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Mr. Carnegie's Gift.
The sotting aside of $5,000,000, the income
of which is to bo used for the benefit of old or
unfortunate omploycs and their dependents, is
so unusual as to attract widespread attention.
Nothing that Mr. Carnegie has done will win
more commendation from the people generally.
This recognition of his obligation to his em
ployes' is creditable to him and un example to
others. While the amount invested for the ben
efit of his former workmen constitutes but a
small proportion of his accumulations, oven a
small per cent is more than most large employ
ers of labor are disposed to return to the wage
earners. If such benefactions were more com
mon tho relations between labor and capital would
bo more harmonious.
In this instance tho donor is tho possessor of
suoh great wealth that parting with five millions
may bo a relief rather than a sacrifice, but this
does not rob the act of its meritorious char
acter. It is to .bo regretted that tho fund is invested
in the bonds of the great steel trust, because this
fact may tend to restrain tho employes from
criticising private monopolies. Mr. Carnegio
probably did not intend this, but. large corpora
tions with an abundance of watered stock may
follow his example for a less philanthropic pur
pose. Below will Jbo found Mr. Carnegie's letter
setting forth the conditions of the gift:
To the President and Managers, tho Carnegio
Company. Gentlemen: Mi. Franks, ray cashier, will
hand over to you upon your acceptance of tho trust
$5,000,o6o'of the Carnegie company bonds in trust for
tho following purposes:
The income of 51,000,000 to he spent in maintain
ing libraries built by me in Braddock, Homestead and
Duquesne. I have been giving the interest of 3250,
000 to each o these libraries hitherto, and this will
give a revenue of 50,000 hereafter for the three,
Braddoek library is doing a great deal of work for
the neighborhood, and requires more than Homestead.
Homestead, ou tho other-hand, will probably require
more for a time than Duquesne, but I leave it to you
to distribute tho funds from time to time according
to the work done or needed. Duquesno's portion can
bo held until tho library is opened and then applied
to meet extras in cost, if any.
Tho income of the other 1,000,000 is to be ap
plied :
1. To provide for employes of tho Carnegie com
pany in all its works, mines, railways, shops, etc.,
injured in its service, and for those dependent upon
such employes as are killed.
2. To provide small pensions or aids to such em
ployes as, after long and creditable service, through
exceptional circumstances, need such help in their old
age and who make a good use of it. Should these
uses not require all of the revenueand a surplus of
$200,000 be left over after ten years' operations, then
for all over this workmen in mills other than tho
Carnegie company in Allegheny county shall become
eligible for participation in tho fund, tho mills near
est tho works of the Carnegie Steel Company being
first embraced.
This fund is not 'intended to be used as a substi
tute for what tho company has been in the habit of
doing in such cases far from it. It is intended to go
still farther and give to the injured or their families,
or to employes who are needy in old age through no
fault of their own, some provision against want as
long as needed, or until young children can become
self-supporting.
Your president and myself have been conferring
for some time past as to the possibility of introducing
a pension and beneficial system to which employes
The Commoner
contribute, resembling that so admirably established
by the Pennsylvania and Baltimore and Ohio rail
roads. We find it a difficult problem to adjust to a
manufacturing concern, but should it be solved here
after the trustees have authority to make this fund
tho foundation of such a system.
Each superintendent will report to the president
such cases in his department as he thinks worthy of
aid from the fund, and the president will in turn re
port to the directors, with his recommendation for
action.
A report to be made at the end of each year giving
an account of the fund and of its distribution shall be
published in two paparsin Pittsburg and copies post
ed freely at the several works that every employe may
know what is being done. Publicity in this manner
will, I Am sure, have a beneficial effect.
I make this first use of surplus wealth upon retir
ing from business as an acknowledgement of the deep
debt which I owe to the workmen who have contrib
uted so greatly to my success. I hope the cordial
relation which exists between employers and employ
ed throughout all of the Carnegie company works
may never be disturbed; both employers and era
ployed remembering what I said in my last speech to
the men at Homestead: "Labor, capital and busi
ness ability are the three legs of a three-legged stool;
neither is first, neither is second, neither third; there
is no precedence, all being equally necessai'y. He
who would sow discord among the three is an enemy
of all."
I know that 1 have done my duty in retiring from
business when an opportunty presented itself, and
yet as I write my heart is full. I have enjoyed so
much my connection with workmen, foremen, clerks,
superintendents, partners and all other classes that
it is a great wrench indeed to say farewell. Happily
there is no real farewell in one sense, because, al
though no longer an employer, I am still and always
must be a friend, deeply interested in the happiness
of all whom it has been my good fortune to know and
work in sympathy with for so -many happy years.
Always truly yours, ' Andbew Cahnegie.
Lincoln and Democracy.
Speaking of Lincoln, the Eome Tribune says:
" We can see no reason in world for democrats to cele
brate his birthday. He was a patriotic American,
but never a democrat."
That depends on what you call a democrat Tho
name is nothing. It is true that Abraham Lincoln
was never allied with the organization which at the
time of his election to the presidency was the demo
cratic party. In that sense he was not a democrat.
So Thomas Jefferson was as much republican as dem
ocrat, if we accept the nomenclature of the day. His
party was the democratic-republican party. But the
name is unimportant. Jefferson stood for those prin
ciples of universal liberty and equality which it has
been the guiding purpose of the democratic party to
maintain. Mr. Lincoln was a true Jeffersonian. He
based his strongest arguments for the preservation of
tho union and the extinction of slavery on the expres
sions of the .author of the Declaration of Indepen
dence. He'did more for the democratization of Amer
ican institutions than any other man besides Thomas
Jefferson.
Mr. Jefferson was called a doctrinaire and his
statement that all men are, and of right ought to be
free and equal, seemed impossible of attainment.
For half a century the words were not taken liter
ally. Lincoln demanded tho literal construction of
that assertion of universal liberty and universal
equality, and ho did much toward attaining it. Only
recently the great truth was reaffirmed in the Cuban
resolutions. In a broad sense Lincoln was as much
democrat as republican. Like Jefferson, indeed, he
was both. His views were not those of a party. Thev
represented the national idea, the strong pulse beat
from the heart of the nation. Circumstances made it
impossible for the south to appreciate Mr. Lincoln
51? Vill fPPeared to degrade and humiliate our peo
ple. But he was a southern man and thr . n
as East Tennesseans. He wae toe affi andS2t
an aristocrat.-Knoxville (Tenn.) Sentinel. '
"I Can Go to See Kruger."
The country is deeply indebted to A. L. Mason, of
Indianapolis, a lawyer and personal friend of tho late
Benjamin Harrison, for the report of an interview
which Mr. Mason had with the General only a few
days before the latter's fatal illness began.
The remarks made by tho ex-president on that
occasion as quoted to the people of tho United States
yesterday by Mr. Mason will endure in the minds of
the people longer than any speech General Harrison
ever made, any argument he ever offered, any procla
mation he ever issued, any message he ever dictated,
any state paper he ever signed.
General Harrison's quick response, "I can go to
see Kruger," will take its place along with a score of
celebrated American phrases which rank as they
were uttered and have rung ever since, such as "Don't
give up the ship," "Millions for defense, but not one
cent for tribute," "Give me liberty or give me death,"
"'If any man attempts to haul down the American
flag, shoot him on tho spot," "Don't cheer boys; the
poor devils are dying," "With malice toward none
and wTith charity for all." It will endure like these
because it sounded a chord as passionately American,
as nobly human, as resolutely bold as any of these.
And it was courageously democratic, spoken out of a
confidence and faith and pride in popular government
that raaketh not ashamed.
It was a patriotic chord, too far lost, struck
again, and the grander because it had reference to
another and a struggling people. It was the flaming
up of the truly American democratic spirit in sympa
thy with democracy the world over.
The words were spoken after reference to General
Harrison's recently published article on the Boer war
and were in reply to a suggestion that if Harrison
went abroad he might not be an acceptable guest at
the English court. The picture of the English court
with its crown, its purple, its gold lace, being the
flower growing out of the dunghill where a monarch
ical system has thrown tho disregarded common rights
of man, did not, bedazzle, the great grandson of a
signer of the American Declaration of Independence
and who had himself in public service added to the
glory of the institutions which his worthy ancestor
had assisted in establishing. He had an alternative
which his genuine Americanism was quick in conceiv
ing. More honored would he be with a reception by
Paul Kruger, wandering, if extremity compelled it,
unattended on the veldt, the modern King Lear
among the sovereigns and rulers of the world, than
with a welcome of affected graciousness to the pres?
ence of king, dukes and barons. That is where tho
president or the ex-president of the greatest republic
in the world, where Unofficial head of a people who
in New York harbor raised the colossal statue of Lib
erty Enlightening the World, would more properly
belong if to enter St. James palace he would have to
abjure one jot or tittle of his political and civil faith.
Omaha World-Herald.
Children and Flowers
How can public school children be interested in
beautifying their home surroundings? To many
communities which seek an answer to this question,
some account of the success achieved in one of the
largest cities in the United States may prove sugges
tive. The Home Gardening Association of Goodrich
Social Settlement, in Cleveland, Ohio, encouraged by
experience among their neighborhood people, sought
to extend their work last year among the public
schools. With the concurrence of the school author
ities the association secured a special committee of
three teachers to take official charge of this move
ment. A circular was sent out to the teacher and
pupils, explaining that packages of seeds of easily
grown flowering annuals four o'clocks nasturium,
zinnias, morning-glory, batchelor's buttons, larkspur,
marigolds, and calendula would be , supplied to
pupils at a cost of one penny per package. Each
pupil received a card on which choice of nine varieties
was allowed; the teachers collected the cards, and
the result was that nearly 50,000 packages were
asked for. The Chautauquan.