a half after the factory is closed, weaving cloth automatic- ally. "Here is presented the problem of the age that is await- ing solution: how to so connect our powers and our neces- sities that there shall be no waste of energy and no want. With this problem properly solved, it is plain that there need be no tired, overworked people; no poverty, no hunger, no deprivation, no tramps. Solutions in- numerable have been proposed, but so far none seems applicable without doing somebody an injustice, real or apparent. The man who shall lead the people to the light in this matter will be the greatest hero and the greatest benefactor of his race the world has ever known." Another writer notes the following as facts : "One man and two boys can do the work which it re- quired 1,100 spinners to do but a few years ago. "One man now does the work of fifty weavers at the time of his grandfather. "Cotton printing machines have displaced fifteen hun- dred laborers to each one retained. "One machine with one man as attendant manufactures as many horse shoes in one day as it would take 500 men to make in the same time. MACHINERY. 153 "Out of 500 men formerly employed at the log sawing business, 499 have lost their jobs through the introduction of modern machinery. "One nail machine takes the place of 1,100 men. "In the manufacture of paper 95 per cent of hand labor has been replaced. "One man can now make as much pottery ware in the same time as 1,000 could do before machinery was ap- plied. "By the use of machinery in loading and unloading ships one man can perform the labor of 2,000 men. "An expert watchmaker can turn out from 250 to 300 watches each year with the aid of machinery, 85 per cent of former hand labor being thus displaced." The Pittsburg Po6t, noting the progress of crude iron manufacture during the past twenty years by improved furnaces, says: "Twenty years ago, in 1876, the production of pig iron in the United States was 2,093,236 tons. In the year 1895 the production of pig iron in the County of Allegheny was 2,054,585 tons. In 1885 the total production of the coun- try was 4,144,000 tons of pig iron, while in 1895 we led the world with 9,446,000 tons." Canadians notice the same conditions and the same ef- fects. The Montreal Times says: "With the best machinery of the present day one man can produce cotton cloth for 250 people. One man can produce woolens for 300 people. One man can produce 154 MACHIXKKY. boots and shoes for 1,000 people. One man can produce bread for 200 people. Yet thousands cannot gel cottons, woolens, boots or shoes or bread. There must be -ome reason for this state of affairs. There must be some way to remedy this disgraceful state of anarchy that we are in. Then, what is the remedy ?" The Topeka State Journal >a \ - : "Prof. Hertzka, an Austrian economist and statesman, has discovered that to run the various departments of in- dustry to supply the 22,000,000 Austrian- with all the necessaries of life, by modern methods and machinery, would take the labor of only 615,000 men, working the customary number of hours. To supply all with luxuries would take but 315,000 more workers. He further calcu- lates that the present working population of Austria, in- cluding all females, and all males between the ages of 16 and 50, is 5,000,000 in round numbers. His calculations further led him to assert that this number of workers, all employed and provided with modern machinery and methods, could supply all the population with necessaries and luxuries by working thirty-seven days a year, with the present hours. If they chose to work 300 days a year, they would only have to do so during one hour and twenty minutes per day. "Prof. Hertzka's figures regarding Austria, if correct, are applicable with little variation to every other country, not excepting the United States There is a steam har- vester at work in California that reaps and binds ninety MACHINERY. 155 acres a day, with the attention of three men. With gang-plows attached, the steam apparatus of this machine can plow eighty-eight acres a day. A baker in Brooklyn employs 350 men and turns out 70,000 loaves a day, or at the rate of 200 loaves for each man employed. In mak- ing shoes with the McKay machine, one man can handle 300 pairs in the same time it would take to handle five pairs by hand. In the agricultural implement factory 500 men now do the work of 2,500 men. "Prior to 1879 it took seventeen skilled men to turn out 500 dozen brooms per week. Now nine men can turn out 1,200 dozen in the same time. One man can make and finish 2,500 2-pound tin cans a day. And this is only a brief review. A thousand instances might be cited instead. Furthermore, many inventions are in an incomplete state; while common sense tells us that invention has just begun. One could scarcely overestimate the possibilities of the future. Then, suppose all of this machinery is run to its full capacity. The machine, skillful, tireless and efficient, in competition with men will outstrip them, take their places and throw countless thousands out of work. What will be the good of all the wealth turned out by the machines? The few who secure work will get less wages. Those out of work will have no means of support. If no one is able to buy this vast product, how will it be disposed of ? If it cannot be disposed of, there will be a general shut- 156 MACHINERY. down, followed by a panic such as the world has never witnessed. Does any onethink the people will be cool and reason- able then? When they think of the ease with which all the necessaries and luxuries of life are produced J when they view the overflowing warehouses; when they think that on account of overproduction, panic, etc., they are out of work and in need of all these things, will they not become frenzied ? or will they stand by with their families and suffer in silence ? No ! Lashed by hunger they will act. History will repeat itself. I wish to impress this fact: that this is only another element at work to hasten the revolution. After thor- oughly examining the subject of machinery one is almost led to believe that it will lead to a revolution in itself. However, elsewhere is told how all these forces will unite ; how they are not separate factors, but intimately con- nected with each other; and the reason why they will act together given. CHAPTER IX. CHILD LABOR. A Curse Without Palliation— The Infamy of Our Civiliza- tion — Heartrending Facts of Cruelty and Injustice. America claims to be the most enlightened country in the world. In inventions we certainly lead. In science, literature and art we are fast becoming the peer of Europe. We weigh the heavenly bodies, and determine their chemical elements. Microscopists and bacterio- logists delve into nature's most hidden secrets. No avenue of research but what is thoroughly investigated by this intelligent people. And finally we put little children to work in the factories and mines. Little tots that ought to be at home under a mother's care, or at school receiving the training that we owe them. How barbarous! How inconsistent with all our learning and wisdom! Why does this nation put these helpless little ones to work in the mines, factories and shops, when we have so much machinery, so many strong men, and such an abundance of wealth, as statistics continually show ? And why is this practice on the increase ? The following report of Labor Commissioner O'Donnell of Minnesota is startling: (157) 158 CHILD LABOR. "CHILD LABOR OX INCREASE. "Minnesota Labor Commissioner Submits Figures for the Benefit of Working Men. "Minneapolis, Minn., Jan. 4. — Labor Commissioner O'Donnell yesterday completed a report of the inspection work done in the entire state during 1901. In all 3,647 establishments have been inspected, employing 85,393 persons. "Of these 3,172 are classified as manufacturing, and em- ploy 71,192 people. "Child labor has increased over 1900 from .92 per cent to 1.01 per cent. A large portion of the child labor, how- ever, was employed DURING THE VACATION OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. Child labor is divided among the classes of establishments as follows : Per Cent. Cigar manufacturing 5 Cooperage 2.55 Knitting works 12.20 Printing trade 1.86 Tinware manufacture 12.00 Department stores 3.00 Retail stores 3.00 "Sunday work, in addition to regular week work as far as the present inspection reached, included 5,374 persons, or 6.29 per cent of the weekly wage earners." "These figures tell the story of capitalist exploitation in CHILD LABOR. 159 more forceful language than a mere theoretical argument. "They show that already 12 per cent of the employees in the knitting works and tinware manufactories of Min- nesota are children and that the employment of children is steadily on the increase. "With the perfection of modern machinery skilled labor has become almost unnecessary, and the hand of a child can as easily direct its motions as the strongest man. "The capitalist class,, whose profits are made from the surplus wealth created by labor, understands the increase which will accrue to it through any reduction in the portion allotted to labor. Any measure which, if adopted, would bring about this result, will at once be put into practice by the capitalist class. "The machine offers this opportunity, and they employ children in their operation for the reason that they do not require as much wages as a man, while their labor is just as effective. "It appears from the report here shown that the great- est increase in this child labor occurred 'during the vaca- tion months.' The children of the working class are not even allowed an opportunity to enjoy their school vaca- tion, but they must give up their time, which should be spent in pleasure and recreation, in the employment of capitalism; they must spend their leisure hours in grind- ing out profits for those who hold the power of life and death over them/' The first question asked is, "What effect will child labor 160 CHILD LABOR. have on the revolution ? Will these little ones rise up and take part." Child labor has an important bearing on the subject, but not because these little ones will ever rise up and pro- test against the wrongs inflicted upon them. It shows what a terrible condition our present industrial system is in; and it will set people thinking and studying. And then, by the practice their fathers are thrown out of work. Stop and think of the condition of things; when the strong men of the nation are forced to idleness and their children compelled to work. This can not be tole- rated very long. The perpetuation of it would be worse than revolution. And, does it not seem that something must be wrong or we never could have reached such a state of affairs. These are not my thoughts or opinions, but facts as they exist all over this fair land of ours. Aside from what I know I give the observations of others ; people who have no concern except merely to publish the truth. The following is from the St. Louis Chronicle : CHILD LABOR. i G 3 WEARING THEIR LIVES AWAY FOR TEN CENTS A DAY. Pitiful Condition of Children in the Cotton Mills of Georgia. CHRONICLE STAFF CORRESPONDENT FINDS STARTLING CONDITIONS. Tots Grow Up Stunted in Growth and in Ignorance. "From a Staff Correspondent. "Atlanta, Ga., Feb. 8. — Hundreds of children, scores of whom are not more than 10 years old, and many only 8 and 9, are wearing their little lives away in the cotton mills of Georgia, or growing up to stunted development, in ignorance as dense as that which pervades uncivilized districts of Central Africa. In describing the conditions governing child labor in the cotton mills, I was particu- larly cautioned not to exaggerafp. "My investigation has proved that exaggeration is prac- tically impossible, for it is difficult to imagine how con- ditions could be worse. Yet I am told that conditions have improved in recent years. If that be true, what a task it must have been for any clergyman to impress the little ones with the punishment of a life hereafter, unless they were threatened with an eternity in the mill. "Children ranging in age from less than 10 years up- ward are working 12% hours a day for as low as 10 cents 164 CHILD LABOB. a day. They are often brought up in the mill, lying in improvised cribs behind their toiling mothers. Frequent- ly they narrowly escape being born there. "Many of the little ones become accustomed to the deafening noise of the machinery before they become fa- miliar with their mothers' faces, and long before they can lisp the name of 'mamma.' "Amid such surroundings they grow up to take their places in the mill as soon as they are able to do the work. "Often whole families work together in the mill, the children in one department and the parents in another, but between them they can not eke out more than a scanty living, so low are the wages paid the hands. "The work of ( the little children is largely confined to the spinning room, where unremitting attention is re- quired instead of muscle or riper intelligence. In the spinning room are the frames, where the coarser material is spun into fine thread, ready for weaving. The coarse thread unwinds from one spool, passes through a corru- gated roller that thins it out and winds up again on another spool. The frames are double, facing both ways, and there are from 75 to 125 spools on each side. "The frames are separated by a passageway about four feet wide, and the children are kept busy walking up and down this alley watching the spools to see that everything runs smoothly. When the threads break they gather up the ends, unite them by rubbing them between their fingers, and start the spools going again. The children CHILD LABOR. 1,; :> have to be on their feet almost constantly, and always on the watch for broken threads. The doors and windows are always kept tightly closed, and as a result the air is bad and filled with flying particles of cotton. The ma- jority of the children employed at the spindles are girls, and the effect of the long hours of work and being con- stantly on their feet is especially noticeable on their health. The health of the children is affected in more ways than one, and their growth and development are stunted. "The general rate of pay is 10 cents a day for one side of a frame. The child is paid nothing for the two or three weeks that it takes to learn to do the work. When the little one is able to watch one side of a frame she is put on the pay roll, and is entitled to draw coupons good at the company store against her pay. After two or three months she may be able to attend to two sides, and then she gets 20 cents a day. By the time she is 16 or 17 years old she may perhaps be able to take care of four or five sides, if she makes good progress. "The spools on the frames are changed from empty to full and full to empty by 'dorfing boys/ They are given certain sections to look after, and have enough to keep them busy. Like the girls who watch the threads, their eyes have to be constantly on the spools. They are paid from 25 to 50 cents a day, but generally the lower price. "The looms in the other part of the mill are operated 166 CHILD LABOR. by the older children, those of 15 and over— and the mothers and fathers. "The children, go to work at from 5:45 to 6:30 in the morning, and work 12 hours and a quarter or 12 hours and a half for five days in the week, with half an hour for lunch. Saturday is a short day, and the mills generally close at 2 or 3 o'clock on that day. Most of the mills run 66 hours a week, but some run 67. Although Satur- day is a short day, a child loses one-sixth of its week's wages if it misses that day. "The effect of the long hours and close confinement is shown in the heavy percentage of sickness "among the children. As a general rule they do not work more than four days a week, either on account of sickness or because, as sometimes happens, they are a few minutes late in getting to work and are locked out. The child who gets in five days a week is thought to be doing exceptionally well. "Another result of the long hours of work is that the children can not go to school, and they are growing up in appalling ignorance. In many cases small schools are maintained by the mills for a few months in the year, but the attendance is very light, because by the time the chil- dren are old enough to learn they are put to work in the mill. Night schools have been tried, but always failed to accomplish anything, because after working all day the children are too tired to attend school at night. "The mill owners admit that not 10 per cent of the chil- CHILD LABOR, 167 dren they employ can read or write. I believe the per- centage is even smaller than that. "HUGH CAYANAUGH." At Union Springs, Ala., there are children working in the cotton mills, at the age of nine and over, who do not know the name of the state in which they live. I give another article by Mother Jones, the great friend of the miners, who was ordered sent to jail by Judge Jackson, as described previously : THE COAL MINERS OF THE OLD DOMINION. "A few Sundays ago I attended a church in a place called McDonald, on Loop Creek, in West Virginia. In the course of his sermon the preacher gave the following as a conversation that had recently taken place between him and a miner : " 'I met a man last week/' said the preacher, 'who used to be a very good church member. When I asked him what he was doing at the present time he said that he was organizing his fellow craftsmen of the mines.' "Then, according to the preacher, the following discus- sion took place: "'What is the object of such a union?' asked the preacher. " 'To better our condition,' replied the miner. " 'But the miners are in a prosperous condition now.' " 'There is where we differ.' " 'Do you think you will succeed ?' " 'I am going to try.' 168 CHILD LABOR. "Commenting on this conversation to his congregation the preacher said: 'Now I question if such a man can meet with any success. If he were only a college gradu- ate he might be able to teach these miners something and in this way give them light, but as the miners of this creek- are in a prosperous condition at the present time I do not see what such a man can do for them.' Yet this man was professing to preach the doctrines of the Carpenter of Nazareth. Let us compare his condition with that of the 'prosperous' miners and perhaps we can see why he talked as he did. At this same service he read his report for the previous six months. For his share of the wealth these miners had produced during that time he had re- ceived $847.67, of which $45 had been given for mis- sionary purposes. Besides receiving this money he had been frequently wined and dined by the mine operators and probably had a free pass on the railroad. What had he done for the miners during that time ? He had spoken to them twenty-six times, for which he received $32.41 a talk, and if they were all like the one I heard he was at no expense, either in time, brains or money to prepare them. During all this time the 'prosperous' miners were working ten hours a day beneath the ground amid poison- ous gases and crumbling rocks. If they were fortunate enough to be allowed to toil every working day through- out the year they would have received in return for 3,080 hours of most exhausting toil less than $400. "Jesus, whose doctrines this man claimed to be preach- CHILD LABOK. 169 ing, took twelve from among the laborers of his time (no college gaduates among them) and with them founded an organization that revolutionized the society amid which it rose. Just so in our day the organization of the workers must be the first step to the overthrow of capitalism. Sjfi SfL Sfi *fi J|» *J> 3|> ■]» ?|C "Then my mind turned to the thousands of 'trap boys/ with no sunshine ever coming into their lives. These chil- dren of the miners put in fourteen hours a day beneath the ground for sixty cents, keeping their lone watch in the tombs of the earth with never a human soul to speak to them. The only sign of life around them is when the mules came down with coal. Then as they open the trap doors to let the mules out a gush of cold air rushes in, chilling their little bodies to the bone. Standing in the wet mud up to their knees, there are times when they are almost frozen, and when at last late at night they are permitted to come out into God's fresh air they are some- times so exhausted that they have to be carried to the cor- poration shack they call a home. "The parents of these boys have known no other life than that of endless toil. Now those who have robbed and plundered the parents are beginning the same story with the present generation. These boys are sometimes not more than nine or ten years of age. Yet in the in- terests of distant bond and stockholders these babes must be imprisoned through the long beautiful daylight in the dark and dismal caverns of the earth. Savage cannibals !70 CHILD LABOR. at least put their victims out of their misery before be- ginning their terrible meal, but the cannibals of to-day feast their poodle dogs at the seashore upon the life blood of these helpless children of the mines. A portion of this blood-stained plunder goes to the support of educational incubators called universities, that hatch out just such ministerial fowls as the one referred to. "The miner with whom this minister had been talking had been blacklisted up and down the creek for daring to ask for a chance to let his boy go to school instead of into the mines. This miner could have told the minister more about the great industrial tragedy in the midst of which he was living in five minutes than all his college training had taught him. ********* "At the bidding of these same stock and bondholders, often living in a foreign land, the school houses of Vir- ginia are closed to those who build them and to whom they belong by every right. The miners pay taxes, build the school and support the officers, but if they dare. even to stand upon the school house steps a snip of a mine boss comes along with pistol in hand and orders them off. ' free speech," said one of them to me when I pro- tested, 'we do not need any free speech. You get off the earth.' Not only the school rooms, but every church or public hall is locked against us. On every school board you will find at least one company clerk or mining boss, and it is the business of this henchman of the mine own- CHILD LABOR. m ers to see to it that the school buildings are not used for public meetings by the miners." "COLORED CHILDREN AT SCHOOL, WHITE ONES WORK IN MILLS." Under this heading a Cleveland daily paper prints the following special correspondence from its reporter, who is traveling through the South: "Union Springs, Ala., Feb. 12. — There is a large mill here that turns out cotton yarn, and in it I found the usual percentage of very small children. One little fel- low, with a face as serious as though he had been fighting life's battles for years, was operating a band-making ma- chine. He said he was 8 years old, and when I pretended to doubt his statement he protested, 'Oh, yes; I know how old I am.' "One little boy working near him said he was 9 years old. "'How long have you been working in the mill?' I asked. " 'Oh, not very long,' he replied, 'only a little over a year/ ' 'Do you know the name of the state you live in ?' " 'Oh, yes sir; Union Springs.' "The little fellow had never heard of Alabama. "Just beyond where this boy worked I picked up a small todler, not over 3 or 4 years old, who evidently knew no other play ground than the mill floor. Here he appears every morning before 6 o'clock with his mother 172 I HILD LABOB. and sister, a girl about 12 years old. The mother and daughter, besides attending to their duties in the mill, keep a watchful eye on the babv as he plays about on the floor. "For the first time I saw colored children at work in this mill. This was explained by the statement that it was very hard to get white worker-, as 75 per cent of the town's population was colored, in all of the other towns that I have visited colored children were barred by the refusal of the white children to work with them. "The result of this condition is that the colored chil- dren are going to school and acquiring an education, while the white children, who work all day in the mills, are growing up in ignorance. It must not be imagined, either, that these children are foreigners. They are all Ameri- cans, and came from families that have lived in this coun- try for generations. They are naturally bright and smart, and would learn easily and quickly with any advantages at all." AND HERE'S ANOTHER. The correspondent of the Cleveland Daily Press is vis- iting the Southern cotton mills. He visited the Ex- position mills near Atlanta, which last year returned big, fat dividends to the stockholders. Here is what he says: "The Exposition company has 800 employes, of whom 275 are children from 10 to 14, while forty are unde 12. As is the rule throughout the state, they are paid ten CHILD LABOR. 173 cents a day for one side of a frame, which is all that many of them can operate. It is liberal to put the average wage of the children at twenty-five cents a day. "The Exposition mill is surrounded by a high board fence, just outside of which are the cheap little two and three-roomed shacks that are rented to the mill workers for $1.50 to $2.50 a month. "I met Chas. D. Tuller, secretary-treasurer of the Ex- position mills. He said conditions had recently been much improved. To mv suggestion that as the owners were inclined to be fair and sincere it would seem to be good nolicy for them to assist in passing a law prohibiting the employment of children under 12, he replied: " 'Never will such a law be enacted in this state. We have educated the legislators to know there is no neces- sity for it. We know it would simply be the entering wedge. The next thing, we would have a state official sticking his nose into our affairs, and then the walking delegate. No, sir ! We will have none of it.' "I stood at the gate of the Fulton Bag & Cotton Mill, in Atlanta, at 5 :30 one morning just as the big bell was call- ing the employes to work, and saw the children come run- ning over the frozen ground from cheerless cabins. Many of them were barefooted and all were thinly clad. The mill employs 1,400 persons, of whom 400 of them are small children. "In indiscriminate questioning I did not find one who 174 CHILD LABOR. could read or write, and but one girl who could spell her name. "In this mill every applicant for employment signs a contract that, in case of injury in the mill, the company will not be held responsible. Parents or guardians sign for minors, and it is a rare thing to see anything more than 'his mark.' " This from a writer in the Review of Reforms : THE NECESSITY FOR ACTION, NOT WORDS, ON CHILD LABOR. "Editor Review of Reforms. "The article entitled, 'Business Men Aroused Against Child Labor,' in your November issue, should enlist the efforts not only of every business man, but of every mother and woman, to stir up. the legislature and congress on this important subject. "The fact that girls, mostly under eleven years of age, are employed in factories and stores, appeals to the motherhood of the race to help educate on this great evil and to 'cry it down.' "That children of both sexes, from ten to fourteen years of age, are employed all night, as well as day, notably in a thread factory at Huntsville, Ala., is an outrage in this 'twentieth century civilization,' of which we so much boast. How can a nation remain free with the ignorance and vice that comes of such customs ? Why do we spend so much for public schools ; and chil- dren be deprived of their opportunities to an education? CHILD LABOR. 175 I fear we are drifting into an empire of ignorance and its accompanying results not surpassed by any foreign coun- try of Europe, that the people of this free Republic have pointed to with the finger of scorn and derision. "Mothers, will you not arouse yourselves on this great question? The past year is fast making history for our Eepublic. The addition of Hawaii and the Philippines and Cuba is an added menace to our free institutions. * The ignorance of the growing youth of our blood to as- sume the duties of citizenship is not a hopeful outlook. Every mother as well as father should arouse to the oc- casion and look these facts squarely in the face before we become ingulfed in irretrievable danger. The social and economic conditions of men and women today, more than ever before since we became an independent nation, are crying to each and everyone to come up and help in these critical times. Culture clubs that study dead history of Plutarch and Greek Sages are futile in these stirring times that call for humanity, and a federated club of women for the betterment of women, men and children. "So I appeal to you, my sisters, to consider these vital questions and make your influence felt. And here I am reminded of the poet who wrote : " 'So many Gods, So many creeds, So many paths that wind and wind, While all the sad world needs Is just the art of being kind/ "HANNAH TYLER WILCOX, M. D. "3840 Finney Ave., St. Louis, December 1, 1898." 176 CHILD LABOR. The Boston Transcript sav.~ : "EFFECT OF CHILD LABOR. "If we are to believe Miss Jane Addams, of Hull House, current jests about the perpetual weariness of the tramp frequently hides a deeper meaning than most suspect. She finds that many persons slip into tramp life through physical and moral exhaustion, resulting from overwork in childhood. In a recent address on this subject before the Chicago Business Woman's Club, Miss Addams said: 'Child labor undertaken too early or performed in excess is responsible for a large number of the tramps and am- bitionless way-farers of America. The boy or girl who works too early is surfeited with labor, bankrupt of am- bition long before the time when work should begin at all/ "The belief that trampdom often is recruited from the ranks of youthful toilers who have been overcome by an intense and terrible physical and moral fatigue because they overtaxed their strength is not new, but so far it has hardly been made the subject of careful investigation. At Hull House those facts have been observed for a number of years, and data are being collected. 'We notice,' says Miss Addams, 'that the child workers who were bright and eager and ambitious when commencing work some six or seven years ago, are different now. Nearly all of them are dull and lifeless, lacking energy and without ambition. Many are actual tramps.' " The recital of these facts might be extended indefi- nately; and. evidence piled upon evidence. But it would CHILD LABOR. 177 be unnecessary. Every trade unionist knows it to be true, as does every newspaper reader, and every resident of our large cities. Like Napoleon who robbed the cradles of France to add to his army, so our much-vaunted captains of industy have robbed our cradles to satisfy their greed. They have extended their army and said, "Suffer little children to come unto us, and forbid them not, for ours is the kingdom of hell." This is only another unhealthy symptom; another gnawing canker, which plainly shows something is radi- cally wrong, and which will meet with heroic treatment. (12) CHAPTER X. THE UNEMPLOYED. An Unsolved Question; Even in Times of Prosperity Great Perils Only Temporarily Postponed— The Cause Deep-Hooted and Growing — Danger Imminent. The problem of the unemployed is a most serious one to any nation; even during the brief intervals of good times. It is serious today, will be tomorrow, and more so the day after. There always have been short periods dur- ing which work has been plentiful, only to be followed by a reaction. At present this country is enjoying an era of prosperity. But it requires but little study and observa- tion to show that it cannot last. The effect must always be governed by the causes and conditions. How can there be plenty of work when inventions and labor-saving machinery are being multiplied daily; and with the sole object in view of dispensing with the labor of men? And when children are taking the place of men in mine, factory and shop? Is not this subject properly a continuation of the subjects Machinery and Child Labor? With Child Labor on the increase, and such improvements (178) THE UNEMPLOYED. 179 in machinery being made, large numbers must necessarily be thrown out of work, and especially when those em- ployed work from eight to sixteen hours per day. If sufficiently aggravated this evil might produce a revolution alone. Benjamin Franklin estimated that, if all would work, four hours labor a day, intelligently applied, would supply the wants of all. If that was true in his time what shall we say of the present era, with its wonderful increase in productive power ? John Stuart Mill wrote, almost with a wail : "It is questionable if all the mechanical inventions yet made have lightened the day's toil of any human be- ing." This cannot continue. The forces are gathering which will demand that machinery be utilized to lighten the labor and increase the comforts of life for every pro- ducer of wealth. Prof. Hertzka, the Austrian editor and author, in his book entitled, "Laws of Social Evolution," says: "I have investigated what labor and time will be neces- sary, with our present machines, etc., to create all com- mon necessaries of life for our Austrian nation of 22,000,- 000. It takes 10,500,000 hektars of agricultural lands, 3,000,000 of pasturages for all agricultural products. I then allowed a house to be built for every family, con- sisting of five rooms. I then found that all industries, agriculture, architecture, building, flour, sugar, coal, iron, machine building, clothing and chemical productions, need 015,000 laborers employed 11 hours per day 300 days a 180 THE UNEMPLOYED. year to satisfy every imaginable want for 22,000, • inn in- habitants. "These 615,000 laborers are only 12.3 per cent of the population able to work, excluding all women and all per- sons under 16 or over 50 years of age. All these latter i<» be called not able. "Should the 5,000,000 able men be engaged in work in- stead of 615,000, they need only to work 36.9 days every year to produce everything needed for the support of the population of Austria. But should the 5,000,000 work all the year — say 300 days, which they would likely have lo do to keep the supply fresh in every department — each one would only work 1 hour and 22i/> minutes per day. "But to engage to produce all the luxuries in addition, it would take in round figures 1,000,000 workers, classed and assorted as above, or only 20 per cent, of all those able, excluding every woman, or every person under 16 or over 50, as before. The 20 per cent of able, strong male members could produce everything imaginable for the whole nation of 22,000,000 in 2 hours and 12 minutes per day, working 300 days a year." These figures are reliable and prove that if everybody worked but two or three hours per day, the world's toil might be accomplished very easily. From various causes — machinery, trusts, inventions, etc. — entire trades and crafts are dispensed with ; and the lsrge numbers employed in them thrown out of work and forced to look elsewhere for employment. THE UNEMPLOYED. 181 This is true of drummers and salesmen. The advent of the trust has killed competition, and thus made the drum- mer less and less a necessity. Eventually the trusts will practically do without them; for having control of all the business, and there being no competition, they will not need to send anyone out to solicit orders; and the drum- mer will go. Mr. Edward H. Sanborn, of the United States census staff, after a careful inquiry, placed the number of drum- mers in the United States in 1880 at 250,000, and their cost to the country at $1,000,000,000 a year. Mr. Dowe estimates the number at present (1899) at 350,000. The cost to the country is probably $1,300,000,000 a year. The trusts will want to save as much of this large amount of money as possible, and will discharge about 300,000 of these, who will help to swell the vast army of the unemployed a few years hence. But the labor-saving machine is the chief cause of many being thrown out of work. Just study these facts : Spinning machines, operated by one operator and two girls, turn out more yarn than 11,000 old-time hand spin- ners could do. What an amazing increase this really is! Each worker turning out more yarn than 3,000 hand spin- ners, and yet getting deplorably small wages. In weaving, one man now does as much work as ninety- five could do with the old hand loom. One man tending a nail machine turns out as many nails ai; 1,000 men formerly did by hand. 182 THE UNEMPLOYED. Formerly it required a good workman to gin five pounds of cotton a day. Now two men with a machine turn ouc 4,000 pounds. Two machines operated by two girls will now turn out 240,000 screws a day, while a few years ago 20,000 screws was the most that twenty skilled workmen could turn out in a day. Formerly it took a quick worker to sew six pairs of shoes in a day. Now one man will sew 1,000 pairs a day with a machine. Who gets this extra wealth ? With match machines 300 girls will turn out as many matches as 8,000 men could formerly do. In making wall paper one man does the work formerly requiring 100 men. With a planing machine for turning out wood work for musical instruments one boy does the work formerly re- quiring twenty-five men. In 1889 the Berlin Bureau of Statistics estimated the power capable of being exerted by the steam engines of the world as equivalent to 200,000,000 horse power, represent- ing in men three time the entire population of the globe. T( has very much increased since them. Facts like these might be extended indefinitely. But every one knows that machinery has prodigiously in- creased the power of men to produce wealth. In the United States steam does the work of 230,000,- 000 men, representing almost the entire present popula- tion of the globe, and we are harnessing waterfalls to elec- THE UNEMPLOYED. 183 trie motors at a rate that seems likely to leave even that aggregation out of sight. Strikes and lock-outs throw thousands out of work; and they are becoming more numerous and larger all the time. Yet, as most strikes are of short duration, and the scene keeps shifting constantly from one part of the country to another, the fact is lost sight of that a large army is constantly out of work owing to strikes. The mightiest factor of all in throwing thousands out of work is the Panic and Crisis. Without exception, all will agree to this; for the panic of 1893 is still vivid in the memory of the people; and the havoc it played will never be forgotton. Some will say they do not believe there will be another such panic. I ask them why ? I ask them have they any sure proof? I can adduce proof that there will be another panic, and that it will precede and largely cause the revolution of 1907. But I will duscuss that later on, and for the present let us confine ourselves to the subject of the unemployed and how it is increased by panics. But let us refresh our memories in regard to the sub- ject. We may have permitted many facts to slip our mind. We will need them before long. The revolution if 1907 will be due largely to the same causes that existed in 1893. In the midst of the last dread panic, The Star and Kansan printed the following: "The unemployed in this country to-day number two 184 THE UNEMPLOYED. millions. Those dependent upon them probably number four times as many more. "Perhaps you have heard this before. I want you to think about it until you realize what it means. It meuu that under 'the best government in the world,' with 'the best banking system the world ever saw,' and everything else at the top notch, and with unparalleled productions of food and every other comfort and luxury of existence, one-seventh of our population has been reduced to abso- lute beggary, as the only alternative to starvation. People are going hungry in sight of warehouses and elevators filled with grain that can't be sold for enough to pay the cost of raising. People are shivering and almost naked in the shadow of store rooms filled to bursting with cloth- ing of every sort. People are cold and tireless, with hun- dreds of millions of tons of coal easily accessible in thou- sands of mines. And the shoemakers who are idle would be glad to go to work and make shoes for the men who mine the coal in exchange for fuel. So would the latter be glad to toil in the mines to get shoes. Likewise the half-clad farmer in Kansas, who is unable to sell his wheat to pay for the harvesting and threshing bills, would be delighted to exchange it with the men in the eastern factories who spin and weave the cloth he needs. "It is not lack of natural resources that troubles the country to-day. It is not inability or unwillingness on the part of the two millions of idle men to labor and produce desirable and useful things. It is simply that the instru- THE UNEMPLOYED. 185 ments of production and the means of exchange are con- gested in the hands of a few. How unwholesome a state of affairs this is we are beginning to realize; and we shall understand it more and more fully as the congestion grows more severe. People are idle, cold and starving because they cannot exchange the products of their labor. In view of such results as this, is not our boasted nineteenth cen- tury civilization pretty near a dead failure? The unem- ployed in this country formed in ranks four abreast and six feet apart would make a line six hundred miles long. Those who depend upon them for subsistence would in the same order reach 2,400 miles. This army thus formed would extend from the Atlantic to the Pacific — from Sandy Hook to the Golden Gate. "If the intellect of the race is not capable of devising a better industrial system than this, we might as well admit that humanity is the greatest failure of the universe. (Yes, that is just where divine providence is leading: men must learn their own impotence and the true Master, just as every colt must be ^broken' before it is of value.) The most outrageous and cruel thing in all the ages, is the present attempt to maintain an industrial army to fight the battles of our plutocratic kings without making any provisions for its maintenance during the periods in which services are not needed." The above was written during the period of the most serious depression incident to "tariff tinkering," and hap- pily is not the normal condition. However, there is no 186 THE UNEMPLOYED. knowing when it may be repeated. Nevertheless, the Harrisburg Patriot, of August 21, '96, gives the following figures under the caption, "The Number of the Unem- ployed : "There are 10,000 laborers out of work in Boston; in Worcester 7,000 are unemployed; in New Haven T,000; in Providence 9,600; in New York city 100,000. Utica is a small city, but the unemployed number 16,000; in Pater- son, N. J., one-half of the people are idle; in Philadelphia 15,000; in Baltimore 10,000; in Wheeling 3,000; in Cin- cinnati 6,000; in Cleveland 8,000; in Columbus 4,000; in Indianapolis 5,000; in Terre Haute 2,500; in Chicago 200,000; in Detroit 25,000; in Milwaukee 20,000; in Min- neapolis 6,000; in St. Louis 80,000; in St. Joseph 2,000; in Omaha 2,000; in Butte City, Mont., 5,000; in San Fran- cisco 15,000." The California Advocate said: "The assembling of the unemployed masses in our great cities in multitudinous thousands is a most grue- some spectacle, and their piteous cry for work or bread is being heard all over the land. It is the old unsolved problem of poverty, intensified by the unprecedented de- pression of business. Involuntary idleness is a constantly growing evil coincident with civilization. It is the dark shadow that steadily creeps after civilization, increasing in dimensions and intensity as civilization advances. Things are certainly in an abnormal condition when men are willing to work, want to work, and yet cannot find THE UNEMPLOYED. 187 work to do, while their very life depends upon work. There is no truth in the old saw that 'the world owes every man a living/ But it is true that the world owes every man a chance to earn his living. Many theories have been ad- vanced and many efforts have been made to secure in- alienable 'right to work' to every one willing to work ; but all such attempts have hitherto ended in gloomy failure. ' He will indeed be a benefactor to mankind who shall suc- cessfully solve the problem how to secure to every willing worker some work to do, and thus rid mankind cf the curse of involuntary idleness." Another account describes how. in Chicago, a crowd of over four hundred unemployed men marched through the down-town streets, headed by one of their number carry- ing a pasteboard sign on which was scrawled the grim legend, "We Want Work." The next day they marched with many banners bearing the following inscriptions: "Live and Let Live," "We Want a Chance to Support Our Families," "Work or Bread," etc. An army of unemployed marched through San Francisco with banners on which were inscribed, "Thousands of Houses to Bent, and Thou- sands of People Homeless," "Hungry and Destitute," "Driven by the Lash of Hunger to Beg." "Get Off Our Backs and We Will Help Ourselves," etc. Here is another: "Newark, N. J., August 21.— Unemployed workingmen held a large parade to-day. At the head of the line marched a man with a large black flag, upon which in 188 THE UNEMPLOYED. white letters were the words : "Signs of the Times— I Am Starving Because He is Fat." Beneath was a picture of a large, well-fed man with a high hat, and beside him a starving workman." Another journal, referring to the English Coal-miners' strike, said : "The stories of actual distress, and even of starvation, are multiplying painfully throughout England, and the cessation of industries and the derangement of railways are assuming proportions of grave national calamity. . . . . As might be expected, the real cause consists in the huge royalties that lessees have to pay for the ground to the landlords from whom they lease the mines. A con- siderable number of millionaires, whose coal royalties hang like mill-stones around the neck of the mining in- dustries, are also prominent peers, and angry public con- sciousness puts the two things together with a snap. . . . . Radical papers are compiling portentous lists of lords not unlike the lists of trusts in America, showing in their figures their monstrous levies on the earnings of the property of the country. "The cry for bread goes up from the city. It is deeper, hoarser, broader than it has ever been. It comes from gnawing stomachs and weakened frames. It comes from men who tramp the streets searching for work. It comes from women sitting hopeless in bare rooms. It comes from children. "In the city of New York the poor have reached straits THE UNEMPLOYED. 189 of destitution that have never before been known. Prob- ably no living person understands how awful is the suffer- ing, how terrible the poverty. No one person can see it all. No one's imagination can grasp it. "Few persons who will read this can understand what it means to be without food. It is one of those thing.; so frightful that it cannot be brought home to them/' The official figures of 1898, of the State Board of Chari- ties, shows that one-third of the people of New York re- ceived some kind of assistance during that year. Later figures are not obtainable because the court of appeals limited the jurisdiction of the board. The report was so startling that the court thought it would prevent such revelations in the future; knowing, of course, that the public could be humbugged into believing that conditions were improving. When, as a matter of fact, the number of persons who receive help is growing larger. The editor of The Arena says in his Civilization In- ferno : "The Dead Sea of want is enlarging its borders in ev- ery populous centre. The mutterings of angry discon- tent grow more ominous with each succeeding year. Jus- tice denied the weak through the power of avarice hai brought us face to face with a formidable crisis which may yet be averted if we have the wisdom to be just and humane; but the problem cannot longer be sneered at as inconsequential. It is no longer local; it affects and threatens the entire body politic. A few years ago one of 19 o THE UNEMPLOYED. the most eminent divines in America declared that there was no poverty to speak of in this Republic. To-day no thoughtful person denies that this problem is of great magnitude. A short time since I employed a gentleman in New York to personally investigate the court records of the city that he might ascertain the exact number of warrants for evictions issued in twelve months. What was the result? The records showed the appalling fact that during the twelve months ending September 1, 1892, twenty-nine thousand seven hundred and twenty war- rants for eviction were issued in the city of New York. "In a paper in the Forum of December, 1892, by Mr. Jacob Riis, on the special needs of the poor in New York, he says: 'For many years it has been true of New York that one-tenth of all who die in this great wealthy city are buried in the pottersfield. Of the 382,530 interments recorded in the past decade, 37,966 were in the potters- field/ and Mr. Eiis proceeds to hint at the fact known to all students of social conditions who personally investi- gate poverty in the great cities, that this pottersfield gauge, terribly significant though it be, is no adequate measure by which to estimate the poverty problem of a great city." The Coming Nation prints this : r 'You will admit that new machines are rapidly dis- placing workmen. The claim that the making and caring for these new machines employs the number thus thrown out will not stand; for if that were true there would be no THE UNEMPLOYED. 191 gain in the use of machines. The fact stands out so prom- inently that hundreds of thousands of men are now idle because machines are doing the work they formerly did, that any man must recognize it, if he will think but a moment. These men out of work do not buy as many goods as when employed, and this decreases the demand for goods, and thus prevents many more workmen from being employed, increases the number out of work and stops more purchasing. "What are you going to do with these unemployed? That prices of goods, as a whole, are being cheapened, does not give these men employment. There is no occupation open to them, for all occupations are glutted with men, for the same reason. You can't kill them (unless they strike), and there is nowhere for them to go. In all seriousness I ask, what are you going to do with them? Skilled farmers are bankrupting, so what show would these men have at that, even if they had land? "These men are multiplying like leaves of the forest. Their numbers are estimated by milllions. There is no prospect of many of them getting employment, or if they do, it is only to take the places of others now employed who would then be added to the out-of-works. You think, perhaps, that it is none of your concern what becomes of them, but, my dear sir, it is your concern, and you will realize it before many seasons. It is a subject that can- not be dismissed by turning on your heel and refusing to listen. The French people thought that, once upon a time, 192 THE UNEMPLOYED. but they learned differently, even if the present generation has forgotten the lesson. The present generation in the United States must solve this question, and will solve it in some way. It may be in peace and love and justice, or it may be by a man on horseback trampling down the rights of all, as you now carelessly see the rights of some trampled. "The French were warned, but they could not listen be- cause of the gaiety of royal rottenness. Will you listen ? or will the present course be permitted to run unchecked until five or six millions are clamoring for bread or the oxide of iron ? The trouble, when it comes, will be intensi- fied in the United States a hundred-fold, because of the social conditions that have prevailed here for a century. The love of liberty has grown stalwart, nursed on a hatred of kings, tyrants and oppressors. No army or navy from the masses can be relied upon to shoot their own fathers and brothers at the beck or order of untitled or titled kings. Seeing what must result from a too prolonged idle- ness of millions, whose conditions will soon cement a bond of fellowship, do you not think you have some inter- est in the conditions they are producing ? Would it not be better to find and apply a remedy, to employ these men, even in public workshops, than to have the finale ? "We know what the capitalists are doing: We see them preparing the munitions of war to rule the masses by force of arms. But they are foolish. They are wise only in their own conceits. They are adopting the tactics of a o o > Of « Of o I h: XT Q) C C d) o 0) XT H o THE UNEMPLOYED. 195 kings, and will be as chaff before the wind, by and by. AH the fates are against their tactics. Kings, with greater armies than can be mustered to fight for capitalism here, are trembling before the steady growth of a higher civi- lization among the people, hurried on by the distress of this rapidly increasing army of out-of-works. Justice injures none, though it may shut off the privileges of robbers. Let us as citizens, solve and settle the problem lawfully, not as partisans, but as citizens who think more of country than of party, and more of Justice than the king's gold." All of these facts bring back to mind the awful con- ditions that prevailed in 1893. They will be duplicated with interest. Listen! Every one remembers Coxey's Army. How it was laughed at and treated as a joke. But imagine another similar army! Imagine times vastly harder and the size greatly increased. When Coxey's Army strode into Washington it was laughed and sneered at ; but this army will receive the moral support and en- couragement of 70,000,000 people. Will this time ever come ? I think so. I am prepared to prove it. After you have studied and analized each element at work you will be forced to admit the same. CHAPTER XI. THE ARISTOCRACY. The Growing Class Feeling— An Arrogant Plutocracy Trampling Upon Manhood and Holding in Contempt the People Who Produce Their Wealth — Revelations of Heartlessness, Snobbery and Extravagance Among the 400. i could not better introduce this subject than by quot- ing an article from the New York Journal : "Mr. Reginald Vanderbilt, son of the railroad family, played roulette one night at Mr. Canfield's gambling house in Forty-fourth street, in the city of New York, and lost $125,000. HE ROSE WITH A SMILE OF GOOD NA- TURED INDIFFERENCE. "Thus briefly the news report tell one incident of life in a great city, where the very rich and the very poor dwell together in harmony. "A man with six children and a wife gets up at day- break — his wife has been up before him to prepare some thin coffee and fat bacon. "He takes his heavy crowbar and starts out for a distant (196) After losing $125,000.00 Reginald Vanderbilt arose from the gambling table with a smile of indifference. THE ARISTOCRACY. 199 point on the New York Central Railroad track, where he has been ordered to work. With the heavy crowbar and other tools he works all day long, tamping down the stone ballast under the ties. "He goes home at dark, having earned one hundred and twenty-five cents — a dollar and a quarter. "Mr. Reginald Vanderbilt, whose family is made pros- perous by the labor of tens of thousands of men, arises at 10 or 11 o'clock, walks on Fifth Avenue, lunches at Del- monico's, rides in the park, dines leisurely, goes to the theatre and drifts into Canfield's. "He nods to the croupier, who, with his apparatus all ready to swindle, is most affable. "A small ivory ball, spun by nervous fingers, swings around the hollow wheel. It strikes, jumps, rattles, set- tles down, and one play is over. "For an hour or two it rattles on. Then Mr. Vanderbilt goes away, having spent the day satisfactorily. HE HAS LOST AT GAMBLING $125,000. "He never EARNED a dollar in his life. "The gambling amusement of one evening represents the labor for one day of 100,000 men. "Is Reginald Vanderbilt a bad, vicious boy ? Not at all. He simply takes what our stupid social organization gives him — the labor of other men. He tries to get what pleas- ure he can out of life and what excitement he can for his nerves. "Not young Mr, Vanderbilt is to blame— nor can you 200 THE AIM STOCK ACY. justly blame the swindling vampire who owns the gambling house. Both of them are products of actual conditions. Both are even useful. For the little gambling stun which leaks out is a splendid lesson. It impresses on men's minds the horrid injustice of turning over the earnings of a hundred thousand men, the railroad wealth of a great state, to a foolish, dissipated boy. It impresses even on the dullest mind the gross stupidity of a system which compels the many to work and suffer that the few may be dissipated, ruining themselves while they deprive others." Mr. Reginald Vanderbilt is typical of a class that has sprung up in this free country of ours within recent years. America, supposed to be the home of freedom, the haven our forefathers sought, to escape the old world aristocracy, has reared an aristocracy more powerful and rich thau Europe ever dreamed of. With money to spend like water, every luxury the world affords is theirs. Banquets and feasts such as kings of old never thought of are at their command. Comforts and luxuries they have, such as emperors and monarchs never thought possible. The very stables of the rich are such palaces of loveliness that mil- lions of Americans would gladly exchange their homes for these. THE ARISTOCRACY. 201 Compare these two news items: TWO PICTURES OF THE "BEST GOVERNMENT ON EARTH." HANNA'S HORSES LIVE IN LUXURY. In the stable are seventeen horses. Their stalls are all oak, trimmed with iron gratings and brass. On each post is a brass ball ten inches in diameter and a straw skirt made by hand in many colors. Back of the stalls is a long hand-made straw mat, which looks like a hedge, the inner edge being fastened down, while the other ends of the straws are not secured and stick up in the air. In a rack at the end of the stable are countless em- broidered towels. Each time a horse is groomed a towel is used to clean the coat thoroughly. A towel is used but once. In the harness room, which is surrounded by plate glass, are sets of harness for each vehicle and horse. In a case in this room are hundreds of red, white and yellow rib- bons, won as prizes at horse shows and races. The entire barn is lighted by electricity, even the hay loft. The coachmen's quarters are on the second floor and are fitted up in fine style. In the center of the barn, about ten feet from the ground floor is the office or observatory. It is handsomely furnished and surrounded by glass. A person sitting in this room can view all parts of the barn. This is where Hanna entertains his friends when they in- spect the barns.— Cleveland Press, March 24. 202 THE ARISTOCRACY. THIED TIME TO THE BOOR HOUSE. "My God, do all roads lead to the poor house ?" asked feeble Matt Raetzel, eighty-three, late Monday evening, as for the third time in his luckless career he left the city dispensary for the home of the poverty stricken. He car- ried with him four small market baskets containing his entire earthly belongings. "I never expect to get out this time," he said with a piteous tremor in his voice, "and so I have gathered up everything to take with me to my last home/' Raetzel has been living at 305 S. Third street with his wife. For days they were without food of any kind. They were too feeble to help themselves and too proud to in- form the neighbors of their condition. Finally the wife started out to find relief. She never returned, and on Monday, Avhen the cold spell brought another of poverty's woes, the old man decided to seek a home among the city paupers. Twice before he went to the poor house, but got out only to return. — St. Louis Chronicle, April 2. Tfle newspapers abound with descriptions of fashionable weddings, balls and banquet at which the so-called "upper crust" of society appear in costly robes and rare jewels. One lady at a ball in Paris, recently, it is said, wore $1,600,000 worth of diamonds. The New York World in August L896 gave a picture of an American lady arrayed diamonds and other jewels valued at $1,000,000; and she does not belong to the very uppermost social strata either. The daily press tell of the lavish expenditure of THE ARISTOCRACY. thousands of dollars in providing these banquets— foi choice wines, floral decorations, etc. They tell of the palaces erected for the rich, many of them costing $50,- 000, and some as much as $1,500,000. They tell of "Dog Socials" at which brutes are fed on dainties at great ex- pense, tended by their "nurses." They tell of $10,000 paid for a dessert service, $G,000 for two artistic flower- jars, $50,000 for two rose-colored vases. They tell that an English duke paid $350,000 for a horse. They tell how a Boston woman buried her husband in a coffin costing $50,- 000. They tell that another "ladv" expended $5,000 in burying a pet poodle dog. They tell that New York millionaires pay as high as $800,000 for a single yacht. The California Christian Advocate, commenting upon one of the fashionable balls of New York City, says: "The lavish luxury and dazzling extravagance display by the wealthy Greeks and Romans of 'ye olden time* a matter of history. Such reckless display is beginning to make its appearance in what is called fashionable society in this country. One of our exchanges tells of a New York lady who spent $125,000 in a single season in entertaining. The character and value of the entertainments may be judged from the fact that she taught society how . . . to freeze Roman punch in the heart of crimson and yellow tulips, and how to eat terrapin with gold spoons out of silver canoes. Other entertainers decked their tables with costly roses, while one of 'the four hundred' is " ave spent $50,000 on a single entertainment. Such lavish 204 THE ARISTOCRACY. expenditure to such poor purposes is sinful and shameful, no matter how large a fortune one may possess." Messiah's Herald commented as follows: "One hundred and forty-four social autocrats, headed by an aristocrat, held a great ball. Royalty never eclipsed it. It was intensely exclusive. Wine flowed like water. Beauty lent her charms. Neither Mark Antony nor Cle- opatra ever rolled in such gorgeousness. It was a collec- tion of millionaires. The wealth of the world was drained for pearls and diamonds. Necklaces of gems costing $200,- 000 and downward emblazoned scores of necks. The dance went on amid Aladdin splendors. Joy was uncon- fined. While it was going on, says a journal, 100,000 starv- ing miners in Pennsylvania were scouring the roads like cattle in search of forage, some of them living on cats, and not a few committing suicide to avoid seeing their children starve. Yet one necklace from the Metropolitan ball would have rescued all these from hunger. It was one of the 'great social events' of a nation called Christian; but what a contrast ! And there is no remedy for it. Thus it will be 'till He come.' " J. R. Buchanan in the Arena, speaking of the heartless extravagance of the wealthy, says : "Its criminality is not so much in the heartless motive as in its wanton destruction of happiness and life to achieve a selfish purpose. That squandering wealth in ntation and luxury is a crime becomes very apparent by a close examination of the act. There would be no THE ABISTOCRACY. 205 harm in building a $700,000 stable for his horses, like a Syracuse millionaire, or in placing a $50,000 service on the dinner table, like a New York Astor, if money were as free as air and water; but every dollar represents an average day's labor. Hence the $700,000 stable represents the labor of 1,000 men for two years and four months. It also represents 700 lives; for $1,000 would meet the cost of the first ten years of a child, and the cost of the second ten years would be fully repaid by his labor. The fancy stable, therefore, represents the physical basis of 700 lives, and affirms that the owner values it more highly, or is willing that 700 should die that his vanity might be grati- fied." The following very interesting bit of information, quot- ed in the National View, is from Ward McAllister, lately a great New York society leader: "The average annual living expenses of a family of average respectability, consisting of husband and wife and three children, amounts to $146,915, itemized as follows : Eent of city house, $29,000; of country house, $14,000; expenses of country house, $6,000; indoor servants' wages, $8,016; household expenses, inclusive of servants' wages, $18,954; his wife's dressing, $10,000; his own wardrobe, $2,000; children's clothing and pocket money, $4,500; three children's schooling, $3,600; entertaining by giving balls and dances, $7,000; entertaining at dinner, $6,600; opera box, $4,500; theater and supper parties after theater, $1,200; papers and magazines, $100; jeweler's 206 THE ARISTOCRACY. running account, $1,000; stationery, |800; books, $500; wedding presents and holiday gift*, $1,400; pev in church, $300; club dues, $425; physician's bill, $800; dentist*! bill. $500; transportation of household to country and return, $250; traveling in Europe, $9,000; cosW.f stables, $17,- 000." A San Francisco Journal, Industry, recently contained the following comment on the extravagance of two wealthy men of this country : "The Wanamaker dinner in Paris, and the Vanderbilt dinner at Newport, costing together at least $40,000, per- haps a good deal more, are among the signs of the times. Such things presage a change in this country. This, which is only typical of a hundred more cases of like ostentatious money show, may well be likened to a feast in Rome before the end came, and the luxury in France that a century ago was the precursor of a revolution. The money spent annually by Americans abroad, mostly for luxury and worse, is estimated at a third as much as our National revenue." And, furthermore, these people are not elevated by their great wealth. Many of them are idlers, with no useful occupation in life. Instead of spending their time and money in improving themselves and their f ellowmen, their chief occupation is that of seeking amusement. Self- gratification has become their sole aim and object in life; their second nature. The daily papers are always reciting their escapades. THE ARISTOCRACY. 209 All remember the remarkable proceedings at Newport, when swell society dined a monkey. It is unnecessary to recount the details of this disgusting affair. It is still fresh in the public mind. Suffice it to say these ideas and tastes are degenerate, and take the place of refined and cultured ones. Such people are ladies and gentlemen in name only. They lack even simple dignity. Though aristocrats, they are forfeiting the respect of honest people. They merit the contempt of all good citi- zens. How can any one look up to them ? They set no worthy examples, though possessed of every opportunity to do so. The Philadelphia Press some time ago published the following: "Danger Ahead !— There is no doubt about it that New York is divided into two great classes, the very rich and the very poor. The middling classes of reputable, indus- trious, fair-to-do people are gradually disappearing, going up in the scale of worldly wealth or down into poverty and embarrassment. It seems unquestioned that between these classes exists, and is rapidly growing, under intentional fostering of evil men, a distinct, pronounced, malignant hatred. There are men here who are worth $10,000,000 and $20,000,000, of whom you know nothing. I know one lady, living in a magnificent house, whose life is as quiet as that of a minister should be, who has given away not less than $3,000,000 in five years, whose benefactions prior to her death will reach not less than $7,000,000, who has H4) 210 THE ABISTCN RACY. in her home paintings, statuary, diamonds, precious stones, exquisite specimens of gold and Bilver, with costly works of every imaginable art, an inside estimate of which if $1,500,000, and she is not as rich as many of her neigh- bors by several million dollars. There are men here who twenty years ago sold clothes on Chatham street, who to- day live at an annual expense of $100,000, who wear jew. costing in reasonable stores ss-. j r,.(»00. "Come with me in a Madison avenue car any day, rain or shine, between the hours of ten o'clock in the morning and 5 or 6 in the afternoon, and I will find you car aft car closely packed with ladies in whose cars arc diamonds Avorth from $500 to $5,000 each, on whose ungloved hand-, red and fluffy, sparkle fortunes. Walk with me from Stewart's old store, at the corner of Ninth street and Broadway to Thirtieth street and Broadway any day. I do not mean Sundays, holidays, or special occasions, but all times, and I will show you on block after block women in sealskin circulars down to their heels, worth from $500 to $1,000 each, with diamond earrings and with diamond finger rings, and other precious stones as well, carrying in their hands dainty pocketbooks stuffed with money. They represent the new rich with which Xew York is filling up. "On that same street, at that same time, I can show you men to whom a dollar would be a fortune, whose trousers, torn and disgraceful in their tatters, are held about their pinched waists by ropes or twine or pins, whose stocking- less feet shuffle along the pavement in shoes so ragged that THE AEISTOCKACY. 211 they dare not lift them from the pavement, whose faces are freckled, whose beards are long and straggling, as is their hair, while their reddening hands taper at the nail ■ like claws. How long before those claws will fasten on the newly rich ? Make no mistake about it, the feeling *s born, the feeling is growing, and the feeling, sooner or later, will break forth. "Only last night I walked through Fourteenth street, on which there are but few residences left, and in front of one, leading from the door to the curbstone, was a canopy, under which charmingly attired ladies, accompanied by their escorts, went from their carriages to the open door, through which floods of light and sounds of music came. I stood with the crowd, a big crowd, a moment, and there was born this idea of an inevitable outbreak unless some- thing is done, and speedily done, to do away with the prejudice which not only exists, but is intentionally fos- tered, against the very rich by the very poor. It would make you shudder to hear the way the women spoke. Envy, jealousy, malignant ferocity, every element needed, was there. All that is wanted is a leader." The world is contrasting with the horrid conditions of the Sweater System of human slavery, and with the miser- ies of the vast army of people out of work, and another vast army of underpaid workers, the luxury and extrava- gance of immense wealth, as did a London journal some time ago — thus: "A Millionaire's Modest Home.— We learn from New 212 THE ARISTOC KA( V. York thai Mr. Cornelius \ an.u-rbilt, the Nei York mil- lionaire and railway king, lias just openod In, new palu with a grand ball. Tin.- mud.-st home, which ii to bh.l; about ten people during six months of tin- v.-ar, and to remain closed during the other hx, stands at the eorm-r of Fifty-seventh street and Fifth avenue, and has cost its owner £1,000,000. It is of Spanish deafen outside, built of grey stone, with red facings, turret- and battlmic-nt-. It is three stories high with a lofty attic The ball room the largest private ball room in New York, being 75 (< long by 50 feet wide, decorated in white and gold, Louil XIV. style. The ceiling coal a fortune, and is made in the form of a double cone, covered with painted nymphs and cupids. Eound the cornice are delicately modeled flower-, each with an electric light in its heart, while an immense crystal chandelier hangs from the centre. The walls on the night of the opening ball were covered from floor to ceiling with natural flowers, at a cost of £1,000; and the entertainment is said to have cost the host £5,000. Ad- joining the mansion is the most expensive garden for its size in the world, for although it is only the size of an ordinary city lot, the sum of £70,000 was paid for it, and a house which had cost £25,000 to build was torn down to make room for the few flower beds." When one contrasts this wealth of extravagant luxury with the thousands of homeless and poverty stricken, he is constrained to exclaim, "What are we coming to!" "Where will it end!" THE ARISTOCRACY. 213 Do these people ever stop to think of the poor? Do they ever pity the homeless, despised tramp ? This is how they think of and pity these homeless creatures : First. The New York Herald says, "The best meai io give to a tramp is a leaden one." Second. Chicago Tribune says, "The simplest plan, probably, when one is not a member of the Humane So- ciety, is to put a little strychnine or arsenic in the meat or other supplies furnished tramps." Third. Scott, the railroad king, says, "Give them the rifle diet for a few days, and see how they will like that kind of bread." I quote the Appeal to Reason. "Mrs. Chauncey M. Depew, the charming young wife of the aged New York Senator, has written for the news- papers some advice to American women. After announc- ing that she has just brought over twelve trunks full of brand new Paris-made gowns, she tells American women that they, too, should patronize the dress-makers of Paris. And now all you common clodhoppers who work on Mr. Depew's railroads and furnish him with the money to buy Parisian gowns, go and do likewise. Your wives would be pleased to wear 'em, I feel sure." Again that paper has the following: " 'American workmen eat too much, especially too much meat. They dress too well. There is too much lace cur- tain about their houses/ "Thus spoke Judge Simon E. Baldwin, who has the 2H THE ai;i>T(mi:\( V. honor to disgrace the professorship of constitutional la at Yale. This man wants the whipping p< ' : and favors more summary trials. Be U as rabid as Funston, who would rather see the men in hi* country who are op- posed to war convicted and hanged as traitors than • the death of a single soldier whose busin< to kill his fellow man. This eminenl professor livea in an atmo phere of refinement. He denies thai to the workmen who have made his life of ease possible. He has all the boo! he needs for the prosecution of In- work. He would den) that privilege to the workmen who have Bupplied him with books. He wears good clothes that fit well, and are kept clean seven days in the week. He want- to take from the workmen the privilege of wearing good clothes at any time, at work or on Sunday. He has what he chooses t.> provide for his own table. He tells the workmen that they eat too much, and ought to he satisfied with what he, the great professor, advises them to eat. "And those lace curtains that the worker's wife -a pennies and denied herself the nec< of life in order to buy and beautify her cheap and miserable home ; that little pleasure she has in seeing the sun light fall through those curtains in spots upon her child as it plays before the window, that too must be foresworn because the emi- nent professor of Yale has decided that the lives of the workers are too happy, they want too many of the good things of life. Perhaps he is afraid the workers will begin to try to live as comfortably as he does; and maybe ha THE ARISTOCRACY. 215 fears that they will want their children to go to Yale and other colleges in the country. Knowing as he does that education unfits the workmen to live in filth, perhaps he fears that lace curtains are evidence of the fact that the workers are getting tired of producing the good things of life for such as he to revel in, and that it is time for him, the great professor of constitutional law at Yale, to advise these workmen to go back to their dingy homes, live on the diet that he thinks best for them, tear down the in- expensive decorations that their hard-working wives have made, and then report to him for further orders. "But the workers are not going to dress like negro slaves were compelled to dress in order to please this self- appointed law-giver of the race; they are not going to be satisfied with adulterated food; and they are going to move out of the tenement districts one of these days and have comfortable dwellings with all the decorations that they please to make. The people will do this, Mr. Pro- fessor; they will speak, and their will, not yours, will be the law." The total capitalization of the companies controlled by king Morgan is placed at $5, 210,993,386. As all the gold of the world, coined and uncoined, amounts to only $4,- 841,000,000 it would seem that the phrase, "Morgan owns the earth" is not only true but that he has got the earth is debt to him for a few odd millions. The following is taken from The Coming Nation: 2K5 Till-: ABISTOCRACT. "THE WORLD AT Ills I !'.! "Mr. Morgan and six other American citizens have now become more powerful than anv Congress or Parliament in the world. "Fourteen steamship line- and 11 railroad lini theirs. "iOn land a mileage of 108,500 and on sea a tonnage «>f 1,200,000 are in their COntroL "Three hundred of the Largesl Bteamships of the world and 30,000 of the best equipped passenger and freight trains take orders from them. "The railway mileage is greater than the combined mileage of Great Britain, Russia, Germany, Spain, Holland and Belgium. And more than 300 vessels, which will sail under its orders, cannot he duplicated from the merchant marine of every ocean. "A world-wide transportation trust has long been Mr. Morgan's dream. English newspapers are making comi- cally pitiful pleas to Morgan to let England come into the new trust, not as an annex to America, but as an equal partner. "The fact that Mr. Morgan is addressed in tones of sup- plication shows that he is absolute master. Xot Alexander, in all his glory; not Ceasar Augustus, not even Xapoleon, with all his mighty armies, was such a conquerer as J. P. Morgan with his lttle "yes" and "no" that makes or un- makes trusts. THE ARISTOCRACY. 217 "NO KING IS SO POWERFUL. "No king is one-tenth so powerful as Morgan. Edward VII, Emperor William, Nicholaus of Russia— any one of these is a pigmy in real power compared with Morgan. By nationality an American, he is in fact a citizen of all coun- tries. "Almost every kind of a man who labors works for Mor- gan through some of his companies. "Rudyard Kipling, Lew Wallace — all the geniuses who in the fine frenzy dash off poetry and write stories for Har- per's, are working for Morgan. The patient scientists are digging out minute facts for Morgan to scatter to the world. The artist with pencil and brush draws and paints, and Morgan pays him. "MORE THAN ALL THE GOLD. "So absolute has he become that while he is personally worth perhaps not more than a hundred millions of dol- lars, corporations over which he has control possess more wealth than there is gold on the earth. "There are in the whole known world about 1,320,000,- 000 human beings. J. P. Morgan controls enough to give each $4. "More than a million men are employed by the com- panies Mr. Morgan controls. This means that five million men, women and children are dependent on him for a liv- ing — or rather that five million persons contribute to his comfort." 218 THE ARISTO< RACY. Again, The Appeal to Reason sa "Eight billions of dollars worth of wealth were produ by the brain and muscle workers of the Dnil last year. The producers received in wi ariea two billions of dollar.-. Where are the bix billion "Mr. Carnegie says thai 'Capitalists do i for the flag." They will sell the nation to an. who will pay the price. They will Bell its flag to any bid- der. They will sell it- legislation to any trusl or combina- tion. They not only will, but have been and 11 doing it. 'Patriotism' is for the common people, while the mo- nopolists loot the nation and enslave the n Other writers say : We commit our sin-, these day-, on a 1;, ale. That is the difference between ancient and modern sla\ Where the old world took men one by one and apportioned them to individual owners, we take the whole mass of pie and make them slaves to a class. — Fohn C. Ken- worthy. Bishop Potter, in speaking of the caste spirit that ruining the world, uses these potent word-: "A cast< capitalists, separated by practically inseparable barriers from a caste of laborers, means SOCIAL ANARCHY AND INDUSTRIAL WAR." Here, then, we have facts from various sources. II we have also the opinions of some of the best talent; the best thinkers and writers in the country. These view- are not entertained by one man; they are held by countless THE ARISTOCEACY. 219 thousands. In short, it tells of actual conditions prevail- ing in our country. Is it any wonder the gap is widening between the two classes of America? Is it any wonder they antagonize each other? The workers and the toilers are the poor classes. The idlers, the riotous livers, are the aristocrats; who own the industries of the country, thus owning the other class. As the hold of aristocracy grows stronger, the discontent of the poorer classes increases. Nothing else could be ex- pected. Slowly it is dawning on the minds of the masses that a system exists under which a few own everything, though they toil not, neither do they spin; nor do they think of the morrow, except as to the new pleasures and extravagances it may bring. They rob and fleece the toilers of all they produce, and in turn cordially despise the slaves for being made of such coarse clay. To work i> disgraceful; to earn an honest dollar beneath them. But the people are becoming aroused. The masses have begun to think. It is not a calm, cool reasoning, but a bitter hatred and resentment. Some have noticed it; some have not. But it is there, and, like a smoldering volcano, remains suppressed and quiet for a time. But the explosion will come. Any extraordinary disturbance may bring this about. The time will come; not by one agency, but by a score of them acting simultaneously. Is not the subject under discussion a strong revolution- ary force? Verily it will have much to do in bringing about the final catastrophe. CHAPTER XII. POVERTY. Proof Positive That Poverty is [m rearing in Spite oi the Aggregate Increase in Wealth— A Fern Are fitting All While the Many Suffer for Necessity — Fact- Almost Beyond Belief. It is remarkable that in this advanced age, with the means of production and transportation BO highly de- veloped, such a thing as poverty should exist. But it d and is very widespread and common. America has broad acres of fertile lands. It abounds in rich valleys, forests, hills and rivers. Its wealth in mines is inestimable. And when all this is augmented by its rich cities, by steam, electricity and many mechanical devices, we are constrained to say, "Surely God, Nature and Science have made bountiful provision for man. None need want for aught." Alas ! That such cannot be true ! Yet we cannot find fault with God or Nature. The curse of poverty must be charged to "man's inhumanity to man/' (220) POVERTY. 221 I quote the following from an exchange. It says : "A more pathetic incident in real life is seldom told in print than the following, which is vouched for by a kinder- garten teacher who resides in Brooklyn, N. Y. "A little girl who attends a kindergarten on the east side, the poorest district in New York City, came to the school one morning recently, thinly clad and looking pinched and cold. After being in the warm kindergarten a while the child looked up into the teacher's face and said earnestly: « 'Miss C , do you love God?' " 'Why, yes,' said the teacher. " 'Well, I don't,' quickly responded the child with great earnestness and vehemence, 'I hate Him.' "The teacher, thinking this a strange expression to come from a child whom she had tried hard to teach that it was right to love God, asked for an explanation. " 'Well,' said the child, 'He makes the wind blow, and I haven't any warm clothes; and He makes it snow, and my shoes have holes in them, and He makes it cold, and we haven't any fire at home, and He makes us hungry, and mamma hadn't any bread for our breakfast.' " Commenting it says: "If we consider the perfection of God's material bounties to the children of earth, it is hard, after reading this story, to regard with patience the com- placency of rich blasphemers who, like the innocent little girl, charge the miseries of poverty to God." The following is taken from The News-Dispatch: 222 POVERTY. "J. Pierpont Morgan's dog, Hi- tfibe, ralne $3,000, wu buried today. The burial was to take place the day befoi but then Morgan wai prevented from attending. The corpse of the dog lay in a i lined with silk. Tha burial place is situated on one of the mosl beautiful on the banks of the Hudson. Many monrnen attended the burial services, as the deceased had been a great favorite in the Morgan household. It \a understood that upon the grave will be erected a Maltese cross. — News dispatch of July 17. "A few days before this burial of tin- dog the New York Times brought the following Vocal nei "'There was a baby born yesterday morning in Den- ver. A baby whose father is at the front fighting for hia country. The little creature who came into the world \ terday morning is just twelve inches long and weigbs only four pounds. "'There were no clothes waiting for it: not a shred. And there are none yet. Last night the bahy was still wrapped in a piece of flannel. When this tiny daughter of a soldier came into the world her mother lay upon a feather tick, with not even a sheet under her. The tick was filthv and sour, but there was no money to buy an- other, and if it were taken away the woman would have lain on bare slats. She had neither sheets nor pillow cases on her bed of pain, and over her was an old comfort that had been taken from the children's- bed to put over her. The children, three of them, lay upon a straw tick, POVERTY. 223 with never a shred of bedding under or over them. This is the condition that one soldier has left behind him, and this is the picture that has haunted him on the blue waters of the Pacific. Sad features of the picture can be duplicated in manv cases among the families of the boys in blue. Grim want stalks among them. Empty larders greet their eyes, and the bitter alternative of starvation or public charity stare them in the face/ ''How the powers that benefit by this war are using their soldiers is seen in the employment of cheap Chinese seamen on government transports and Chinese slave labor in the manufacture of soldiers' uniforms. Had this soldier's wife applied for work on uniforms, she would have been bluntly informed that the contractors were at- tending to it ; and they are — for the benefit of the con- tractors and those who let the contracts. — Free Society." The following taken from The Appeal to Reason tells of an actual occurrence at Cleveland, 0.: "HE STARVED TO DEATH. "A man was picked up in Cleveland, 0., a few days ago from a snow bank in which he had fallen and because of starvation had been unable to lift himself up, so he died. It was near the new Senaca street bridge; and when the workmen gathered around they recognized in the corpse a man who had been looking in vain for work. The super- intendent had told him that he might have something in a day or so. An old story. The unknown had no money; and as one of the workmen shared his lunch with him the 224 POVERTY. day before he was found dead, he told of a wife and chil- dren depending upon him; his emaciated face grew sad as he said he had no money for them. His clothes were rough and threadbare, his shoes being worn so that his feet touched the ground, or rather the snow. He was picked up tenderly by the workmen and placed in a dead wagon and sent to the morgue. "Think of it! In Senator Hanna's home; right at the door of him who promised a full dinner pail to every one if the Republicans won, a man starved to death because he could not find work. Maybe the man was shiftless; perhaps he was, but he was looking for work, and we are told that prosperity is stalking about the country, just run- ning right into everybody's way, that you have to hustle to keep out of the way of work, and that if you are not careful a job will force itself onto you whether you want it or not." The following is from St. Louis Labor : "An excellent example of man's value under capitalism was shown last week on one of the fashionable thorough- fares just west of Grand avenue. The day was one of the coldest of the cold week, and the few persons of that dis- trict that were compelled to be out were hurrying along wrapped up in furs. "The Humane Society ambulance was drawn up in front of one of the houses and a number of well dressed men ;uid boys were putting a sick horse into it. "A mattress was placed on the floor of the ambulance, POVERTY. and great care was taken to arrange the door to thai head might rest comfortably. "Quite a crowd had gathered and many expn of sympathy were sent forth to the poor dumb creature. "As I started on I heard the notes of a bugle, and abo half a block away I saw a poor one-legged man, thinly clad, blowing a bugle for the few pennies thai passera-by might give. "The bare hands that held the bugle were chapped and bleeding. "The ambulance drove away and the crowd that had gathered passed on, laughing and talking by their poor outcast brother with the bugle. Who would claim kin- ship ? not they. "The vile capitalist system that turns out hundreds <>f the same kind of unfortnates every day, disabled in t mills, factories and other profit-making hells, or when fighting in their wars, could find no more use for him. "Why should they bother about him, when there are thousands of able-bodied men ready to take his place at even lower wages, in the desperate fight for bread. "The Humane Society that seems so affected by the sight of a dumb animal in pain, does not see a brother in the next block. "To get another horse, about fifty dollars ha- to be pended, while for the asking they can get a thousand hu- man lives, willing to be bound in chains, far vrorae than that— the slave bonds that can be severed in an instar/ (15) 226 P0\ KIM'Y. the capitalist, when the life is of no more profit to him, but which make the capitalist slave willing, yes, anxious to lay down his life that his family may gel bread enough to keep them from actual starvation."' "MEN WITH FAMILIES WORK FOB BOYS' WAGES. "Men with families, says the Philadelphia Evening Tel- egraph, "are employed as bottle blowers at boys' wages in (he George Jonas Glass company at the little hamlet of Minotola, N. J. They live in houses owned by the com- pany, to whom they pay rent: and they are compelled to I rade at the company store on the cash book system ; th< are compelled to contribute toward the support of the preacher; they are prohibited under pain of discharge from meeting together to plan means for throwing off the shackles that bind them in the bitterest kind of slavery. Children much below the legal age of 12 years are em- ployed; and unless a man has two boys whom he will place at work in the factory he cannot secure employment; and if he is fortunate enough to have two little children whom he is willing to turn over to his employer he will be per- mitted to go to work at apprentice wage>. "Slavery is a mild word to use in describing the con- dition of the workers in Minotola. The entire town be- longs to the company and the employes are not allowed to walk on the company's grounds after being discharged. One man had to walk down the railroad track in order to get to his home, where his wife was so ill that she could not be moved from the company house in compliance with POVERTY. the order to get out. And all of this is going- on in a few hours' ride from the nation's capital; where lackeys cringe and crawl before the very men who have caused all this suffering of the poor." The following story is enough to freeze the blood with horror : CHILD SHOT FOR BEGGING BREAD. The past winter (exact date has slipped my mind and I have mislaid my notebook) a white child went to a back door in the city of Birmingham, Ala., and begged for food. This is unlawful, as the hungry child probably knew. When he stepped back into the alley, a policeman shouted to the little chap and like any other child who had done that which he knew was punishable, he feared the officer and ran from him. The blue-coated brute shot the boy dead. If he had been a negro child, there would have been the assertion that this was another case of race hatred; but we do not hear it cited as an example of the hatred of the millions of capital for those who are poor ! There is too much of this warping of events to make them fit preconceived ideas. This eleven-year-old child was killed by a policeman "in discharge of his duty," so the officer did not lose his position on the force and there was no lynch- ing. One can but hope that the quick death of the mur- dered boy was easier than the slower one by means of starvation. — W. S. Abbott, Oak, Cal. That crowds are always hungry in the large cities is at- tested every Christmas by the thousands of poor who flock 230 POVERTY. to the big charity dinners given by the newspapers, lodges, churches, etc. The day after Christmas the Chicago papers published the following: "Between 11 o'clock in the morning and 9 o'clock at night 10,000 men and boys and about 100 women ate platesful of turkey and potatoes and drank cup after cup of steaming hot coffee in the old Waverly Theater. This is what they ate and drank : "4,500 pounds of meat, chiefly turkey. "125 bushels of potatoes. "4,000 loaves of bread. "1 barrel of gravy. "2 barrels of cranberry sauce. "150 gallons of pickles. "500 gallons of milk. "150 pounds of good coffee. "In the whole crowd of 10,000 forlorn, hungry people the police failed to discover a single professional crook. After the first 700, who were mostly from cheap lodging and barrel houses, had been fed, THE CROWD WAS MADE UP CHIEFLY OF MECHANICS AND LABOR- ING MEN, WHO WERE HUNGRY AND OUT OF WORK." Of the ten thousand, nine thousand and three hundred were mechanics and laborers who were hungry and out of work! That is quite a different story to what the same daily newspapers, in their servility to wealth and power, have been trying to have the people believe. They didn't POVERTY. 231 intend to give the lie to their untrue and bombastic claims ; they were just caught off their guard and may be expected to prostitute their calling more recklessly than ever to make up for it. St. Louis, as well as all the large cities, has these Christ- mas dinners, given to the hungry thousands by well-mean- ing and charitable people. It is a blessing that they are remembered, yet the question will come, why is this neces- sary ? Why do we have so many poor? Whose fault is it? Commenting on this, St. Louis Labor, a paper for working people, says : "THEIR CHRISTMAS DINNER UNEQUALLED IN THE DAYS OF ROME. "The last Sunday's edition of one of our great dailies contained a very interesting article on the 'Millionaires of St. Louis.' It enumerated some eighty or more and proudly declared that their wealth proved the wonderful prosperity of St. Louis. . "This, notwithstanding 10,000 people had eaten a 'charity' dinner on Christmas Day. While the article in itself might not attract so much attention, when it is placed in comparison with the other item, it shows only too plainly the lie of its 'prosperity' talk. "The Post-Dispatch organized the Christmas dinner, and patted itself on the back with such headlines as *Not a Hungry Person in St. Louis on Christmas Day.' "The Post-Dispatch can play its own horn and write its own eulogies,. but .there still-remains the fact that though 232 POVERTY. they fed 10,000 persons on Christmas Day, they were hungry the next. It is cheap charity, indeed, which will starve a man 364 days in order to give him a sumptuous banquet on the remaining day of the year. Those who prate of prosperity had better place themselves in the po- sitions of these people. Ten thousand people fed by char- ity in a city of 600,000 inhabitants. Rome, in its height, did not support a larger number. Romans thought that they, too, were prosperous, but theirs was all on the sur- face; it was confined to the ruling class. And as soon as opportunity offered the robbed and despoiled population of Rome turned on their despoilers, sacked their homes, ruined their villas and burned their city. A similar fate awaits America, if steps are not taken to avert it. "We cannot continue to feed 10,000 starving people while 80 millionaires revel in the wealth which they have robbed from those they now regard as beggars." After careful investigation, The New York Sun con- cludes that 40,000 working women in that city are receiv- ing wages so low that they are compelled to accept charity or starve. Volumes might be filled with facts similar to those cited, and still all would not be told. The American na- tion is learning these facts and knows them to be true. Any one may verify the facts, and they have been proven over and over again. And yet there are those whose perverted ideas of justice POVERTY. 333 and pity lead them to such erratic expressions that we are prone to doubt their sanity. Edmond Kelly in his book says : "There is no longer any reason for distinguishing between the criminal and pauper." There you have it; if a man is poor, arrest him and put him in jail. Proclaim Captain Kidd as chief of saints. Erase from the calendar of the great such names as poor Isaiah, poor Jesus, poor Paul, poor Socrates, poor Dante, and look with respect upon the ages that produced and yet neglected to have them punished. Poor teachers, reformers, authors, inventors and work- ers all to be condemned as criminals, and presumably, the rich and unscrupulous, who have extorted on the poor, made life difficult for them, are to be recognized as the real benefactors of the race. Some other remarkable views are also held, as instance the following: "POVERTY A BULWARK OF THE CONSTITUTION. "Harper's Weekly of March 1st closes an article on the 'Worst of Being Poor/ with these words: 'As poverty is one of the bulwarks of the constitution we cannot guard it too carefully, or too vigilantly oppose any scheme tend- ing to undermine it. But we may all fitly join in trying to lessen the undue apprehension which it inspires.' The writer seems to be afraid that prophets will arise who will try to abolish want itself unless the fear of want is abolished by those who live in luxury. ■He thinks that 234 POVERTY. poverty is a good incentive to make men work for starva- tion wages for instance ; and that if poverty were abolished the country would go to pieces. And yet he thinks that the country might profit by considering the eccentric commonwealths of Australasia, where a man is provided with a house and farm, and secured against want through all his career. But in this country we must cling to our poverty. What a blessed thought that we have such great newspapers to advise the poor to be satisfied that their children are hungry and in rags. Be satisfied workingmen when the wife whose cheeks used to be so full of life, so beautiful with the dawn of health, if she looks like a skeleton, if her rags and dingy clothes brings a tear to your eyes. Be satisfied when your little child throws its ragged arm around your neck, and when you feel its fever- ish heart beating through a shabby dress, draw it closer to your bosom, and be manly enough to say : 'It is my fault, little one, that you are in rags. My work and the work of my fellow laborers have filled the worfd with all the good things of life; but we laboring people have decided to let some one else have the greater share of what we pro- duce. We know that all wealth is the product of labor, and that those who work should have what they produce ; but still it is our opinion that we should live in poverty while those who do not work should have the good things that our labor gives to them.' " Still others say that if the poor were only saving there would be less misery and want. This view. is illogical and POVERTY. 235 absurd: for the poor, being in the vast majority, are of course the great consumers. Now, if consumption were curtailed, business would drop off, and counltess thousand? would be thrown out of work. This shows how defective and abominable our present industrial system is. The poor are injured by the virtue of economy; and aided in- directly by the vice of extravagance, which helps business; which gives employment. Again, we cannot agree with Mr. Carnegie when he says it is a great advantage to be born poor. The Post- Dispatch discusses this as follows: CARNEGIE'S PHILOSOPHY. Mr. Andrew Carnegie, who knows all about it, has as- sured us that it is a great advantage for a man to be born poor, and a disgrace to die rich. Dr. Felix Adler gives a new and saner turn to the thought by observing that it is a "misfortune to live poor." Among the evils of poverty Dr. Adler mentions these: 1. "Inefficient nutrition," leaving the body a prey to disease and causing "dreadful mortality" among the chil- dren of the tenements. 2. "Care" — anxiety for the future, the uncertainty of existence. "It is this care that comes to the poor man and sits at his table — that comes at night and places hot coals under his pillow and prevents him from sleeping." 3. The crushing of mental activity and growth in young men and women of talent and even of genius, from lack of means of education and development. 336 POVERTY. If these are the evils of poverty, then it is no advantage to be born poor. Children bred in an atmosphere of want, fear, squalor and death are at a distinct disadvantage, not- withstanding Mr. Carnegie's confident assertion to the contrary. — Post-Dispatch. "Mr. Neefe, the Breslau statistician, publishes an inter- esting paper from which the following important facts are taken : " 'In the year 1896 it appears thai the death rate of the poorer classes was nearly three times greater than it was among the rich. The amount paid in rent is given as a criterion of means, the figures being as follows: " 'Out of every 1,000 who paid a rent up to 300 marks, 20.7 died; out of every 1,000 paying a rent of from 301 to 750 marks, only 11.2 died, and out of every 1,000 paying a rent ranging from 750 to 1,500 marks, only 6.5 died, the average being 17.6 persons dying to each 1,000 living.' "According to these figures the mortality of the Breslau poor population is at least three times greater than that of the rich, but as a matter of fact it must be much great- er, the deaths of servants, journeymen and persons who die in the hospitals not being included, and they in all cases belong to what are called the poorer classes. The same article shows that more than one-half of the children born belonging to the poor population died in babyhood, while the deaths of the children of the rich amounted to only about one-sixth of the total number born."— Solidar- ity. POVERTY. .,;;; '•WEAKENING INFLUENCES OF POVERTY. "In the American Medicine for February 15th, the editor, commenting on the investigations of Mr. Rown- tree as to the effects of poverty, says : 'That of 7,000 per- sons in New Y'ork living in primary poverty, in 1,130 it was due to death of the chief wage earner; in 370 to his illness or old age; in 167 to being out of work; in 205 to irregularity of work; in 1,603 to largeness of family; in 3,756 to low wages. Dividing the workingmen's districts into three classes according to income, Mr. Rowntree finds that the death rate of the lowest is more than twice as high as that of the highest. As to the school children, the average height of boys of 13 is less by By 2 inches in the poorer section than in that of the highest elementary schools, and the difference in weight is more than eleven pounds, with the difference in general physical condition still more marked. The truth of all this is emphasized by the fact that the immense proportion of men offering themselves as army recruits do not come up even to the moderate military standards demanded. The demonstra- tion seems complete — a steady physical degeneration due to the dwarfing and weakening influence of poverty. Now all of this, be it noted, is taking place in the richest nation of the world, and in times of unexampled prosperity/ ' Poverty, then, is one of the greatest curses with which man is afflicted. It is a curse in every sense of the word. A New York preacher one Sunday devoted his sermon to "the wickedest block in the world/' It is on Stanton 238 POVERTY. street, in that city, and consists of seven houses, contain- ing a thousand families. Do you wonder at it ? And yet all of this poverty exists in the midst of plenty. Why should the majorty of people in the richest country on earth have to practice frugality ? And the very people too who have produced so abundantly that hundreds of millions worth have to he sent out of the nation to find consumers? What arrant insanity. It is the. industrial system that is at fault. And any in- dustrial system that grinds out millionaires and paupers will sooner or later strike the rock. Such has and such will always be the case. The day of reckoning approaches; coming events cast their shadows before. CHAPTER XIIL FEMALE LABOR. How Marriage is Discouraged, and Why it is Often a Fail- ure — Womanhood Dishonored By Grovelling Industrial Slavery— The Truth About Female Competition. The subject of female labor is too important to pass un- noticed. It is attracting nearly as much attention as child labor. It is almost as important. Today we find women who work for a little over half of what men work for. Often they displace men. Frequently we behold the strange spectacle of the male members of a family out of work and the female members toiling daily, early and late. How unnatural! What opinion do I hold on the subject? Simply and emphatically, that these poor women, with the rest of society, are victims of a vicious system. Victims of circumstances over which they have no control. Com- pelled to work or starve. They have no choice, or probably (239) 240 FEMALE LABOK. they would choose home and woman's sphere in prefer- ence to the factory and office, which is man's sphere. And yet women are generally blamed, as though thej were the authors of the present industrial system. They are accused of lowering wages and throwing men out of work; but not, however, by people who think honestly and seriously on the subject. This opinion is held only by those who do not think at all. The truth is, woman has been torn from the fireside, the home, and woman's sphere, by the most tyrannical slave driver that ever existed. And that is Economic Want. It is economic want that lashes them out into the cold world to battle for the necessities of life. Grave and unnatural are some of the results. Can the poor girl or woman give up work to yield her position to some man, or to keep up the price of labor ? No ! "Self- preservation is the first law of nature." Perhaps there are loved ones at home depending on the small wage for their very existence. And so it is that woman is compelled to go out and labor whether she will or no. And sometimes the results are very grave indeed. ' Frequently we observe a young man courting a girl, hav- ing the' most honorable intentions in the world; yet he is out of work, and she has employment; just the reverse of what it ought to be. It makes no difference in the end whether she or some other girl took his position. The result is just the same. But to make the problem clear and forceful, let us assume the following situation : The girl takes her sweetheart's position, throwing him FEMALE LABOE. g 1 1 out of work; the daughter usurps the father's work, send- ing him home to idleness, and the sister takes the place of the brother in factory or office. In the shuffle we lose sighl of the gravity of it all, because the displater and the dis- placed are strangers to each other. It would be clear in an instant were the unnatural shuffle to take place in one family, as described. But why not face the question as it is? When examined it must be admitted that something is wrong. It is also apparent that woman, instead of be- ing at fault, is the victim. How unnatural for the sister to be the bread-winner and the brother the dependent. Worse even is the case of the father and daughter. How can she be educated when her time is entirely taken up with toil? How can the father pay for if when he is out of work? Worse still "s the case of the lovers. How can the young man marry the girl who has taken his position? Is not the young wo- man herself, unhappily, the bar to marriage ? Is she not preventing the thing that is dearest to the heart of every true woman ? What can be worse than a condition of affairs that pre- vents marriage ? It would be hard to tell the amount of unhappiness such conditions produce. It is here we find the answer to the question, "Why, do not more young peo- ple marry?" Also in discussing the question, "Is mar- riage a failure ?" this phase cuts an important figure. Female labor is a bar to marriage. None can deny that a greater number would take place if all men had work (16) ;)}•. FEMALE LABOR. and were sure they could retain it. Female labor greatly increases this uncertainty. Marriage decreases. The girls who should be married are forced into the field in com- petition with men. Thus, like a two-edged sword, it cutfl both ways; and woman is made, unhappily, an instrument of her own undoing. What can she do to mend matters? Absolutely nothing. I quote the following: "THEY ARE SLAVES. "(J. 11. Bowers in Lconoclast.) "He who dare not make for himself a home and take to his heart a woman who would bless him in abundance, is not as free as God intended men to be. "There are thousands of young men and women to-day, who, because of the very uncertainty of their economic footing, abjure marriage. The men, most of them, des- tined to father that social sore, the army of prostitutes, with the money that should go to the support of a home and the rearing of children, are they free men ? And the women — God pity them all, and especially those who out of the vast multitude forced into factory and shop fall bv the wayside, victims of the men, who, if free, would have established them in homes, where love and honor would have filled their lives, are they free? "Who among us will contend that a system of labor that forces women and children to carry the world's burden, to the exclusion of thousands of strong-armed men who stand ready to take more than their share of the world's work FEMALE LABOR. 243 that the loved ones may be relieved, is anything short of slavery ?" Again, the Appeal to Reason says : "Out of the 17,000 representative workingmen in In- dianapolis only 2,000 are married. Industrial conditions are such that workmen find it difficult to provide for a family, and they are finding it more difficult to find in- telligent women who are willing to become the slave of a wage-slave. Girls can make a living by their own work, and have a measure of independence that the working- man's wife cannot have. The whole industrial system is opposed to happiness, and it is constantly getting worse. But the worse it gets, the better it will be; for when the condition becomes so miserable that society cannot tol- erate it, then there will be a change for the better. The darkest hour comes before dawn. If that be true, let the darkness get so thick that it can be felt ! If that is neces- sary, let it come." The following is worthy of profound consideration: The question of a Housekeeper, Clyde, Neb., asking how $10 a week can be made to support, clothe and feed a fam- ily of seven — five little children among the number— at- tracts my attention. This is but another phase of what I call the riddle of the age, and as it is one which especially concerns us women, we should take deep interest in study- ing it. In a magazine I saw the proposition succintly stated as follows: "The problem is one which confronts most young married men and women in the present time, 2 u FEMALE LABOR and can be stated m this way: A. and B. wish to marry. As business is sufficient to warrant him in the conclusion that he can support himself and wiiV in comfort they do marry. At the end of the first year C U born. The sick- ness and other expenses attendant upon his arrival ha made large calls upon A's surplus funds, still lu- can man- age. In less than two years more 1) puts in an appear- ance. There are more expenses, more sickness, and life begins to look very serious to A. This goes on for a longer or shorter period, but anyone can Bee that the limit is soon tc be reached. If the family continues to increase with- out a proportionate enlargement of income, the time is not far distant when A cannot support them all, to say noth- ing of supporting them in comfort. The problem, then, which all these people have to meet, is, 'What is to be done about it ?' Some of them attempt one solution, some an- other, but the question remains unsettled." Now most young people contemplating matrimony see the future in a very attractive light, but as Emerson says, "No picture of life can have any veracity which does not admit the odious facts." I do not wish to call children "odious facts," but they are certainly factors which are seldom taken into account by young people when planning their future. No doubt the husband of our Clyde housekeeper expected to support his wife in comfort. Probably he took her from a home where she was more familiar with a piano and book than with wash-board and broom; for American parents are indulgent and seldom expect much work from FEMALE LABOR. 245 their daughters. No doubt he was a fascinating lad, as these salesmen are wont to be, and had no difficulty in walking off with the belle of the town ! Of course, this is just a fancy picture, but we all know that such cases are common. And then — five children within seven years! and dollars have so little elasticity even in experienced hands. If the wife has good health remaining, which will be most unusual, the case is not quite so tragic, but if her strength and spirits are gone, and she allows the necessity for daily, hourly economy to render her fretful and morbid, it seems to me there is a very good chance for love to fly out of the window. And in such a marriage, with love gone, what would be left ? She says her husband is expected to be well dressed, and, of course, the wife and little ones need warm, comfortable clothing. Probably there is house rent to pay, and when the wise ones are answering the question let them not forget that there are other expenses besides food and clothing. We cannot live by bread alone. How much out of this $10 a week should go for literature, music, excursions, entertainments, etc ? Then there is the life insurance fund — surely our house- keeper's husband ought to have his life insured. If they belong to a lodge, there are the dues to consider; if to a church they want to give their mite. Of course they will want photogranhs of their little ones and at Christmas time Santa Claus is eagerly expected. There! I have not answered the question, but have amplified it; and with Housekeeper and others, shall look eagerly for the replies 246 FEMALE LABOR. of those who have solved it.— Catherine Harbaugh, I cade, Colo. I fear that this question, in its many phases, will prove almost too hard for The Eomemaker to handle satisfac- torily; but we shall all be glad to know of the little econo- mies practiced by those who find it necessary to make one dollar do the work of two. Personally I believe the true solution of the problem can only ruin,' through a change in the industrial system. Of one thing we may be assured — behind all the threatening social and economic up- heavals of the day, shadowed forth by the deep unresi of the multitude, is working that Almighty Power that makes for good. Let us trust it, as we have always done, and, with Tennyson, "Be grateful for the sounding watchword, Evolution, here." — Ed. American Woman. Also these plain words on this subject : The aversion of woman to child bearing is one of the bitter evils of the day — and its effect on the coming race will be of serious moment. The causes of this aversion are many and hard to overcome even by reason and educa- tional forces. It is very true that the economic conditions which make the environment of many women are re- sponsible for the dread of bringing children into the world, both directly and indirectly. Directly, by reason of the fact that the mother must go into the factory and shop to supplement the fast decreasing wage of the father. In the great mill districts of New England, mothers work at their FEMALE LABOR. 247 looms through the whole period of pregnancy, in many in- stances up to the very day of confinement. Not much wonder that these women dread the coming of children. It is not hard to imagine the future of these little ones poorly nourished, scantily clad, deprived of a mother's care — all this enters into the great economic problem of today. — Ella Reeve Cohen, in Woman's Physical Develop- ment. None can denv that judicious marriage promotes chas- tity. And anything that checks marriage increases the social evil. Then women and girls working promote the social evil by preventing marriage. Yet who would blame women? She, the unhappy cause to a certain extent, is the worst sufferer in the end. The following facts are taken from a medical journal : An eminent Frenchman made an investigation of the subject and records the fact that vanity and a desire for fine raiment prompted many women to become prostitutes. Quite a number, also, took to the vice in order to escape hard work in the factories and the work-shops. As long as this social system exists, prostitution will exist. As long as commercialism is a factor of our civiliza- tion, prostitution will prevail. When young men can marry on a small income, and our standards are raised to a higher point, prostitution will de- crease. Judicious marriages promote chastity, and are encour- aged by every moralist. j>48 FEMALE LABOR There are in New York City some 50,000 such women ; their average life after falling is four years; $50,000, 000 a year is expended in the traffic. — Medical Brief, June. But the limit has been reached; the end is at hand. The present social system is tottering, and ere long will col- lapse. Women at work. Men displaced, Marriage pre- vented. The social evil augmented. Woman the principal victim and sufferer. This quota will be added to the general upheaval. Alone it is of vast impportance, but its gravity is increased when taken in connection with the other ills that have siezed the social body. And the social body, already sick unto death with many diseases, is ready to succumb when this ad- ditional affliction is added. But this is not all. CHAPTER XIV. THE FIERCE STRUGGLE: How Men Are Forced to Wage Relentless War On Each Other, In Order to Hold Their Own.— The Hor- rible Cruelty and Debasing Effects of the Situation. Strange to say, that with the increase of civilization, population, and improvements, has also come a desperate battle for a foothold in life. A strenuous effort that wears out body and soul, and is kept up daily, weekly, yearly, until the victim, tired, worn, spent, and old before his time, is forced out of the conflict. With the shriek of the whistle, the great throng in mad haste, fly to their work. Then all through the long day, a killing pace, and such an intensity of application is kept up that one might believe the day of judgment were com- ing, and but one day remained to get ready for it. Even the banker and speculator is not exempt. All rush like mad. At noon scarcely any rest is taken. Indeed, many scarcely take time to snatch a morsel of food. (249) 250 THE FIERCE STRUGGLE. The Appeal to Reason Bays : "Mr. Rockefeller's mad race to own the world has re- sulted in ruining his Btomach, causing his hair to fall out of his head, his eye-brows and moustache to disappear; it has succeeded in making thousands of bis competitor* go into bankruptcy, and in causing the people generally to think of him as a fiend. If he had lived under a sine industrial system, Mr. Rockefeller might have been as universally liked, as he is well liked by those of his friends. It is the system of profit that has caused all his trouble. It is driving thousands to the grave of suicide, and the poor house, as the days ^o by. It is the most damnable thing — this thing called profit — that was ever conceived in the mind of savage man. And the people are, beginning to see the depths of degradation to which profit has sunk the souls of men." And why this mad race? What is the great r-take? It is simply the uncertainty of one's position. None feel secure. The rich banker, speculator, financier, all fear they may lose their foothold any minute. The next market report may bring news of financial ruin. Even many merchants and manufacturers struggle under a great load. For, doing business at a loss, the morrow is always an uncertainty, for fear they will be unable to meet obligations. Thus are many haunted by the nightmares of disaster. Then when reverses come, how often is relief sought by poison or the pistol. To pick up a paper and THE FIERCE STRUGGLE. 251 read that a business man has killed himself is of common occurrence. Here are a few samples. Just an ordinary news item this: "Forced out of busi- ness and practically ruined by the exactions of the beef trust, Louis Holebeck acknowledged defeat yesterday by taking his own life."— Press dispatch in Baltimore News of April 2-1. Holebeck was in the retail business in New York. His customers were mostly of the working class; and as the price of meat went up his profits fell away, and his trade became so bad that he had to close his shop. He thought it would be an easy matter to find work at his trade; but as he tramped from place to place he was told that men were being discharged, not employed. It was too much for him, this "unexampled era of prosper- ity,*' so he took his own life, after the Beef Trust ("which does not exist") took his business. The next move for the financiers will be to make a "noble" gift to some church or college that is run in their own interest. The people learn through suffering. Depressed by financial difficulties, George Erlinger, aged seventy-one, 1221 North Gay street, New York, a brush manufacturer, took a dose of poison the other day as the quickest way out of his troubles. Thus the old sometimes end their lives, when they are no longer able to make a living in this competitive world. Under sane con- ditions, this old man would have spent his last days in peace. As one's childhood is spent in play and amuse- ment, so should the last days on earth be. 252 THE FIERCE 8TR1 6GLE. But why the fierce struggle of those who do not own and operate businesses of their own? They have nothing at stake. They have uo capital or enterprises to worry about. The poorer classes have worries and troubles, in get- ting their daily bread. Many a man employed at a mini- mum wage, dreads disaster t<> his employer, more than the employer himself, simply because his position is at stake; and on his position depends the daily bread of himself and family. Should he lose this, it may be a long time be- fore he secures another, and with no money ot friends it is no wonder he worries and frets away his life. Often the temptation comes to be dishonest. A news- paper has the following: "Henry Penning, homeless and out of work, committed larceny in New York city, was arrested and put in jail, where he committed suicide in order to get away from the prosperity that is abroad in the land. It may be added that he was not one of the guests at the dinner given by Morgan to Prince Henry of Prussia." Here are other instances: "Mary L. Anderson, aged forty, attempted suicide at 8:30 a. m., April 15. She had been out of employment for some time, and in a fit of despondency used a carving knife on her throat. — Baltimore World." The above is a typical news item. And yet we call this a happy and con- tented people, worthy to carry civilization to other na- tions; and capable of forcing our stereotyped customs down the throats of foreigners. THE FIERCE STRUGGLE. "Los Angeles, April 7. Becoming despondent over the difficulty 01 providing for herself and her three children, Mrs. C. F. Schweitzer of El Monte, thirteen miles from this city, ended her life by drowning herself in a tank of crude oil. The body was today found floating in the tank, which is connected with a pumping plant on a neighboring ranch." The terrible struggle for existence, with the consequent nervous strain wastes the powers of the individual, and undermines the health of mind and nerve. It is no won- der that many degenerate morally. It is no wonder that large numbers turn to dishonesty, immorality, and suicide. The strain and pressure of modern competition is too severe. Suicide is increasing. Death, naturally feared above everything, is now in many cases welcomed as a friend. Statistics, and the daily papers bear this out. The Appeal to Reason makes the following observation : "Business worries cause the suicide of 1,500 people a year in the principal cities of this country. Nice system, eh? Vote for a system, believe in it, fight for it, — and then kill one's self to get away from it! The modern business man is a lulu! He never thinks — he just thinks he thinks. He knows less of the system he lives under, less of political questions, less of the phenomena about him than the, average laboring man who belongs to a un- ion. The oilier day I met a business man from Kan he weak-minded? Net at all. lie simply is not posted along this line. And not being posted is as much out of place as a jockey or sailor would he in the presi- dential chair at Yale College. However, the jockey and sailor would know and have sense enough to admit that their training left out presidential chairs. But President Hadley knows it all. The trust question? Easiest thing in the world. Don"! admit the trust people into society. Wonderful wisdom. Wonderful statesmanship! Great shades of Jefferson and Washington! And yet Mr. Hadley never doubted for an instant his superior ability and knowledge on these questions. In fact, at the time he made the statement he was touring the country, looking over different railway systems, prepara- tory to enlightening the American people and uttering pearly truths of great wisdom on the transportation prob- lem. I have never had the benefit of his views on this EDUCATION. question, and have wondered many times if they were as profound and deep as his views on the trust question. But he is not the only one. The education of all our teachers has been sadly neglected along these lines. In times of panic what views prevail! What outlandish rem- edies are proposed. The last panic and crisis of '93 was caused by the World's Fair at Chicago, according to some. Another theory was the sun spot theory; the adherants of the latter claiming that whenever the sun had certain spots on it a panic would surely follow, reasoning that the heat of the sun was tampered with, which had a bad effect on crops, thus precipitating the panic. Another old theory, which, thank goodness, has almost been abandoned is the Malthusan theory, which holds that population increases faster than food products. Hence there is a crowding and a struggle for existence. Some thought that the poor were not saving enough. That they ought to work harder and spend less. Some said women were the fault, as they were taking the work awav from men. Some said there was over-production, a glut, a lack of market; others said it was the tariff, or free trade, or the silver question. So it went all the way down the lines. We all had our views and have yet. We are right, gener- ally, in proportion to the honest study and investigations we have made. Yet there are many exceptions. We still disagree with each other. What some say is good others say is bad and vice versa. And this is exactly what is 268 EDUCATION. wanted by our plutocratic masters. As long as we disagree they are sale. We will always disagree as Long as we are kept in ignorance pn these 3pecial subjects. It is safe for the plutocrats to keep as divided. Were the public to be educated along these lines, in- telligent elections and Legislation would tajce place. The people would become aware thai the rich were growing richer and the poor, poorer; and fully alive to the horrors of child Labor, and many kindred evils, could take im- mediate steps to abolish all of them. They would act in union against plutocracy, and establish "a government of the people, by the people and for the people." Is it likely, then, that as long as the rich control the colleges and the politicians have charge of the public schools any of these doctrines will be taught? Xo, be- cause before many years an army of brainy and enlight- ened people would he spreading the truth from the At- lantic to the Pacific. In short, it is a mistaken idea to suppose that education as dispensed to-day will meet and solve the social and industrial problem. A -student turned out of the present schools is harmless to the trust baron or plutocrat. His head is filled with latin, mathematics and science. His education is complete, and he would smile at any information that did not come from the colleges. It would be a hopeless task to try and convince him that he was as ignorant as a new-born babe on the real live issues of the day. He has high ideals, very high, con- cerning many things. He has none economically. EDUCATION. 269 He is the hardest person in the world to convince. The man who isn't highly educated is more open to conviction than he. Finally, then, we may safely conclude that the revolu- tion will not be prevented by education such as is gen- erally understood. Of course, the people as yet haven't offered this crit- icism against modern educational institutions, but they have a criticism. It is a wonderful one. It is so remark- able that I cannot refrain from touching on it. We have all heard the ridiculous remark "Colleges do not fit a man for business." I shall proceed to deal with this remark in the most forcible language possible. I want to show how shallow and thoughtless it is. A college education in order to fit a man to cope in the business world today, would have to develop the cunning, the shrewdness, the avarice, the cruelty and coldness in the student, and permit to lie dormant kindness, gentle- ness, loveableness, generosity, pity, warmth and feeling of all description. The high, the moral, the noble principles of man must not be developed; the meanest, the basest and most physical must be, and you have your modern and successful business man. He must be able to cut wages without feeling. He must look upon the ruin and down- fall of a competitor with coldness and indifference. He must not wince if the militia shoot down his striking em- ployees. The suffering of the wives and children of the strikers must not touch his heart. 270 EDUCATION. Can any one deny thai this is a picture of the modern businessman? True, there are many exceptions. Thank heaven, there arc many business men who would and have accepted failure rather than injure a fellowman. But as competition becomes keener and keener business is lie- coming more and more a desperate and heartless conflict in which but few can win. Do people think, when they say colleges ought to teach men to be monsters of cruelty and heartless selfishm No! They have hardly realized into what condition mod- ern business has degenerated. If they did such thought- less suggestions would not be made. Thank goodness the colleges do not teach us how to be- come successful business men. By far rather ignore the whole question, as they do to-day, than follow such a course. But a word in regard to the man who has just finished college. Perhaps he is filled to the brim with classics, with science, art, or literature, and his ideals are very high. It is now time to strike out in the world. Above all things, he wishes to succeed. Sad to say, all success to-day is measured by dollars and cents. To be a successful man he must make money. To his bitter disappointment, hr. finds this has degenerated into a degrading task. He finds men who willingly waive all principles of honor to mak:j money and be counted successful. Close application to his books and studies has kept this alarming condition from EDUCATION. 27] him. He never thought going out into the world meant a grappling with such unprincipled men. However, he must make up his mind as to the coir he will pursue. Shall he hecome mercenary, selfish and avaricious ? Shall he enter the conflict, and, like his com- petitors, resort to any and all means to succeed? Or shall he preserve his integrity, his principles; his high ideals? Suppose he tries to pursue the right. If he tried to observe the golden rule he will be taken advantage of at every turn. Those without conscience have every ad- vantage over those of keen conscience and honor. They can outstrip them in the race. Whenever a brainy man like this fails, thoughtless people sometimes say, "Well, it's too bad, but a college education does not fit a man for business.'' 1 say, heaven spare us from one that does, it must be a most degenerate education that fits a man to be more cunning and pitiless than some of the human hyenas that infest the business world today. On the other hand, suppose he decides to succeed, even though he must waive all principle and honor. Still there remain many obstacles in his way. To begin with, if he lias no capital his chances are very slim. If he has immc capital, he will be almost sure to succeed. Without capital he must work for somebody else. To begin in a small way and work up is out of the question altogether. Such chances and openings are gone forever. And right here one of the gravest charges may be 2VZ EDUCATION. lirought against modern business, and it is so important that I must digress long enough to touch on it. Modern business methods are responsible for the clos- ing up of all the opening- and avenues that lead to busi- ness success. No more openings remain. Either one nni-t start in business with immense capital or take a position working for somebody else. The young man with only brain and pluck is out of the race even before he starts. In olden times everybody had a < hance to start in business for himself. The journeyman shoemaker had only to pro- cure himself a set of tools, a bench and a room to work in, and he had an opening and an equal opportunity with everybody else. Today he would have to own an elaborate factory and expensive machinery, all of which takes capi- tal. The carpenter of yore had little more difficulty in starting in, while to-day he would require an expensive planing mill with all kinds of machinery, which would also take an immense capital. Likewise' the small merchant had no mammoth department store to compete with, and could begin on a very small scale. I do not wish to be misunderstood. I do not advocate a return to old-time methods, but it cannot be denied that with the passing of the small business enterprise has gone the opening for the young man. The young man fresh from college will find these open- ings few and far between. Suppose he has no capital and must work for some- body else. He immediately finds a host of young men EDUCATION. struggling for the same prize that he is. All struggling for a promotion, and for every lucrative position held out there are scores doing their utmost and straining every nerve to win. Only a few can win. And these are gener- ally the strangest. The rest must remain where they arc Yet there are many who persist that there is plenty of room at the top! An old and fallacious saying. There is no more hope of all succeeding to-day than there is for ever}' runner to win in a foot-race, or than there is for every man to be president of the United States. So, with the competitive struggle so fierce, the tempta- tion to do wrong grows stronger every day. Thus the college graduate is soon brought face to face with things that surprise him. He learns facts that were not included in the college curriculum. Sometimes he will wonder why they were not, and why he was left to learn so many things in the bitter school of experience. But he seldom digs deep enough to discover the real cause. Those students who are rich or who make a success of life never think of the subject at all. To them everything is just as perfect as can be desired, and they have no objections to offer whatever. The unfortunate ones sometimes discover the power behind the throne and lend their aid and sup- port to all efforts of reform. To recapitulate, then, it is futile to look to the colleges and schools of the present day to rectify any or all of our social and industrial evils. Plutocracy would strain even- point to prevent light on these subjects escaping from these institutions of learning. (18) CHAPTER XVI. THE CHURCH. Its Exalted Mission: Lamentable Failure in Fulfilling It- Why It Does \<>t Draw the Massi The Worship of Mammon — Corruption in High Places — Why It Will Be Unable to Pre- vent the Revolution. Since we cannot look to education to avert the impend- ing calamity, another influence Buggests itself as a pro- posed remedy. And this is the church or religion. If there is any influence that should pour oil on the troubled waters it is that of the church. It should be a light to the world, and utter in no uncertain tones con- demnation of evil wherever found. It should champion right and the oppressed at all times. It should be a heal- ing balm to the wounded and broken hearted at all times. To a monitor of this kind the people would lend an obedi- ent and willing ear. They would hearken to and heed such a voiee. (274) THE CHURCH. Has the church been such a monitor? Have the peo- ple hearkened to her ? If so the church will be a strong factor in quieting the storm. If not its words will carry but little weight. Let us inspect the record of the church to-day. What has it done for the poor; for the widows and orphans; the oppressed and homeless? Sad to say, the evidence is against this. The evidence shows that it has felt the paralyzing touch of mammon and the world. The evidence shows that the masses have turned sorrowfully from it in disappointment. The following, by Bishop K. S. Foster, of the M. E. Church, we clip from the Gospel Trumpet. It bears the same testimony, though in different language; a little too plainly perhaps for some, as the bishop has since been re- tired against his wish and despite his tears. Bishop Foster said: "The church of God is to-day courting the world. Its members are trying to bring it down to the level of the ungodly. The ball, the theater, nude and lewd art, social luxuries, with all their loose moralities, are making in- roads into the secret enclosure of the church; and as i satisfaction for all this worldliness, Christians are making a great deal of Lent and Easter and Good Friday ami church ornamentations. It is the old trick of Satan. The Jewish church struck on that rock; the Eomish church was wrecked on the same, and the Protestant church is fast reaching the same doom. 276 THE CHURCH. "Our great dangers, as we see them, arc assimilation to the world, neglect of the poor, substitution of the form fcr the fact of godliness, abandonment of discipline, a hireling ministry, an impure gospel— which, summed up, is a fashionable church. That Methodists Should be liable to such an outcome and thai there should be signs of it in a hundred years from the 'sail loft" seems almost the miracle of history; but who that looks about him to-day can fail to see the fact ?" The Literary Digest says: "Not long since a \c\v England clergyman addressed a letter to Mr. Samuel Gompers, Presidenl of the American Federation of Labor, asking him to state why, in his opinion, so many intelligent workingmen do not attend church. In reply Mr. Gompers -aid that one reason is that the churches are no longer in touch with the hopes and aspirations of workingmen, and are out of sympathy with their miseries and burdens. The pastors either do not know, he said, or have not the courage to declare from their pulpits, the rights and wrongs of the toiling millions. The organizations found most effective in securing im- proved conditions have been frowned upon by the church. Laborers have had their attention directed to 'the sweet by and by/ to the utter neglect of the conditions arising fiom 'the bitter now and now.' The church and the min- istry have been the 'apologists and defenders of the wrongs committed against the interests of the people, simply because the perpetrators are the possessors o' THE CHURCH. . . . a wealth/ Asked as to the means he would suggesl for reconciliation of the church and the masses, Mr. Gompera recommends ■ religious instruction in other places besides the prisoi in the homes, for instance, and in the Sunday Bchi Yes, we will not be outdone in Liberality, we favor religious instruction in some churches. You canM have too much oi ;i good thing if vou take il in moderation."' In an article in The Forum of October, '90, on "Social Problems and the Church/' by Bishop Huntington, we have his comment onaverj ootable and significant fact,. is follows : "'When a great mixed audience in one of the public halls in New York cheered the name of Jesus Christ and hissed the name of the church, it Bettled no question, solved no problem, proved no proposition, expounded no Scripture, but it was as significant as half the Bermons that are preached.' He then referred to the tact that the time was 'when the people heard the words, 'Christ and the church,' with reverent silence if not with enthusiastic de- votion, and then remarked: 'Only in these later days when workingmen think, read, reason and reflect, does a promiscuous crowd rudely, rather than irreverently, take the two apart, honoring the one and scouting the other." " The Appeal to Reason says : "According to the news dispatches, Rev. Russell Con- well, of Philadelphia, recently made the following state- ment in Omaha: 'Every man in Omaha has had an oppor- tunity to get rich. It is a disgrace, too, for any man to THE CHURCH. 27g live in Omaha for ten years and not be rich. \o man has a right to be poor. As a rule the poor people are the dishon • est people,and the rich people are the honest people in this day of Christian civilization. The foundation of busines success and Christianity are identical. Money is power and you should pray for power. Get money, no matter how; nor who suffers by you taking from the producers what by right belongs to them.' 'Get money; get it honesi if you can; but get money/ That's the doctrine, and the aforesaid gentleman will pray for your wrong doing pro- vided you donate to one of his enterprises." It is plain then that the church, delinquent in its duty, weakened and palsied, will not command respect enough in the great day of trouble to stay the hand of trouble. I do not for an instant assert that this grandest of insti- tutions is passing away forever, or that it will fail to tri umph or be glorified in the end. Far from it. But I do most emphatically say that it is falling far short of its high calling in the present day; and will utterly fail to draw men after it and away from the grave dangers ahead. How is it possible for the church to gain the confidence of the people — the poor and oppressed — when her own garments, which should be without spot or wrinkle, ai often polluted with the same filth that corrupts the body politic ? Nothing is more painful to the earnest Christian than to discover these blots on the fair fame of that holy institution. But they are often so glaring, so palpably apparent to the whole world that it would not only be 280 THE CHURCH. hypocrisy, but sheer idiocy to attempl to conceal the facts, and no good ever came from such concealmenl however we may deplore them. Ii is best to look them in the face and make an honest confession, though ii covers us with shame. The revelations in the case of the M. E. Church South and the publishing house scandal are humiliating to every Christian, without regard to denominational lines. We give this instance, not because this great branch of the church is worse than other-: nay. she is perhaps Dearer the great heart of the people than any other. She has been corrupted as little by the prevailing influences of evil in the world as any oilier; yet, what are the facts in this case? During the Civil War the federal troops occupied the buildings of the publishing house and \\ reiterate that I do not select this particular church as though it were worse than others, but rather, THE CHURCH. 283 because it is better than most; and yet these facts are notorious. But it is also notorious among the preachers of another, and even larger church, that one of her greatest leaders — in fact, many consider him the greatest orator in her pul- pit — has been guilty time and again of scandalous conduct with women. Yet no one dares to bring him to justice. He is too powerful with the moneyed interests of the church. Evidence from all sources might be adduced to show that the church generally is favoring capitalism and the rich. And that in doing so is losing its hold on the great mass of the people. With this power gone it is very improbable that it can and will settle the great social and industrial questions that are stirring society to its foundations. If it could it is doubtful if it would. Its sjanpathy and support go nega- tively to plutocracy. When the revolution breaks upon us there will be no re- straint or check morally. Education and the Church might have furnished this, but the power of mammon has pre- vented it. In all its fury it will burst upon a people whose suffering and misery will be intense; who in their con- fusion and trouble will not know which way to turn or what to do. CHAPTER XVII. THE FARMER. History of Land Ownership; the People Becoming Ten- ants—Millions of Acres Owned By Railroads and Other Corporations— Tin Farmer Robbed On All Sides — An Industrial Slave to a Ruthless Master, Plutocracy. The question of escaping the calamity comes up for a brief consideration. One might leave the country and find safety in Europe or England. But as 70,000,000 peopie could not pull up stake and escape from each other, it is useless to discuss emmigration. A handful of the rich will do this, but even they may be going from the frying pan into the fire. The same economic laws are at work in l'u rope as in America, and stupendous social and labor troubles may overtake European society before it does us. So much for that. But another means of escape proposed I wish to investi- gate more closely: that is, the suggestion that the peopl-3 (284) THE FARMER. 285 move out into the country on farms, etc., and there, living in quiet and peace, be free from the impending troubles. Recently a friend, confiding in me, said he feared he would lose his position, as it was said a trust proposed to absorb the firm he was working for. He finished by say- ing: "Well, if the worst comes, one can always take his family and move out on a farm." There never can be a trust of farms and the people can always have that as an a\ enue of escape." I said: "You are mistaken if you think farm life is a way of escape. Even though a few families with a little money move to the country and prosper, what would hap- pen if the great mass of the people did likewise ? What would be the result if people by the hundred thousands and millions flocked to the farms? Intense competition; a great decline in prices; and the most intense suffering and distress imaginable." No, farm life is -not the solu- tion of, or escape from the impending troubles. Further, I am going to prove that the farm, instead of being a national safety valve, is going to be a fruitful source of trouble and discontent; and that the farmer will be a most important factor in the impending crisis. At present there are 34,000,000 people living on farms. This is by far the largest of any one industrial class, and comprises nearly one-half the population. Very little at- tention has been paid to the farmer class heretofore, be- cause it has always been the great conservative and steady class of America. But it is certainly very evident 286 THE FARMER. that this large number of people could make themselves heard if they chose to do so. This they will do, as will be shown a little later. Land will cut an important figure, not only because it is everything to the farmer, but because it is almost as im- portant to the rest of the people, no matter where they live. Now, it may not be generally known that land was not always private property. Rut such is a fact. The private ownership of land came into use after feudalism. To better understand the interesting situation, a brief historical review of a few facts may not come amiss. To begin with, land was first siezed by conquering kings, after which it belonged to the throne. Rut it was never sold to the subjects. It was let out for use only. With the fall of the Roman Empire came the Europe of the middle ages. Serfdom was instituted and it took the place of slavery. This was some steps in advance of slav- ery and it flourished. Under it, the lords compelled the serfs to perform cer- tain duties for them, called week work and boon work. The week work meant several days' work a week for the lord without pay; and the boon work, extra work at special seasons for the whole family. The balance of the time he might work for himself or for others. In addition the serf usually gave his master small dues in quarterly pay- ments of money, a certain number of bushels of oats (of his own crops) and different kinds of service. THE FARMER. This was the way the lords of the land were firs! i ated. They were called landlords because they could take the rent or surplus earnings away from their tenants. The slave owner, the feudal lord and the landlord had each the same object in view. They took all but enough for the serf to live upon. While their methods might differ some, the results were the same. This aristocracy of the land controlled the law-making power, of course. They soon passed laws thai the lands should remain in their families. And here was the begin- ning of the private ownership of land. "With the passing of feudalism, the land owners freed themselves from the feudal dues which formerly went in the king. Then they became bolder and laid claim to the common lands, which formerly furnished the serfs with pasturage, fire wood, etc. Thus, by these repeated thefts, were the rights of the people disregarded; they were brushed aside and hardships imposed until intense hatred was engendered in their bosoms. Of the efforts of the nobles to appropriate the old ••com- mon lands," Mr. Harold Cox, in his book on "Land Nationalization/' page :28, says: "In county after county the peasantry rose against these encroachments. . . . The nobility and gentry quickly combined for common de- fense; they sold their plate and jewelry, armed their re- tainers, and with the aid of German and Italian mercen- aries suppressed the successive uprisings. The peasantry were thus compelled, by the unanswerable argunn 288 THE FARMER. musketry and hangman's rope, to Bubmil to the loss of common rights which were theirs by the prescriptions of centuries." Page after page of quotations from history might easily be given showing by what base methods th9 nobles acquired the titles to their land.-, and how they utterly disregarded the welfare of the common people, blading the lives of multitudes and actually killing great numbers of them. Once the private owner-hip of land wa- established, it became a permanent institution. The older the system grew, the less it was questioned, and finally it was looked upon as right. The words of Blackstone and oher great men made but little impression; and yet Blackstone's words were, and are, and always will be, the truth: "The earth and all things therein are the general prop- erty of all mankind from the immediate gift of the Cre- ator. Thus the ground was in common, and no part of it was permanent property of any man in particular. Thus, also, a vine or other tree might be said to be in common, as all men were equally entitled to its produce; and yet any private individual might gain the sole property of the fruit which he had gathered for his own repast. "BLACKSTOXE." The question now arises, why was the system of the pri- vate ownership of land transplanted to America ? Simply because at first there was an abundance of land and but a handful of people. Then the land question was THE FARMER. of no special importance. But time has shown the mis- take, and time will make it plain to all. A writer in The American Magazine of Civics, Mr. J. A. Collins, discusses the subject of the Decadence of Amer- ican Home Ownership, in the light of the last census. At the outset he tells us to be prepared for startling facts, and for threatening and dangerous indications. We quote as follows : "A few decades ago the great bulk of the population was made up of home-owners, and their homes were practically free from incumbrance ; to-day the vast bulk of the popu- lation are tenants." Since the occupant of a mortgaged home is virtually but a tenant of the mortgagee, he finds 84 per cent of the fam- ilies of this nation virtually tenants, and adds: "Think of this startling result having been produced in so short a time, with the vast domain of free lands in the West open to settlers, with the great fields of industry open and offering employment at good pay; and then con- sider what is to be the result with the great West all oc- cupied, or its lands all monopolized, a population increased by the addition of millions, both by natural increase and by immigration, the mineral lands and mines controlled by syndicates of foreign capital; the transportation sys- tem controlled in the interest of a few millionaire own- ers; the manufactures operated by great corporations in their own interest; with the public lands exhausted, and (19) 290 THE FARMER. the home sites monopolized and held by speculators b yond the reach of the industrial m Less than one-fifth of the American people have a clear title to a home. More than 300,000,000 acres of land are owned by foreign and domestic capitalists ; 120, ,000 this is rented ; and the balance is owned by the greai rail- way corporations. Even in 1889 State Assessor Wood of New York was quoted as follows: "In a Uw yeare there will be few or none but tenemenl farmers in this state. Year by year the value of farm land depreciah It is a fact thai no nation in the world, save Greal Britain, shows so large a per cenl of tenemenl farm< as the United States. In the state of Nevada three m< practically control all the land sutable for agricultural purposes, bv simply controlling the irrigation facilitii British capitalist- are draining 120,000 acres of land at Cape Girardeau, Mo., and will farm it under the mo?t scientific system. They will be able thus to produce at one-third the cost to the average farmer. By a decision of the Supreme Court. Archbishop Ire- land is made owner of fifty thousand acres of land in Min- nesota, and according to dispatches will begin ejection proceedings against the families who have settled upon the land, in order to make an honorable living. The following is taken from the Appeal to Reason: "A piece of land 31x51 feet in Xew York City was leased the other day for twenty year.- at an annual rental THE FARMER. 291 of $40,000. It was bought a short time ago for $100,000. This $-10,000 a year is added to the cost of doing busic bv additions to the cost of goods and the public pays it. The owner does nothing for society, did not even build a shanty on it — the lessee having to do that. This is one of the ways that labor is robbed — but so cunningly hid that but few see it. Thousands of millions annually are thus put onto the working classes for the benefit of the drones." The following arc the words of Dr. McGlynn: "To take possession of these natural bounties, to mo- nopolize them under cover of law and custom, and to make all nun who would use them pay beforehand for the privi- lege, have been the aim of the money-makers since time began. It is an easy matter to run up a fortune of one hundred millions when you can tax for two or three decades the millions who must buy bread and meat, timber and coal, cotton and wool, which all come from the land. This is what has been done directly in European countries, where, as in the British nation and in Ireland, millions of acres have been seized by the few under cover of the law, and the people have been compelled to pay first for per- mission to get at the land, then for permission to con- tinue their labor on it. -The same thing happened indirectly in this country when millions of acres were given to the great railroads, and capitalists were permitted to get hold of millions more by various subterfuges, all to be held with a tight grip until the tide of immigration had swelled these prop- 292 THE PARMER erties to untold values, when they were Bold off at rate- that made millionaire- ae common in this country and in Europe as knights in England. The readers of oewspapi are well acquainted with the career and methods of the coal harons of Pennsylvania and elsewhere, who got hold of the great coal-producing districts under cover of law, and for fortv years have levied tribute on consumers and miners alike by every device that human ingenuity could invent without regard to justiee. . . . "Just as the few ge\ control, almost absolute control, of the natural bounties, so they also gel control of the means of transportation in a country. What this mean- is bi comprehended by the statement thai society makes no ad- vance without a proper exchange of commodities : for civil- ization to improve on every side, men must have the great- est facilities for exchanging the work of their hands. . . . Ease of transportation is, therefore, as vitally necessary to the laborer as ease in getting at the natural bounties; and as all men are laborers in the true sense of the word, the few who have placed themselves in charge of the transportation facilities of a nation get incredibly rich in the briefest time, because they tax more thoroughly and absolutely every human being in their jurisdiction than does the government itself. "The Vanderbilts are worth perhaps a third of a billion to-day. How did they get it ? By hard labor ? Xo. By using the privileges foolishly granted them by the foolish people: the right of way over the state of Xew York; the THE FARMER. right to fix what rates of freight and passage the citizens of the community must pay to use their own roads; the right to hold immense domains of the State as the creation of their own hands. ... No individual or corpora- tion should be allowed to amass billions out of these public properties. . . ." Henry George says : "Since man can only live on land and from land, since land is the reservoir of matter and force from which man's body itself is taken, and on which he must draw for all that he can produce, does it not irresistibly follow that to give the land in ownership to some men and deny to others all right to it is to divide mankind into the rich and the poor, the privileged and the helpless? Does it not follow that those who have no rights to the use of land can live only by selling their power to labor to those who own the land ? "Thus, so long as private property in land continues — so long as some men are treated as owners of the earth and other men can live on it only by their sufferance — human wisdom can devise no means by which the evils of our present condition may be avoided." Is it any wonder that with such conditions prevailing and growing worse the independence of the farmer is passing? And, further, is it not apparent that the coun- try, instead of furnishing a haven in time of trouble, will furnish fuel for the coming conflagration ? And is it not plain that the farmer, instead of being the staid, conserva- 294 THE PARMER. tive member of society, lb ripe [or any radical uprising? Information from every available source shows that the condition of the American farmer has steadily declined, until today the income per capita of the farming popula- tion is 26c per day. In addition to this, he is not nearly as independent of society now as he used to be. The time wras when he could live almost apart and away from society and get along nicelv. Bui that is all goim. "No man liveth or dieth to himself/' applies to the farmer a- well as to every- body else to-day. Let us briefly analyze his present con- dition. Society to-day is a very complex organism. With all of its branches of work divided and sub-divided, its mem- bers are interdependent. Formerly the farmer was not included in this. To-day he is. Instead of the farmer producing all of his food and clothing on the farm, and himself building log houses and barns; instead of doing his work without machinery; in- stead of supplying all of his needs from his farm, he must now go to society for a thousand things. He can no longer be his own blacksmith, butcher and carpenter. His clothing, stockings, etc., are no longer produced on the farm. For all of these things he must go to society, even for such things as butter and cheese, which to-day come from the factories. He, like everybody else, has become a specialist. He THE FARMER. sticks to raising one or two things only. Hence his de- pendence on society for all of his other necessities. Even then he cannot confine himself to his specialty without society helping him in that. First, he must have the railroad to carry away his cropa and bring to him machinery, tools, supplies, etc. The elevator, stock yards, and telegraphs play an important part in his life. The scythe, pitchfork and hand rake have given place to the six-foot-cut mower, the sulky tedder and horsefork. The windmill has taken the place of the well, and the steam thresher, with automatic feeder and blow stacker, does in an hour the work that once kept the flail busy for a week. In short, the tendency toward specialization is the same on the farm almost as in the factory, and has the same ef- fect. Being, then, such a member of societj', he is helped or injured by everything that helps or injures it. Strikes and panics effect him; wars and rumors of war; the rains of India, and the floods of Russia; all play upon him. II is no longer far removed from us; he is one of us. But he is still a serf to the landlord, the trusts and big corporations. Let us see. First of all, his productive power has been greatly increased. It does him no good. He works so many days in the year for the mortgager : a certain number of days for the harvest machine manu- facturer, the wire and twine trust, and so on down the 398 THE FARMER line. The time he hae Left is bis own, winch in the case of the serf of old, a bare li\ ing. To-day he has the form and appeal ming the land, but in reality he only accumulat< What he really owns is a permanenl ami exhausting y<\> thai m him a few cents per day. Mi- work is like the Bweated trades of the city slum-, h is work done at home. Him- self, wife, sons and daughters all toil laboriously, from sunrise to sunset, with Imt few holiday- and little recn tion. The fanner would see the point and raise a greal pro- test if lie were asked to do the same thin;: on one of the big syndicate or bonanza farm.-, lint now he congratulal himself that he is not at the caprice of >um,. employer in a factory who might discharge him at will. In the mean- time his wife is frequently driven insane by the grinding toil, as statistics show. Mi- children also must often stop school to help in the field. There was a time long ago when iln farmer knew he was a serf, and did not pretend to be free. In those days he worked only a certain number of days for himself, and a certain number for his lord. But to-day some think he is free in spite of the fact that all of his products, almost, are taken from him by our modern industrial system, that leaves him but a mere pittance for himself. He is almost a serf to-day, under different condition-. In the olden time if the farmer could not sell his prod- uct he could consume it himself. To-dav he must sell it THE FARMER. to get hold of money. He could not live under modem complex conditions without money. Thus often he is forced to sell at the lowest prices. Other farmers fare likewise. Keen competition prevails. This competition is further increased by the annihilation of distance, as the railroads handling products from far and near bring him in competition with all his class. Almost as bad off as the factory hand, he has no unions like them to uphold prices. He is unorganized; belongs to no trust, and there is nothing to prevent his income be- ing reduced steadily each year. These are all facts — serious facts — that must be dealt with soberly. No light, superficial treatment will suffice. The class it concerns is too large; the people that com- prise it too honest and hardworking. How grating on the nerves, then, are the observations of some of our would-be thinkers and leaders. While attending a convocation of the Protestant Episco- pal Church in Xew York City, Bishop Worthington's views respecting the social commotion were gleaned by a newspaper man and published broadcast on October 25, '9G. He is reported to have said: "The trouble with the farmer, in my judgment, is that we have carried our free educational system entirely too far. Of course, I know that this view will be considered as a bit of heresy, but still I believe it. The farmer's sons— a great many of them— who have absolutely no ability to rise, get a taste of education and follow it np. They will 300 THE FARMER never amount to anything — thai is, many of them— and they become dissatisfied to follow in the walk of life that God intended they should, and drift into the cil It is the over-education of those who arc not qualified to re- ceive it thai fills our cities while the farms lie idh BON. W.J. BBYAN'S REPLY, As to the justice of the Bishop's suggestion, we leave it for .Mr. \Y. J. Bryan to answer, quoting from his press- reported reply as follow "To talk about the over-education of the fan -ons and to attribute the difficulties which surround us to-day to over-education, is, to my mind, one of the most cruel things a man ever uttered. The idea of saying that farm- ers' sons, who are not able to rifle in life, get a taste of education, and enjoy the taste so much that they follow it up and become dissatisfied with the farm and drift into the cities! The idea of saying that there i- over-education among our farmers* son>! My friends, do you know what that language means ? It means a reversal of the progress of civilization and a march toward the dark ages again. "How can you tell which one of the farmers' sons is going to prove a great man until you have educated them all ? Are we to select a commission to go around and pick out the ones that are to be educated? "Ah, my friends, there is another reason why people have gone into the cities and left the farms. It is because your legislation has been causing the foreclosure of mort- gages on the farmers and the farms. It is because your THE FARMER. 301 legislation has been making the farmer's life harder for the farmer; it is because the non-producing classes have been producing the laws and making it more profitable to gamble in farm products than to produce them. "The idea of laying the blame of the present condition at the farmer's door ! The idea of suggesting as a remedy the closing of schools in order that the people may not be- come dissatisfied ! Why, my friends, there will be dissatis- faction so long as the cause for dissatisfaction exists. In- stead of attempting to prevent people realizing their con- dition, why don't these critics try to improve the condition of the farmers of this country ?" The Appeal to Eeason says: "The demand for servant girls in the cities is greater than the supply, so the papers state. The farmers should send their daughters to the cities to wait on the drones. After raising the food of the world to feed the drones, the farmers should train their girls to cook for them! And make their clothes ! and clean their houses ! That is the system. The number of people who are getting a graft on production that enables them to charge a profit on tha farmers and workers sufficient to enable them to live thus, increases rapidly, hence the scarcity of 'servant girls.'" 'Servants' is the same term applied to the black slaves. At a time when the girls and boys are needed at home to ease down the life of the father and mother who have raised and loved and suffered for them, the industrial con- ditions are made so hard that they are forced to go out :;<)•. THE PARMER. 'into service' for the fellows who have been charging the parents a profit on what they had to buy large enough to pay their sons and daughters a wage. In reality, the parents pay the wages by this profit, while the drom the service. Onlv poverty compels the girls and bo work for the drom-. Poverty is necessary to have Bervii and the drones Bee thai poverty exists. Otherwise thi would have in do their own work." To recapitulate, then, it would firsl of all he ou1 of tin- question for the mass of the people to think of [feeing to the country and taking up fanning, when tin- Lfivai BOCial and industrial troubles break upon Bociety. And Becond, we may look for disturbances to break out amongsl tin- farming population at any time. Tin- landlord, tin- trust, competition, and. in fact, all of tin- evil- of our preseni in- dustrial system, have been at work and have changed the farmer — the once sturdy and conservative element of so- ciety — into a seething and discontented class, ready to resort to any and everything to change a system that works so many wrongs and hardships upon them. Such items a- the following have opened the eyes of the farmer and set him to thinking. A recent editorial in the San Francisco Examiner says : "Mr. W. K. Yanderbilt's huge British steam yacht Valiante has joined Mr. F. W. Yanderbilt's British steam yacht Conqueror in New York harbor. The Yaliante cost $800,000. This represents the profits on a crop of about 15,000,000 bushels of sixty-cent wheat, or the entire prod- THE FARMER. 303 uct of at least 8,000 160-acre farms. In other words, 8,000 farmers, representing 40,000 men, women and chil- dren, worked through sun and storm to enable Mr. Vander- bilt to have built in a foreign shipyard such a pleasure craft as no sovereign in Europe possesses. The construc- tion of that vessel required the labor of at least 1,000 me- chanics for a year. The money she cost, put in circulation among our workmen, would have had a perceptible in- fluence upon the state of times in some quarters." The present tendency of things indicates that the time will come before long when we will have a landlord and a landless population in the place of the farmers. But the probabilities are that before the culmination of such an unhappy condition of affairs, society will be in the throes of a deadly revolution. A revolution long in prepa- ration, and slow to manifest itself, yet none the less ter- rible and far-reaching in its effects when once precipi- tated. CHAPTER XVIII. PLUTOCRACY. Banks and the Money Power — What Scarcity of Money Means — How H is Manipulated By Wall Street and the Banks— A Villainous System Thai Enslavi the Industrie- and People of the Country — Speculators; Watered Stock; Methods of Finance. The great revolution will be preceded and precipitated by a money panic. After a general survey of the field, the important hearing of money, the money power and hanks becomes apparent. Also the expediency of reserving the discussion of these factors until now. At the bottom of the whole financial system is a scarcity of money. There is not nearly enough money to conduct the business of the country on. Money in a verv limited quantity is what the money-lenders want, and is the chief characteristic of our present financial system. Were money plentiful their occupation would lie gone. They see that it is kept scarce. It is estimated that the volume (304) Plutocracy Enthroned. PLUTOCRACY. 30? of business transacted in this country is eight times as great as the amount of money in circulation. In case of panic, each dollar is wanted eight times over and wanted badly. The money lenders deceive the public in every way. They -ay money is sensitive; capital is timid. They say any tiling but that money is scarce. The fall of 1902 saw the country almost thrown into a panic. Large crops had to be moved, and the cry was raised, "there is not enough money." For a few days things looked serious on Wall Street. Toward it all eyes were turned. Had Wall Street succumbed it would have been felt all over the country. Trouble was averted by Rockefeller and Morgan coming to the rescue. They bought heavily, kept up prices and showed by their ability to prevent a panic that they also have power to cause one if they so choose. Mr. Shaw, the Secretary of the Treasury, also came to the rescue. To the average citizen it seems strange that the government would let the banks have large sums of monev without interest, but when the citizen comes to the bank he must pay interest for all money he borrows. This is the way the money power takes care of itself. At nearly all times in the history of the world there has be°n a money power. Reformation has taken place in everything else but this. Many political and social wrongs have been righted ; slavery and much oppression abolished, but the money power, unmolested, is as strong to-day as ever. It sits enthroned in the high places. At its dicta- 308 PLUTOCRACY. tion rulers bend. Its mandates, the legislatures, the judiciary and executive authorities of the governmenl obey. Its power is enormous. It controls the numerous class that are borrowers at its counters. It controls and muzzles the press. It controls a large and influential class of salaried officials, clerk.-, etc., all of whom find it to their interest to sanction its policy or remain discreetly -ilent. It stops at nothing to attain its end. When better means fail, fraud is resorted to in any way. shape OT form. Some- times it is perpetrated on a gigantic scale. The first, and one of the greatest frauds ever consumated was the de- monetization of silver in 1873, when less than half a dozen Senators and Congressmen were aware of what was taking place. Though the remonetization of silver at present might result in upsetting things and producing a series of evil results, the fact remains that a most heinous crime was perpetrated against the people when it was demonetized, without their permission, and without their knowledge. We give the opinion of different Senators and Congress- men. Senator Thurman said: "When the bill was pending in the Senate we thought it was simply a bill to reform the mint, regulate coinage and fix up one thing and another, and there is not a single man in the Senate, I think, unless a member of the com- mittee from which the bill came, who had the slightest PLUTOCRACY. 309 idea that it was even a squint toward demonetization."— Congressional Record, volume 7, part 2, Forty-fifth Con- gress, second session, page 1,064. Senator Conkling in the Senate, on March 30, 1876, during the remarks of Senator Bogy on the bill (S. 263) To Amend the Laws Relating to Legal Tender of Silver Coin, in surprise inquired : "Will the Senator allow me to ask him or some other Senator a question ? Is it true that there is now by law no American dollar ? And, if so, is it true that the effect of this bill is to make half-dollars and quarter-dollars the only silver coin which can be used as a legal tender?" Senator Allison, on February 15, 1878, said: "But when the secret history of this bill of 1873 comes to be told, it will disclose the fact that the House of Rep- resentatives intended to coin both gold and silver, and in- tended to place both metals upon the French relation, in- stead of on our own, which was the true scientific position with reference to this subject in 1873, but that the bill afterward was doctored." Hon. William D. Kelley, who had charge of the bill, in a speech made in the House of Representatives, March 9, 1878, said: "In connection with the charge that I advocated the bill which demonetized the standard silver dollar I say that, though the chairman of the committee on coinage, I was ignorant of the fact that it would demonetize the silver dollar from our system of coins, as were those dis- 310 PLUTOCRACY. tirguished Senators, Messrs. Blaine and Voorhees, who were then members of the House, and each of whom a few days since interrogated the other: 'Did you know it was dropped when the bill passed ?' 'No/ said Mr. Blaine, 'did you ?' 'No,' said Mr. Voorhees. 'I do not think that there were three members in the House that knew it.' ' Again, on May 10, 1ST9, Mr. Kelley said: "All I can say is that the committee on coinage, weights and measures, who reported the original bill, were faithful and able, and scanned the provisions closely; that as then- organ I reported it ; that it contained provision for both the standard silver dollar and the trade dollar. Never having heard until a long time after its enactment into law of the substitution in the Senate of the section which dropped the standard dollar, I profess to know nothing of its history ; but I am prepared to say that in all the legisla- tion of this country there is no mystery equal to the de- monetization of the standard silver dollar of the United States. I have never found a man who could tell just how it came about or why." Senator Beck, in a speech before the Senate, January 10, 1878, said: "It (the bill demonetizing silver) never was understood by either House of Congress. I say that with full knowl- edge of facts. No newspaper reporter — and they are the most vigilant men I ever saw in obtaining information — discovered that it had been done." Mr. Murat Halstead, editor of the Cincinnati Com- PLUTOCRACY. :;i; mercial Gazette, is one of the able men of to-day. The following from his pen under date of October 2 I. L871 quoted from the New York Journal: "This, the British gold policy, was the work of experts only. Evasion was essential to success in it, and possibly because coin was not in circulation, and, being out of pub- lic view, it could be tampered with without attracting at- tention. The monometallic system of the great creditor nation was thus imposed upon the great debtor nation without debate." The following words are publicly credited to Col. R. G. Ingersoll : "I do ask for the remonetization of silver. Silver was demonetized by fraud. It was an imposition upon every solvent man, a fraud upon every honest debtor in the United States. It assassinates labor. It was done in the interest of avarice and greed, and should be undone by honest men." That the effect would be as it is was foretold by numer- ous statesmen upon the floors of Congress as soon as the true situation was realized — 1877 to 1880. Some were blind to the issue, and some were quieted by self-inten and some relied upon the advice of "financiers," but others spoke valiantly against the wrong. The late Hon. James G. Blaine said in a speech before the United States Senate (1880): "I believe the struggle now going on in tin- country and in other countries for a single gold standard would, if sue- 312 PLUTOCRACY. cessful, produce widespread disaster in and throughout the commercial world. The destruction of silver as money, and the establishment of gold as the sole unit of value, must have a ruinous effect on all forms of property except those investments which yield a fixed return in money. These would be enormously enhanced in value, and would gain a disproportionate and unfair advantage over every other species of property. If, as the most reliable sta- tistics affirm, there are nearly $7,000,000,000 of coin or bullion in the world, very equally divided between gold and silver, it is impossible to strike silver out of existence as money without results that will prove distressing to millions, and utterly disastrous to tens of thousands. I be- lieve gold and silver coin to be the money of the constitu- tion; indeed, the money of the American people anterior tc the constitution, which the great organic law recognized as quite independent of its own existence. Xo power was conferred on Congress to declare either metal should not be money; Congress has, therefore, in my judgment, no power to demonetize either. If, therefore, silver has been demonetized, I am in favor of remonetizing it. If its coin- age has been prohibited, I am in favor of ordering it to be resumed. I am in favor of having it enlarged." The late Senator Vance said later: "The power of money and its allies throughout the world have entered into this conspiracy to perpetrate the greatest crime of this or any other age, to overthrow one- half of the world's money and thereby double their own PLUTOCRACY. 313 wealth by enhancing the value of the other half which is in their hands. The money changers are polluting the temple of our liberties." The United States' government recently sent official let- ters to its representatives in foreign countries, requesting reports on monetary affairs. The report of Mr. Currie, Minister to Belgium, recently published, is a remarkable showing, in harmony with the experiences of the people of the United States. He reports the following reply to his questions given by the Hon. Alfonso Allard, Belgian Director of Finance : "Since 1873 a crisis, consisting in a fall in all prices, exists continually, nor does it appear possible to arrest its progress. This fall in prices, reacting on wages, is now evolving a social and industrial crisis. "You ask me why we returned in 1873 to monometal- lism, limping though it be. I can conceive no other rea- son, unless that it was to please a certain class of financiers who profited thereby— a class supported by theories in- vented and defended at that time by some political econo- mists, notably by members of the Institute of France. "You ask what influence these monetary measures have had in Belgium on industry and wages? Money, which was already scarce in 1873, has become still scarcer, and that fall in prices which was predicted has taken pi. The average fall in the price of all the products of labor is 50 per cent since 1873— that of cereals over 65 per cent. Industry is no longer remunerative, agriculture is ruined, 314 PLUTO CK AC Y. and everybody is clamoring for protection by duties, while "our ruined citizens think of war. Such is the sad condi- tion of Europe." The New York World, under date of September 24, '96, publishes the following words of Prince Bismarck to Herr von Kardorf, leader of the Free Conservative Party in the German Eeichstag: "I am too old to go to school over the currency issue, but I recognize that, although I acted in 1873 on what I regarded as the best advice, my action was too precipitate in view of the results which have followed. "The one class that we cannot afford to estrange is the farming class. If they are convinced, and they assure you they are convinced, that agricultural depression is peculiar to these monetary changes, our government must review its position." Thus, evidence in abundance, and from all sources, might be adduced to prove that fraud — stupendous fraud — was committed in 1873, when silver was demonetized. And though it may be proven that the remonetization of silver would bring the most evil results, the fraud is still a fraud, and unjustifiable from any standpoint. But fraud is not always necessary for the money power to attain its ends. Frequently laws thai favor it and ope- rate against the people arc openly passed, and with very little protest from any source, for those who under- stand are generally in a position to be benefited, and re- main silent, while the greal majority who are being in- PLUTOCRACY. jured have never investigated and do not in ml. Those who honestly protest are in the minority. Tie are sometimes silenced by being called calamity howl yellow journalists, etc. Then, there are others who p ceive and understand how things are going, but fa way of making themselves heard. Thus it is that the money power has feathered it with surprising audacity and impunity. The chief instrument of the money power — on.' that tains its ends, that yields it golden harvests, thai br ii: enormous incomes, in an eminently respectable wa; the bank. It is remarkable, the superstition that prevails in I gard to the National Banks. Nothing Beems bo i able, safe and sound. Many are laboring under the Insion that the system is the grandesl ever devised. While this delusion prevails at present, it is bring dispelled, and in a few more year- enlightenment on the subject will be general. I wish to ask just one question to prove my radical statements. If security, soundness and the people's welfare w desired, why have not Postal Savings Bank* been adopt In England these institutions were established in L8I in Canada in 1868; in Austria-Hungary in i have also been established in Fran gium, Nether- lands, Denmark, Germany, Etaly, Norway, Switzerland, Sweden, India. Ceylon, Finland, Japan, A 31C PLUTOCRACY tralia, New Zealand, Hawaii and Trinidad. Postal savings banks have been adopted by almosl every civilized nation in the world excepl the Onited Stat. Why should we not haVethem? Dr. C. P. Taylor states in The Medical World thai he has corresponded with ;i large number of Congressmen on the subject, and in reply to this question, YV. YV. Bower, member of Congress from San Diego, Calif., sent a copy of his "Postal Savings Bill," which has been pending in Congress for years, and write "Bankers and money shark- do not want any postal -av- ing system. That is the answer to your 'why not T ' Just think! A score of countries have government banks, which are absolutely safe, sound and secure. The United States is a conspicuous exception. Why is this? Bank, i- and money sharks do not wain it. Of course not. No matter how secure these United States Banks would be, the money power wishes to reserve this business for them- selves. The money power is stronger in the United States than anywhere else. Were the government to engage in the banking business they would be crowded out. Their golden harvests would be reaped by the government, which is the people themselves. The stream of wealth flowing into their pockets would cease. That is why we have pri- vate and National, instead of strong government banks. Freedom says: "Under the Constitution of the United States it is the sovereign function of Congress to supply the nation with money. The function of supplying money ever since gov- PLUTOCRACY. 317 ernments were first established has been always regarded as a sovereign function, i. e., a function belonging exclu- sively to the sovereign power, to the government itself. Congress in the very beginning of our government exer- cised this sovereign function, one, the exercise of which, more than any other, directly touches every individual in the nation, for the reason that in civilized society money is an absolute necessity. In a civilized state, the demand for any product or commodity or service, whether it be the simplest necessity or the greatest luxury, expresses itself in the shape of money, civilization's sole* purchasing agent. It is only the beggar that makes a demand directly for food or clothing. It is for this reason that it is said 'The demand for money is equivalent to the sum of demands for all things whatsoever' — money being the instrumentality through which the wants of man are satisfied. "In 1863, under the influence of the bankers, brokers any money lending classes, who alone could be benefited by the scheme, and without any demand having been made therefor by the people who have for 35 years been the vic- tims of that evil legislation, the Congress of the United States enacted the national banking law yet in force. The National Banks under this law were permitted to use their capital in buying securities and then depositing the se- curities with the United States government (just as some years ago the Farmers' Alliance asked permission to do) and then to issue their own promissory notes (payable on demand only at the bank issuing them) to the extent of 90 318 PLUTOCRACY. per cent of the face value of the securities so deposited. These securities were bonds bearing interesl al 6 per cenl in gold. Congress made these notes receivable as money, in effect indorsing the ootes of the bank and causing them to pas? as money. On the bonds deposited as securities for the notes the bankers gol the interest, which was payable every six months, and they loaned their own promissory notes out to the people as money and drew a heavy interesl upon them, thus also getting interest on what they, tin- banks, owed. "In effect the banks got two interests on their capital, one on their bond- and one on their own note- loaned out to the people. Congress could as well have issued paper money (as it had previously done) as to have tanned out that sovereign privilege to the money tenders who organ- ized the banks, and thus have saved the people more than $1,000,000,000 that would have been left with the people instead of having been paid over to the 'rielf few. who now substantially own the property of the country. "Congress could as well, as fairly and as reasonably have turned over to other corporations the sovereign functions of levying taxes, raising armies, borrowing money on the credit of the United States, passing bankrupt laws, declar- ing war, establishing courts or exercising any other sov- ereign function of government as to turn over to the Na- tional Banking corporations, as it did, the sovereign func- tion of furnishing the currency with which the American PLUTOCRACY. 319 people have been compelled for 35 years to transact their business." This is characteristic of the money power; to compel the government to turn over the sovereign function rf issuing money to them; and characteristic of the people also is their dullness in perceiving the iniquity of it all. No wonder they grow richer. No wonder their fortunes are figured in fabulous numbers. The Appeal to Reason says : "The First National Bank of New York City pays 50 per cent a year on its capital stock besides princely salaries for its officers. How would farmers like such a return after drawing $50,000 a year for superintendence and the pay of all the people who did the work on the farm? But are they not more benefit to the nation than mere money changers? Yes, the country is exceeding prosperous! For the bankers. The farmers are no part of the country and hence are not considered." Again, this paper prints the following: "Please explain how the government has printed and given to the banks $349,856,276 in bank notes without any benefit or equivalent. — A Reader. "That was the amount of the bank notes in circulation reported by the United States treasury department on January 1. This amount was printed by the government and given to the banks for their use. They deposited bonds to secure the notes, but the government paid the same interest on the notes as if they had not been de- 330 PLUTOCRACY. posited. The governmenl gol no return Eor the use of these notes. It taxes the banks enough to pay for the printing and care of the notes, thus saving the bank the expense and trouble of such printing and care. Bui no BENEFIT to the governmenl was received. It i- strange that the people are so innocent of the character of the national banking schemi — a scheme pure and Bimple to give one set of citizens money free while the others who furnish the money have to pay Eor it- use. There is no reason why the governmenl should not print and ng< money instead of printing and gh ing it to the hank-. If its money is good in the hands of bankers it is good in the hands of the government. It Beems to me that a child should he able to see the cheat — hut the politicians are controlled by the hankers and their friends and make law; for their friends instead of the public. Why should the government give the hanks the face of their bonds in bank notes and still pay the banks the interest on the bonds? Would you give a man who held your note the money for the note and then jjay him interest on the note also? But that is just what the government (of, by and for bankers) does to bond holders— IF THEY ARE NATIONAL BAXKERS. Write your member of Congress for a copy of the banking law and study up. It will be worth the mental cost." "Will you tell us whether or not somebody isn't paying interest on all National Bank notes in circulation ? If not, why are they in circulation ?— G. B. Hoitt. Exeter. X. H. PLUTOCRACY. "Guess somebody must be cinched for the per cent. I never knew of banks giving away the notes after the gov- ernment printed and placed them in their lilly white hands. That is their business— loaning. Xot only ar> they drawing interest on the notes, but when the notes are re-deposited by some one whom the borrower has paid, the bank loans them again and gets another interest. THIS IS DONE AX AVERAGE OF TEX TIMES FOR EACH DOLLAR. Ask something hard." In regard to the safety of these institutions, this same paper has the following interesting article: "The Pittsburg, Pa., Press of March 31, calls attention with pride to the fact that savings bank reports show that deposits- are $600,000,000 greater than all the monies of every kind in the nation — that if the depositors of savings banks alone were to withdraw their deposits there wouljd not be money enough in the nation to pay them. The Press says if they were to do so other nations would sup- ply the money thus withdrawn so that business would go right on. Just think of the other nations sending us over their pound, shilling and pence; their peso, crown, franc, colon, sucre, piasters, mark, drachma, gourde, rupee, lira, yen, florin, sol, milres, ruble, etc? What a nice time we would have doing business with the money of other na- tions. One nation does not furnish another nation money. Metal passes back and forth between nations, but it is not money until it has gone through the mint of the na- tion. But what strikes me most in the matter is, that all (21) 322 PLUTOCRACY. the money in the cation is owned by savings bank de- positors, and that the trusts use thai money to organize trusts and monopolies and skin the very people wrhofurnish the money they are using! II' the people were to withdraw their money from the banks every monopolist in the i lion would be broken, bui the people would aot be broki for they would have their money in their pa ake advantage of the greal tumble in prices that would occur. It was the knowing of this fad thai during the run on some Chicago bank two years ago, the late P. I>. Armour stood along the long line of depositors and urged them to leave their money in hank, offering to give bis personal curity for their deposits. If the depositors had all de- manded their money. Armour would have been ruined, and with him many oilier.-, whose sole hold on their wealth is the fad that the masses stupidly put their money in hanks for these gentlemen to manipulate. But some fine morning the trusts will wake up and find that the people have 'lo>t confidence,' and have demanded their money and there will he no loan- for their manipulating the market. Keeping the massi - _norant of the fact that their deposits are the basis of every speculation and ev< trust and monopoly is working all right just now. 'But you can't fool all the people all the time.' " "The banks of the United States owe their depositors nearly $9,000,000,000 and have less than $900,000,000 in cash ! There are only $2,255,000,000 of money of all kinds Wi\y are v^)e not given Postal Savings Banks? Tl\ir\K it over. PLUTOCRACY. 325 ic this nation. Well, maybe there will not be a harvest, by and by!" "Preston, Wis., is a town whose citizens would resent the statement that their place lacked in civilization, and would point with pride to the handsome building next door to a modest hotel on which 'BANK' stood out in bold relief. The bank was the only thing that prevented the burglar from breaking in and taking the hard earnings of a life time, and the young and old, man and maid, hurried tc its iron box to deposit in safety their daily gatherings of nickels. It was run by the eminently respectable class, the pillars of society and church, who alone prevented the social structure from turning back to barbarism. The credulous had deposited about $200,000 with this safe institution, and when the pie was opened the other day there was $75 in money and $250 in notes in the bank. The balance had been — not stolen, my dear, not stolen; that would be harsh — but had been financed out of sight by cashier Todd. It is only one of thousands that have occurred and will continue to occur under the system of private or so-called national banking. Writing up this incident in the course of our national prosperity, the St. Paul Dispatch runs the following headlines, which tell the tale in a nut shell. You keep your money in one of these safe banks, eh ? Had the losers read and heeded the Ap- peal they would not now be mourning. Government banks would be too paternalistic for you, eh ? Here are the head- lines : 326 PLUTOCRAt V. •■ 'Todd Coni rhal B i : R. Clem- ent, of La < Without Consideration ia I'. Greenleaf, Once Prominent in St. Paul - and Who Was Left $150,000 Upon the Death ol Hei Husband, 1- PenniL Todd Admits Thai H< Has Not I Kept a Proper Set of B the Bank— Admits That II,. Had Practical Control of the Green] e, but Says He Does Not Know Whi ime of thi rty— Widows, Orphans and Farmers are the Principal Sufl the B Men Havin the Institution 3 Alone— He Tears a Numb His 1 to Hide the Identity of thi I' rson or Persons Who R< the Cash— Miss Laura Rolfe Loses th( to Attend the State University — Farmers I. r 9 High Rate of Interest A I ight — « ' i. ■ Prevent Him Going to Dying Fathei sid< — Harry HuniDi Lost Accumulations for an Europ Trip — M Diehred, a Very Old Lady, Lot . a Lit Savings, &c.' " The marvel is, that the banks, after having secured the privilege of issuing the money of the country, do not dis- charge the Eunction with extreme care and caution for fear of losing it. But they seem to have no such fear: not only so, for instead of being satisfied as things are. th do everything in their power to increase the burden of debt. This can be proven. If nobody were in debt, hankers and money lenders would have to go out of business, for none would need to PLUTOCRACY. 327 borrow. Therefore, a system that upholds or forces credits is necessary to their existence. Would they like to everj body out of debt ? Not for an instant. They want to see debt increase. And they work to attain that end. The more debt increases, the more their business flourish- es, and the greater their profits. Let us see how they pro- ceed to increase and perpetuate debt. If we estimate the debts of the country at $40,000,000,- 000 (which would probably under, rather than over state, the amount), and the population at 70,000,000, it would make the debt $5"J 1 for each individual; or estimating five to a family (i. e., a man, his wife and three children), it would make the debt already loaded onto each active man, even the poorest, amount to $2,855. Every child in the country is born with a heavy mortgage on it. A perpetual bonded debi has been saddled on the people. Repeated concessions to banking interests; the various so- called refunding acts, which have each time so changed the terms, that no progress is made in wiping out debts; the donation by Congress of public lands and guaranteed railroad bonds to build railroads; and finally the watering of stocks, are some of the different methods used to in- crease and perpetuate debt. The last-named meuiod is the most simple and the one the public know most about. Everybody knows to-day that stocks are watered to the limit. And everybody ex- pects that when the inflation reaches a certain mark a PL1 TOCRA( 1 collapse will ensue. At tima these colli ill In panic The. elder Vanderbill aln pen issued million- of dollaw of i I railroad doing he, in effect, created an enormous n nd placed it on the industry of the i ountry. The actual ere haw been toiling IJ the int. immense Bum. The people srho at \ I hold I curities" Bimply "fleece" labor y< they receivei Did Vanderbill "rob" indus tenl ': How long will tin- people continue to patiently carry the load thus unjustly imposed upon then The Bame line of reasoning can of i be applied to other similarly acquired fortuni Beyond the collapses and i»;i w realize th< significance and depth of the* as. But listen! i not the debtor a >la\c to the creditor? Ha- il that way in all ages of the world? A- enabled to squeeze out of the debtors a la' hard earnings? Docs it make any difference under wl name the process goe- ? I- not the }»rin< i]>K- the -a: even though it be called rent, interest, advanced prices for certain commodities, or profits, etc.? Dr. McGlynn, touching on this point. Bays : "Here again the world seem? to be all at sea as to the elementary principles of this problem ; the money-lend alone have fixed and profitable principles, which enable them to tax every human being who uses money, for the PLUTOCRACY. 329 use and for the continuance of the favor to use it. They have placed themselves between men and the medium of exchange, just as others have placed themselves between men and the natural bounties, between men and the facili- ties of transporting goods to market. How can they help getting millions together as the Eothschilds have done; million.-, again, that should be in greater part passing into the treasury of the community." John Clark Ridpath, the historian, has proven that our present national debt represents more wealth than did our entire national debt of 3000 million dollars at the close of the war. thirty year- ago. These are Mr. Eidpath's words: "For thirty years the American people have been paying into that horrible maelstrom the volume of their great re- BOnrces. They have paid on their debt, or at least they have paid, in this long period such a prodigious sum that arithmetic can hardly express it. The imagination cannot embrace it and yet it is the truth of the living God that in the year 1896 the national debt of the United States will purchase as its equivalent in value as much of the av- erage of twenty-five of the leading commodities of the American market, including real estate and labor, as the same debt would purchase at its maximum on the first of March, 1866. The people have paid and paid for thirty y< ars, and at the end have paid just this— NOTHING !" The truth of the matter is that a Plutocracy has been built up right in our midst, and that the people have been slow to waken to the fact. This power is fast gaining con- 330 PL1 TO( RA( Y. Mu | of the government and i hih pi viding for itself. When the speculat Wall 5 money in banks in watered si ment i to tlic rescue and deposit! millions of public fun in the banks bo th< ' people furnish the money for the with. Ever] thing possibl< is do Bui hard for au American cil own beloved country. Many will never b< con- vinced until the Republic begins to topple, and Bom until they behold the, ruin- of the the world has ever produced. CHAPTER XIX. PANICS. Two Kinds: Financial and Industrial — First Caused By reify of Money, Over-Speculation, Watered Stocks, Etc. — Second Caused By Over-Production or Under-Consumption — Latter Not Frequent, But More Serious. Why Foreign Markets Will Soon Be Gone, Thus Causing a Glut at Home — Terrible Industrial Panic Inevitable. Panics are the result of one or two causes. The collapse of speculative values and inflated stocks, or ovcr-pro- duction. The former, generally called a money panic, is of frequent occurrence, and is generally tided over in a short time with but comparatively serious results. The latter, called an industrial panic, is of less frequent occur- rence, but more widespread and serious in its results. A monev panic may not be serious enough to affect business (331) and iinln ' \" ind by a lii nic. 'I'll. \aluet mere) to burst. All pi Bui an industrial ; ■ \y: I In minim P I ii~i. ad "t !■ called, it i- really un warehousi and Btan ine «rar< ! Lei us i samine thi- Though never b productive caps producer i- only paid ba< k fr<>m .. of what he prod I • keta become glutted ? to one-seventh of the vast produ goes as over-production; it ly undi Given such conditi the ii de< in the output of all pro* being im demand for . a shut-down < in the factories, mines and .-hops, and business in the stores and traili: An industrial panic is the blocking of t 1 if eom- PANICS. 333 merce. Even in times of peace and prosperity, this block- ade will occur every time the warehouses are filled and there is do outlet, because the consumers haven't the wherewith to buy back the product. 1 l luree, when business ceases, wages also cease. And when \ curtailed the buying power of the con- sumer is also decreased, and the panic is further augment- ed. Well-chosen is the name panic. It describes con- dition- perfectly. Ii is as though the populace were placed between the upper and lower mill-stones, for a glut pro- duce- low wages, and low wages increases the glut by re- ducing the consuming power. And then, in addition, work being scarce, fierce compe- tition between the wage workers ensues, and wages are forced to a -'ill lower point. It i- just -udi a condition of affairs that will precede the ing revolution. Later, I shall show how the ex- plosion will be precipitated by a panic; how a financial and industrial panic will be the spark to touch off the powder ae. ;t first I wi-h to consider some objections. It may be ted thai if industrial panics are caused by a glut of the market-, then by finding foreign markets and export- ing th( -production, a blockade of business may be averted. his suggestion is well made, and I will investigate it [f thi \a-t product we cannot consume be shipped abroad, then a panic might be averted. We will find, Hi England is and hai b i. in l Euro] themselves from panic bj Amerii \t\i u. find thai f< markets have 1" i' can be tmown i 1 produce for then and America with their prodi Ami last, tli. rwhelminj long there will be no mo foreign countries will produce more than enough for Ives, [f this is true th< duction and panic. And as rare as thi i; will be the match thai will train of expli Bui to prove all this. Many think England's passion for territorial conq is merely a love of acn >r Empire <\; sire to give otheT nations wise or I But nol so. Nations are conquen re their trad' . In this England has been -ful. and ! ilth h. enormous. The first nation to ha\ r-production, - quickly sought foreign market-. Tl. ' equally as cl< . stahlished a tariff against her. Still - disposed of her product the world over, until the develop- ment of machinery, the increase of inventions and the PANICS. 33 5 spread of civilization reduced the markets of the world for England. Not many years ago a number of delegates came as rep- ntatives of a number of unemployed shoemakers to Lord Chamberlain, then ( 'olonial Secretary. In discussing the situation with them, he said in part: -What you want to do is not to change the shop in which the boots arc made, hut to increase the demand for - i: you can gel some new demand for boots, not only those who are now working but those out of employ- ment may find employment. That should be our great object. In addition to the special point before me, you most remember that, -peaking generally, the great cure lliciilty of want of employment is to find new markets. We are pressed oui of the old markets (out of the neutral market- which used to be supplied by Great tain) by foreign competition. At the same time, for- eign governments absolutely exclude our goods from their own markets, and unless we can increase the markets which are under our control, or find new ones, this ques- tion of want pf employment, already a very serious one, will ;ic of the greatest possible magnitude, and I see the gravest reasons for anxiety as to the complications which may possibly emue. I put the matter before you in thee ral terms: but I beg you, when you hear crit- ms upon the conduct of this government or of that, of this commander or of that commander, in expanding the British Empire, I beg you to hear in mind that it is not a RANK jingo question, which lometi l lrV , — it ii ii. ,1 .1 qui stion oi iim i! is really a question oi continui English people hive alwa keta and relations with bhe uri unless thai is 'I i, and dom : that, grave as are the ei \\- now, v time t<> inert much mori All of the European nati< upon these foreign markets, and 1 1 * ■ them is intense. Bui at tln> junctor* threatens them all. China and Japan a their long Bleep ol centui there is steam, electricity, machinery, l»i- tal has begun operations in tip Ami wh \w remember that tin- population o that oi England, ami China's five timet the United States, the prosp |uippin| labor with the Latesl machinery i- appallii g. For th< people air ool savages, hut civilized, hard-worki] They were manufacturers loi _ English. We find that capital i- being in heavily in ti: countries. Alter a time railroads ami manufacturing establishments will operate a- Bmoothly there as in Eng- land and America. These toiling, patient, submissive, vet energetic and frugal people is ju.-t the kind of labor that capital PANICS. 337 mploy. It may not be imported to our countries, but capital may be easily sent to theirs. The rewards of capital will be infinitely greater here, where labor can be had for from 6 cents to 15 cents per day, (even received gratefully), than at home. I- i! no! plain thai the foreign markets of the civilized world will soon be a thing of the past? The Emperor of Germany, foreseeing this calamity, had an artist paint a picture representing the nations of Europe a- female figures, clad in armor, standing in the light >hining from a cross in the skies above them. They ail appeared t<> be looking toward the angelic figure of Michael. Approaching them was an immense black cloud, rising from China; hideous forms and faces were shown. Under the picture appeared the words, "Nations of Europe! .'..in in the defense of your Faith and Homes!" The following is extracted from an able paper in the Journal of the Imperial Colonial Institute (English), by Mr. Whitehead, a member of the Legislative Council, bong Kong, China. It is in every way reliable. He says: - Ear, the Chines'e have made but a beginning in the construction of spinning and weaving factories. On the river Yang Tsze and in the neighborhood of Shanghai, some live mills are already working, and others are in course of construction. It is estimated that they will con- tain about -?('»0,000 spindles; and some of them have com- I w^k. The capital employed is entirely native, and with pea stored in these regions, there is, with 338 PANH 9. honest, capable management, while our present moi Bystem continues, really do limit i<> the expansion aud de- velopment of industries in < hricntal count rii Mr. Whitehead discussi - the recent war b< I l and Japan, and declares thai in it lies th< lioj i china's industrial resurrection. Be continu "The outcome of the present war may help to reli< the Chinese people from the trammels of the mandarins. China's mineral and other resource known to be enormous, and at the verj door they have million oi land admirably adapted to the cultivatio which, though of Bhort Btaple, is suitable for mixing \\ other qualities. In the Shanghai River in Decemb 1893, there were at one time do less than five ocean-j steamers taking in cfl of China-grown cotton I transportation to Japan, there to be converted 1>\ Japan- ese mills ami Japanese hands into yarn and cloth. The Japanese are now importing for their mills cotton din from America and elsewhere. Alter thi^ terrible awaken- ing, should China, with her three hundred million of in- tensely industrious people, open her vast inland provim by the introduction of railway-, her interior waterway- to .-team traffic and her boundless - to development, it is impossible to form an estimate of the ccmsequen< Iv would mean the discovery of practically a new hemi- sphere, thickly populated with industrious races, and abounding in agricultural, mineral and other resourc< - but so far from the opening of China, which we may r< PAXICS. 339 scnably hope will be one of the results of the present war, being a benefit to English manufacturers, unless some change is made, and that soon, in our monetary standard, the Celestial Empire, which has been the scene of so many of our industrial victories, will only be the field of our greatest defeat." Mr. Lafcadio Hearn has an article in the Atlantic Monthly, October. '95. He was for several years a teacher in Japan, and gives some good reasons why Japanese com- petition will be sharp. Mr. Hearn says, in part: 'in the great industrial competition of the world. fluidity i> the secret of Japanese strength. The worker shifts his habitation without a regret to the place where he i- most wanted. The factory can be moved at a week's notice, the artisan at half-a-day's. There are no impedi- menta to transport, there is practically nothing to build, then- is ii" expense except in coppers to hinder travel. "The Japanese man of the people— the skilled laborer able to underbid without effort any Western artisan in the -ante line of industry— remains happily independent of both shoemaker and tailor. His feet are good to look at, his body is healthy and his heart is free. If he desire to travel a thousand miles, he can get ready for his journey in five minutes. His whole outfit need not cost seventy- five cents; and all his baggage can be put into a handker- ehief. On ten dollars he can travel a year without work, or he can travel simply on his ability to work, or he can travel as a pilgrim. You may reply that any savage can M) I'Wii .I-, the tame thi S . bul i and the Japan I- .1-1 a thousand yean. Hi threaten \\ estern manufa 1 mmenting on the above, tl 'Thai .- .i n i , not wortl frankly, ai w< ban alwa "•'"I"'"' 1 "" l« a \ le thing, which ma} deeply affecl all the conditions of I trial civilization." The British Trade Journal f< count of the industi pondenl of the Adelaide (Australia respondent, writing directly from with the variety and vitality of the industries of tl, ,ll: " •»• calls it "the Ma... f the 1 "Some ides of the magnitude of the manufacturing in- dustry of Osaka will be formed when it is k: «e of factories with a capifc aml «^er, more than thirty each with a ca] 100,000 yen, four with more than L,00i with 8,000,000 yen. These include Bilk, a ^mp, jute, spinning and weaving, carpets, mat leather, glass, bricks, cement, cutlery, furniture, umbr. !■*, tea, sugar, iron, copper, brass, sake, brushi combs, fancy ware, etc. It is, i n fact, a greal hi. activity and enterprise, in which the imitative genius and the unflagging pertinacity of the Japanese have set them- PANICS. 34l st Ives to equal, and, if possible, excel, the workers and artisans of the old civilized nations of the West. "There are ten cotton mills running at Osaka, the com- bined capital of which is about $9,000,000 in gold, all fitted up with the latest machinery, and completely lighted by electricity. They are all under Japanese management, and, it is said, all paying handsome dividends — some a3 much as eighteen per cent on the invested capital. Out of *1 '.1,000,000 worth of cotton imported into Japan in 1894, the mills of Kobe and Osaka took and worked up about seventy-nine per cent." A silver "yen" is now worth about 50 cents in gold. The Hon. P. Porter in the North American Keview has an interesting article. We quote him in part. The Japanese themselves do not hesitate to boast of their approaching triumph in the "industrial war." Mr. Porter says : •'When in Japan I had the pleasure of meeting, among other statesmen and officials, Mr. Kaneko, Vice-Minister of Agriculture and Commerce. I found him a man with intelligence and foresight, and of wide experience in economical and statistical matters. Educated in one of the great European universities, he is up to the spirit of the age in all that relates to Japan and her industrial and commercial future." Mr. Kaneko recently made a speech to a Chamber of Commerce, in which he said: •The cotton spinners of Manchester (England) are 342 PANK - known to have Baid thai while the Ai passed i hrough i hrei i at ions I" fort 1 clever and apt hands for the Bpinninj ese have acquired the ill in l ten years' time, and hi w advanced t they surpass the Mancln - iple in skill."' A dispatch from San Frai dated "M. Oshima, technical d works in Japan, and foul the steamer Rio dc Janeiro from Yokohan a tour of inspecl ion of tl and Europe, and are commissioned to bu) a ; ,000,000. Tin u ill buy just where tin lniv the best and cheapest. The plant is to 1 ity of 100,000 tons. It will be built in tl Southern Japan, and both Martin and B --■ mi r are to be manufactured. "Mr. Oshima said: "We want to put our nation wh it properly belongs, in the van. as a manufacturing nation. We will need a vast amount 1 and do not want to depend on any other country for it.' " Further evidence might be produced in abundance to establish the position taken, that when the next panic from over-production coi - America will find no out] That foreign countries, instead of being markets, have entered the competitive field, and the over-crowded Arm ican markets will remain in a 3tate of glut. The desperate efforts of capitalists to find foreign and PANICS. 343 domestice markets will be more desperate than ever, and likewise more futile. How many people stop to think of the frenzied efforts made to get rid of product. Advertising is. considered good business sense, yet in the long run it is a waste and loss to the commonwealth. It only gauges the desperate efforts put forth to get rid of product. o. P. Eowell & Co., the largest advertising firm in the world, stated recently that there were many firms in New York that spent $1,000,000 a year each for advertising. A billion dollars ($1,000,000,000) would be a moderate es- timate of the amount so spent in the United States each \t ar. And all this is nearly dead loss to society. Then, to recapitulate. In two ways are we making for the next panic. First, by wild and reckless speculation — gambling, in fact — in the inflation of stocks and bonds to greatly cx- gerated values, and by keeping the volume of money down to the lowe.-t limit. The crash that follows such j> oceedings sometimes results in the most serious of pani S cond, over-production, or uncler-consumption, which i- inevitable under a system that only enables the people to buy back from one-seventh to one-fifth of what they produce. This latter way is the more deadly. It is more widespread and general, because the people cannot buy back the vast amount of goods they produce, and the out- lel io foreign countries is rapidly being cut off. :ui PANK Thf inevitable n-ult followi (hat production n And. of OOU no wager wa^c* means no bread, i nf thr> r life, In i ndition I think They will rev. CHAPTER XX. FINIS. 1 All the Elements of Destruction Are Being Mixed Like Deadly Chemicals— How and When the olution Will Be Precipitated. A dangerous joke is sometimes played on chemists and A prescription is sent to be compounded, which >r a number of ingredients that will explode n mixed in certain proportions, and sometimes the ' thoughtlessly or carelessly falls into the trap. Tak irately, these ingredients may not be dangerous, but to mix, pound and stir them up may develop an ir- T our Republic is in danger. On all sides have rous and threatening elements. Their power increased many fold when taken together. If 1 by one or two evils, it may put down and survive them. This happened when slavery was abolished. It was nirt and overcome. However, now the Republic is assailed by .1 of dangers from all sides. And, like the chemi- (345) 346 F1N1 calfl thiil explode when mixed, th< will fonn such as overwhi Iming and •■ Republic will not b< i briefly taken ap and the presenl social order. « element, and imagine the ■ hol< Bame time. The Trusts, which al< Republic. The Money Powi r, I A Plutocracy, which pro which controls legists . ihc Injunction. An Aristocracy, very similar an important part in thi and which was the can The new factors of Machinery and Ti The Fearful Corruption, in I - , na l government; where bribery and perjury how public morals are being contaminal Legislation for the Rich; Child and Female i Poverty for the ma- Landlords and landless farm. The vast army of the Unemployed, which in time panic will become a seething, tumultuous ma- All of these evils exist, and more too. Many threaten- ing evils have not been touched. FINIS. 347 We might say all of these deadly factors are placed in the National mortar, ready to be touched off. THE AMERICAN CIRCUS. \Y. R. Andrews, of Grand Rapids, Mich., at a recent sjot off the following appeal to the Filipinos: 'You Filipinos don't know what you are missing by not wauling to become citizens of this grand country of ours. There i-n"t anything like it under the sun. You ought to Bend a delegation over to sec us — the land of the free — i of fine churches and 40,0(50 licensed saloons; Bibles, forta and guns, houses of prostitution, millionaires and paupers j theologians and thieves; liberalists and liars; politicians and poverty: Christians and chain gangs; Bchools and scalawags; trusts and tramps; money and ry: ho s and hunger; virtue and vice; a land where you can gel a good Bible for fifteen cents or a bad drink of whiskey foT five cents; where we have a man in Congress with three wives and a lot in the penitentiary for having two wive-: where Borne men make sausage out of their wives and some want to eat them raw; where we make bologna out of dogs, canned beef out of horses and sick cows, and corpses out of the people whoeat it; where we put a man in jail tor not having the means of support and on the rock pile for asking for a job of work; where we license bawdy houses and fine men for preaching Christ on the streei corners; where we have a Congress of 400 men to make laws and a supreme court of nine men to set them aside; where good whiskey makes bad men and bad men 348 FIX IS. make good whiskey; where newspapers arc paid for sup- pressing the truth and made rich for teaching a lie; where professors draw their convictions from the same place they do their salaries; where preachers arc paid $25,000 a year to dodge the devil and tickle the cars of the -wealthy; where business consists of getting hold of property in any way that won't land you in the penitentiary; where trusts 'hold up' and poverty 'holds down;' where men vote for what they do not want, for tear they won't get what they do want by voting for it; where 'niggers' can vote and wo- men can't; where a girl who goes wrong i- made an outcast and her male partner flourishes as a gentleman; where women wear false hair and men 'dock' their horses' tails; where the political wire-puller has displaced the patriotic statesman ; where men vote for a thing one day and 'cuss' it 364 days; where we have prayers on the floor of our National Capitol and whiskey in the cellar; where we spend $500 to bury a statesman who is rich and $10 to put aw r ay a working man who is poor; where to be virtuous is to be lonesome and to be honest is to be a crank; where we sit on the safety valve of energy and pull wide open the throttle of conscience; where gold is substance — the one thing sought for; where we pay $15,000 for a dog and fifteen cents a dozen to a poor woman for making shirts; where we teach the 'untutored' Indian eternal life from the Bible and kill him off with bad whiskey; where we put a man in jail for stealing a loaf of bread and in Con- gress for stealing a railroad; where the check book talks, FINIS. sin walks in broad day light, justice is asleep, crime run* amuck, corruption permeates our whole social and politi- cal fabric, and the devil laughs from every street corner. Come to us, Fillies! We've got the greatest aggregation of good things and bad things, hot things and cold things, all sizes, varieties and colors, ever exhibited under one tent." A horrible indictment, yet who can say it is overdrawn? The Appeal to Reason says: "The Governor of New Jersey, the state that issues per- mits for corporations to do anything they like, has just signed a bill that was passed by the corporations' repre- sentatives giving the courts power to imprison a man for any speech or writing which the court may not like. The constitution don't stand in the way of liberty of speech or press in New Jersey, and both will become a thing of the past in a few years. The corporations aie in the saddle, and the working people are being ridden." Daniel Webster said: "The freest government cannot long endure when the tendency of the law is to create a rapid accumulation of property in the hands of a few, and render the masses of the people poor and dependent." The very thing Webster warned us against has been strict- ly carried out until we now have on the one hand more than 4,000 millionaires and on the other thousands who are losing or have already lost their homes, and other thousands who are actually destitute. 350 FINIS. Up to date it is estimated that there are about 4,000 trusts in the United States. Col. Robert Ingersoll in The Twentieth Century said : "It is impossible for a man with a good heart to be sat- isfied with the world as it now is. No man can truly enjoy even what he earns — what he knows to be his own — know- ing that millions of his fellow-men are in misery and want. When we think of the famished, we feel that it is almost heartless to eat. To meet the ragged and shivering makes one almost ashamed to he- well dressed and warm — one feels as though his heart were as cold as their bodies. "Is there to be no change ? Are the"', ws of supply and demand,' invention and science, monopoly and compe- tition, capital and legislation, always to be the enemies of those who toil? Will the workers always be ignorant enough and stupid enough to give their earnings for the useless ? Will they support millions of soldiers to kill the sons of other workingmen? Will they always build temples and live in dens and huts themselves ? Will they forever allow parasites and vampires to live upon their blood? Will they remain the slaves of the beggars they support? •Will honest men stop taking off their hats to successful fraud ? Will industry, in the presence of crowned idleness, forever fall upon its knees? Will they understand that beggars cannot be generous, and that every healthy man must earn the right to live ? Will they finally say that the man who has had equal privileges with all others has no right to complain, or will they follow the example set by FINIS. 351 their oppressors ? Will they learn that force, to succeed, must have thought behind it, and that anything done in order that it may endure must rest upon the cornerstone of justice ?" A member of the Supreme Court once made this state- ment; it is part of an address made to the Alumni of the Law Department of Yale College. Speaking of Labor and Capital, Judge Brown said : "The conflict between them has been going on and in- creasing in bitterness for thousands of years, and a settle- ment seems further off than ever. Compulsory arbitration i] a misnomer — a contradiction in terms. One might as well speak of an amicable murder or a friendly war. It in possible that a compromise may finally be effected upon the basis of co-operation or profit-sharing, under which every laborer shall become, to a certain extent, a capitalist. Perhaps, with superior education, wider experience and larger intelligence, the laboring man of the twentieth cen- tury may attain the summit of his ambition in his ability to command the entire profits of his toil." Another writer says: "Demagogues, partisan orators and editors may use sophistry ever so thick, but they cannot cover up this fact: The laboring masses cannot live like American citizens ought to live, and educate their children, when they re- ceive but 17 per cent of what they actually produce." Wendell Phillips expressed his opinion as follows: "No reform, moral or intellectual, ever came from the 352 FINIS. upper class of society. Each and all came from the pro- test of the martyr and victim. The emancipation of the working people must be achieved by the working people themselves." These are the words of Patrick Henry: "Government is, or ought to be, instituted for the com- mon benefit,, protection and security of the people, nation or community. Of all the various modes and forms of gov- ernment, that is best which is capable of producing the greatest degree of happiness, and is most effectually se- cured against the danger of maladministration. And whenever any government shall be found inadequate, or contrary to these purposes, a MAJORITY OF THE COM- MUNITY HATH AN INALIENABLE, AND INDE- FEASIBLE EIGHT TO REFORM, ALTER OR ABOL- ISH IT IN SUCH MANNER AS SHALL BE JUDGED MOST CONDUCIVE TO THE PUBLIC WEAL." Proof and argument might be extended without end, to show the condition we are in, and the worse condition toward which we are tending. But it would be super- fluous. At this time the people, fully alive to the situa- tion, need no argument or evidence to convince them of the straits we have reached. The present social order is reared over a mine that is liable to explode at any time. Things are growing worse from day to day. And there seems to be no organized or intelligent effort made to remedy or to alleviate the coming storm. The question is not discussed or mentioned at the schools and colleges. FINIS. 353 In fact, as has been shown, the subject is studiously avoid- ed. The church seems to think that the proper attitude is that of silence or neutrality. Indeed, many churches openly side with Plutocracy. Will education suddenly be directed to this subject, and a happy escape discovered? Will the church suddenly lay hold of the question and point out the wrongs and take the part of the oppressed ? Will the people suddenly know how to think and legislate clearly and in some way bring harmony out of all this chaos ? Never! The history of sociology proves that great evils are never prevented. Though the remedy were the simplest, the people always permit calamity to swoop down upon them, causing wreck and ruin instead of taking measures of prevention in time. 'Tis true, society always rebuilds and recuperates, but it never prevents. The following is part of an interview with Senator Vest in the St. Louis Republic, October 15, 1902: "All the facts now so well and so freely commented upon by the people of the United States have been before them for years. Every intelligent man has known that the rail- roads and collieries were under the same control. This has been the case in regard to the meat product, which has been absolutely in the hands of the Chicago packers since 1883. The trouble is that until the matter comes person- ally to each citizen there is general indifference on the sub- (23) 354 FINIS. ject, and the cry of 'let well enough alone' allays the ap- prehensions of everybody. ********* "I spent the whole summer of 1891 investigating the meat trust at Chicago, and made a report of more than GOO pages, giving the unquestionable proof that the trust existed, and that it controlled the price paid for beef cattle and the price paid by the consumer for meat. The com- mittee of which I was chairman reported five bills, and but one of them passed the Senate. It was never even con- sidered by the House. The other four bills died in the Senate, as the trust was" strong enough to prevent their consideration. ********* "The statesman who can originate some legislation which will compromise justly the present antagonism be- tween labor and capital will live in history as the greatest benefactor of our country." I take the position that things are ripe for a revolution, and that nothing short of divine power can prevent it. Evi- dence from every source goes to prove that the ground is well taken. What then will precipitate it? What will be the last straw ? - The first real panic ! ! The spark that will touch off the powder magazine will be a panic!! If, then, everything is ripe for a revolution, and the FINIS. 355 revolution will be precipitated by a panic, we can de- termine the date of the revolution by ascertaining the date of this panic. I propose to fix the time when the next panic will break upon us! Some have argued that panics recur at regular intervals of either ten, twelve or fifteen years. This is foolish. Time is not the important element and cuts but little figure. All of the panics of the past have come at irregular intervals. My deductions have not been made after this fashion. But there are two unfailing factors that determine the advent of the panic. I have pointed out these two agents clearly. The one is over-production or under-consump- tion. As shown, when this conditions prevails a panic is inevitable. The other is the breaking of speculative and inflated values of stocks and bonds. When the stock market be- comes abnormally weak, when speculators are caught and money becomes scarce, a financial panic results. If it is severe, business is dull and- listless ; nobody wishes to buy the product on the market, and over-production is at hand, which is shortly followed by an industrial panic. But the question will be asked: "Who can predict when the mar- ket will be glutted and when crashing speculative values will precipitate a financial panic ?" In answer to this I say that both these conditions are about FULFILLED NOW. First, we will consider the financial market and Wall Street at present. 356 FINIS. That there has been a great scare this fall none will deny. It is true the papers tried to allay the fears of the public and also suppressed most of the news. Neverthe- less it is well known that strenuous efforts were made to bolster up the market and ward off a financial crash. Russell Sage, the veteran financier, early in the sum- mer announced his opinion that money was going to be- come panicky. His prediction came true in the fall. In the meantime he had been selling his holdings at enor- mous profits. The St. Louis Republic orinted the follow- ing: "RUSSELL SAGE WARNS AGAINST MORGAN'S PLANS. 'Ultimately, He Says, They Will Result in Terrible Panic and People Will No Longer Tolerate Them. "DANGER IS NOT IMAGINARY. "Republic Special. "New York, Aug. 21.— Russell Sage, perhaps the great- est individual capitalist in the country, his wealth being estimated at $100,000,000, in a statement to-day takes di- rect issue with J. Pierpont Morgan regarding gigantic combinations and the consolidation of great industries. "To Mr. G. A. Parkin, a fellow-passenger on the Oceanic, Mr. Morgan said during his trip from Europe that the era of combination has just begun, and that he has FINIS. 357 other vaster schemes which are to dwarf the billion-dollar Street Trust and the shipping combine. "It is this announcement by Mr. Morgan that leads Russell Sage to sound a note of warning. The veteran financier declares that such giant combinations are a menace; that they will inevitably result in one of the greatest financial panics this country has ever experienced, and that ultimately the American people will no longer tolerate them. " 'Combinations of all great industries are a menace to the government/ declares Mr. Sage. 'Such combinations are not only a menace, but are the oppressors of the peo- ple. "'FINANCIAL RUIN SUCH AS WAS NEVER DREAMED OF. " 'Should an era of combinations ensue, the American people will certainly revolt against them and, if they do, there will be financial ruin such as people have never dreamed of in the history of the world. " 'The American people will most certainly revolt at no very distant time against the enormous combinations of the various industries. If continued, the combinations will some day result in financial ruin, not only to those interested, but to the country. " 'The success attending the combination of some in- dustries has led to the belief that the same success will mark the organization of other great combinations. This 358 FTXIS. will not prove true, and before many years every one wiii realize it.' "Mr. Parkin, who is president of the Toronto Uni- versity, was astonished by the vastness of Mr. Morgan's economic plans, as revealed by him on the trip. He said: " 'Mr. Morgan's word picture of the ideal industrial de- velopment is so vast that I confess I could not adequately comprehend it. Combination is the keynote of his idea. He declares that the idea of combination will progress, growing wider and greater all the time. The Steamship Trust he used as an illustration, saying the present plan was only the beginning of an ultimately vast combination of shipping interests. His idea is so great that it com- pletely enthralled me, and I asked permission to visit him at his office and hear him more fully develop his idea for me.' " Russell Sage expresses his opinion in another maga- zine. The first contributor to a notable symposium in the May North American Review on Industrial and Railroad Con- solidations is Russell Sage. Mr. Sage illustrated one feature of industrial combination by taking an imaginary factory worth, say, $50,000. This factory falls into the hands of eonsolidators, who issue $150,000 of stock against it, and ask banks to loan $60,000 or $70,000 on the prop- erty that would not in the hands of the original owner be considered good security for more than $10,000. "Under these circumstances, a 'squeeze' seems to be inevitable. FINIS. 359 The clearing house is reporting, from week to week, an expansion of loans far beyond anything that was dreamed of heretofore. THIS CAN NOT GO .ON FOREVER; yet, from all appearances, the era of consolidation has only set in. A REACTION MUST COME as soon as the banks realize the situation. A property is not worth $50,000 one day and $150,000 the next simply because a company of men, no matter how big and important they are, say so." — Public Opinion. Now then, if all the conditions necessary for a money panic prevail, why does it not break upon the country at once? Because Pierpont Morgan, Rockefeller, Mr. Shaw, Wall Street and the Republican Party desire most earnestly to avoid it if possible. They do all in their power to suppress the pent-up volcano. And they have succeeded temporar- ily. Commenting on this, Appeal to Reason says : "The banks run short of money recently and the banker who heads the United States treasury rushes to their as- sistance with the people's money and loans to them with- out interest, millions. When the people, to whom this belongs, need money, do they get it from their dear, sweet government? Not on your penny. They can go to the banks and borrow their own money and pay well for it. But the bankers understand the art of voting for their in- terest, while the masses have no such understanding. When the rich need help they get it ; when the poor need help they get it — in the neck. What an odd arrangement. 360 FINIS. And the people go blundering along and never see a thing." Now, the question comes, "How long can the money barons stave off a financial panic ?" Not forever! Because the inflation keeps right on. Stocks are watered and paper and artificial values issued against enterprises more and more every day. But they will prevent a financial panic taking place be- fore the presidential election of 1904. If they did not their party would be defeated. It is nec- essary for them to keep down the panic until then. They must, and will, have their party placed in power in 1904. After the election they will not be able to stave off the evil day for more than one year, no matter how hard they try and in spite of everything they resort to. The year 1905 will thus be bolstered up and made artificially pros- perous. The year 1906 will bring the greatest financial panic the country has witnessed. It will be worse than that of 1893. By this time there will be over-production. The evils of over-production have been fully discussed, and the little hepe there was of escaping it. It becomes plainly ap- parent, then, for these two reasons alone that a panic at this time will be intensely severe. Great over-production and highly inflated values which have been kept that way and bolstered artificially will be too much even for the money barons and all Wall Street. FINIS. 363 But, on the other hand, suppose the Democratic Party should win the election of 1904. As the same causes for a panic would prevail, no matter who won, a panic would be inevitable in such a case also. And further, as the trust barons and monopolists would be afraid of tariff tinkering, Wall Street would begin to draw in all of the money it possibly could. They would be scared and uncertain; the withdrawal of the small amount of currency that we have from the channels of business would only hasten the crisis. In fact, it is well known that the volume of currency is far below necessary requirements, and that at the slightest scare it is with- drawn by the money lenders from legitimate enterprises. Fifty capitalists in Wall Street could precipitate a panic at any time. So, should the Democratic Party win in 1904, with" ever so good a man as President, and ever so good a platform, we will have a panic in 1905 and the Revolution in 1906. But the Democratic Party will never win! Plutocracy will see that the Republican Party does, and after it is in power will do everything it can to bolster it up. The panic of 1906 is all that is needed to cause the ex- plosion. The explosive has been prepared. Dumped into the national mortar are mortgaged farmers, and the unem- ployed. Heaped upon them are pauperism and child labor. Added to their misery are strikes, lockouts, the injunc- tion, machinery, panics, corruption, bribery, class legisla- tion. This mass of misery is aggravated by the strong mil FINIS. arm ot oppression; the militia, Pinkcrton detectives, fed- eral troops and plutocracy. I repeat that it only requires a strong agency like a panic to bring a revolution that will be terrible in its ef- fect. Strikes of great magnitude will precede the cataclysm. Two classes will oppose each other. On one side the strik- ing working classes, supported by the vast farming popula- tion, and a murmuring, discontented poor, unemployed, wretched and desperate; and on the other side, an arro- gant rich, backed by a corrupt government, the army, militia and police. The former will have the advantage o.<: numbers, but the latter will have on its side the wealth, law and army of the land. Then the foolish attempt to settle an economic prob- lem by force will once more be made. Eeason, by which alone it might be settled, will be set aside. When we look back at the Civil War, the stupidity of resorting to force instead of reason to settle a question i^ plain enough. All of those lives, all of the misery and pain, to say nothing of the vast treasure, might have been saved had the coun- try resorted to reason. But they didn't, and won't in the impending revolution. As has been said before, sociology teaches that no great social cataclysm is ever prevented by the people coming together and reasoning. Perhaps in the dim future such may happen. To-day we only think to- gether when mending and curing, and after it is too late. Then we unite and patch up. FINIS. 367 Great and numerous riots will follow the many strikes, and force will be used to keep them down. Bread riots have been common in the past, but meat riots are some- thing new. Many people were killed in New York recently in these latter. It shows how easily the people will resort to violence when goaded on to it. It also affords a fore- cast of what will happen when the great panic and revo- lution comes. The granaries and storehouses will be filled to bursting with grain, cereals and food. The warehouses will be filled with dry goods, clothing and all kinds of supplies. But millions will be hungry, ragged and wretch- ed. In this condition, in the midst of plenty, they will not quietly, meekly and submissively reflect, but will riot at once. The absurdity of the situation will only goad them to frenzy. They will see one thing. We have raised and produced too much food, and millions of us are hungry. We have produced too much clothing, and the majority of us are ragged. We have built too many houses, so countless throngs of us are crowded into tenement houses like cattle, while others are homeless. Over-pro- duction, over-production, over-production of everything. Too much, and yet we go without. Frenzy, madness and rioting will be their answer — bloodshed their only satis- faction. The hungry, the wretched, the unemployed; the strik- ers, paupers and fanatics will be the most aggressive and will bear the brunt of the battle. The other side, having a trained army and the latest de- 368 FINIS. vices of warfare, will clash with them, and once more the free soil of America will flow with precious blood. Let none, then, be deceived by two or three years of prosperity between now and 1906. Plutocracy must by all means prevent a money panic between now and election time. They may possibly extend it a year beyond that time. While they may do this much, they cannot by any means ward off an over-production panic! That is an ill that goes through the whole social system, from top to bottom. The evidence of an over-production panic does not ap- pear as plainly just yet as do the financial disturbances. But this is coming and cannot be avoided, as has been clearly shown. Because, simply, the consumers are not paid enough to buy back the product and the foreign mar- kets are about gone, leaving no outlet for the over-pro- duction. No human power can prevent an over-production panic ! To give an idea of what the revolution will be like we quote various able articles and the views of some of the world's best thinkers on the subject. Prof. Fisher, of Yale College, in his Universal History, page 497, says: "First among the causes of the revolution in France was the hostility felt toward the privileged classes — the king, the nobles and the clergy — on account of the disabilities and burdens which law and custom imposed on the classes beneath them. "The Land. — Nearly two-thirds of the land in France FINIS. 369 was in the hands of the nobles and of the clergy. A great part of it was illy cultivated by its indolent owners. The nobles preferred the gayeties of Paris to a residence on their estates. There were many small land-owners, but they had individually too little land to furnish them with subsistence. The treatment of the peasant was often such that when he looked upon the towers of his lord's castle, the dearest wish of his heart was to burn it down with all its registers of debts (mortgages). The clergy held an immense amount of land, seigniorial control over thousands of peasants, and a vast income from tithes and other sources. In some provinces there was a better state of things than in others ; but in general, the rich had the enjoyments, the poor carried the burdens. "Monopolies. — Manufacturers and trades, although en- couraged, were fettered by oppressive monopolies and a strict organization of guilds. "Corrupt Government. — The administration of govern- ment was both arbitrary and corrupt. "Loss of Eespect for Eoyalty. — Respect for the throne was lost. "Abortive Essays at Reform. — The efforts at political and social reform in France and other countries, eman- ating from sovereigns after the great wars, produced a restless feeling without affecting their purpose of social reorganization. "Political Speculation. — The current of thought was in a revolutionary direction. Traditional beliefs in religion r24 v > :;;<» I IMS. «r e re boldly questioned. Political speculation was rife. Montesquieu had drawn attention to the liberty secured by the English constitution. Voltaire had dwelt on hu- man rights. Rosseaa had expatiated on the sovereign right of the majority. "Example of America.— Add to tie nciee the in- fluence of the American Revolution, and of the American Declaration of Independence, with its proclamation of human rights, and of the foundation of government in contract and the consent of the people." In all those leading causes which culminated in the ter- rors of the French Revolution we Bee a strong resemblan to similar conditions to-day which are rapidly and surely leading to the foretold similar result-. A thoughtful writer recently said: "In France before the great revolution the condition of the peasants was, in most districts, miserable in the ex- treme. Exactions of all sorts which went to feed the luxury of the court at Versailles left them with barely the means to sustain existence. They were impoverished to the level of brutes, and were not even well fed and well housed animals. Writing under these conditions a great French statesman denounced the economic system which took from a thousand men the necessaries of true human life to feed the immoral extravagance of one courtier. A thousand men, he said, were debased by poverty in order that one man might be corrupted by wealth too great for his virtue. This description of the condition of the peo- FINIS. 371 pie of France yesterday may be accepted as a fair por- traiture of the condition of the people in many nations to-day. Will history repeat itself, or will a higher civi- lization influence a peaceful, rather than a bloody revolu- tion?" One of Charles Dickens' stories, the scene of which is laid in the troublous times of the French Revolution, be- gins thus, and aptly fits the present time, as he suggests: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it- was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; ifc was the season of light, it was the season of darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way; — in short, the period was so far like the present period that some of its noisiest authorities in- sisted on its being received for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only." MACAULAY'S PREDICTION". The Paris Figaro quotes the following extracts of a let- ter written in 1857 by Mr. Macaulay, the great English historian, to a friend in the United States : "It is clear as daylight that your government will never be able to hold under control a suffering and angry ma- jority, because in your country the government is in the hands of the masses, and the rich, who are in the minority. are absolutely at their mercv. A clay will come in the :;;■.' FINIS. state of New York when the multitude, between half a breakfast and the hope of half a dinner, will elect your legislators. Is it possible to have any doubt as to the kind of legislators that will be elected? "You will be obliged to do those things which render prosperity impossible. Then some Caesar or Napoleon will take the reins of government in hand. Y r our Republic will bo pillaged and ravaged in the twentieth century, jusl as the Roman Empire was by the barbarians of the fifth century, with this difference, that the devastators of the Roman Empire, the Huns and Vandals, came from abroad, while your barbarians will be the natives of your own country, and the product of your own institutions." In 1858 the same great historian said: "The time will come when New England will be as thickly peopled as old England. Wages will fluctuate as much with you as with us. Y^ou will have your Man- chester? and your Birminghams, and in those cities thou- sans of artisans will sometimes be out of work. Then your institutions will be fairly brought to the test. * * * It is quite evident that your government will never be able to restrain a distressed and discontented majority. For in a republic the majority is the government, and has the rich, who are a small minority, absolutely at its mercy.'* More recent, and more pointed, are the almost prophetic words of our martyr president, Abraham Lincoln, written shortly before his assassination, to a friend in Illinois. He wrote : FINIS. 373 "Yes, we may all congratulate ourselves that this cruel war is nearing its close. It has cost a vast amount of treasure and blood. The best blood of the flower of American youth has been freely offered upon our country's altar that the nation might live. It has been a trying hour indeed for the Republic. But I see in the near future a crisis approaching t*hat unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned, an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money-power of the country will endeavor to prolong its. reign by work- ing upon the prejudices of the people until all the wealth is aggregated in a few hands, and the Republic is de- stroyed. I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war.'' To us at this late day these words show a marvelous foresight. But a few more years are required to make them immortal. "No structure of government/' said Lincoln, "can en- dure unless founded upon justice. There must be one law for all, and equality under that law. The slave power must not be resurrected in a more oppressive and tyranniz- ing money power." Words of wonderful truth that are coming home to us. But they will be of no service to us as a warning. We merely marvel at them, and praise their wisdom, but do nothing further. We are not guided by them in the least. A people never prevent, they only repair social and :;;i FINIS momic evils. After the diasterjre will < of Lincoln and engrave platei with hii propheti ind call liim a greal prophet. "What fooli theee mortal Why aol heed the irordi now, while it i ~ t \n our of prevention i- worth a pound <>f < ur<-. Representative Hat.li <>f v. ;,i, in ■ in financial ami -<>rial matters, i- reported in I public press t" I ■! : -Mark what I ' It tin- inexorable law "f and effecl has nol been expunged from the -tatutr l><><>k <»f tl Almighty, unless a halt i< called verj you m t.> Bee the horrors of the French Revolution put on the American Btage with all the modern improvements, ann the island ami hi a British Bubject, -aw what i- coming a- plainly as I