Will Maupin's weekly. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1911-1912, March 17, 1911, Image 5
WAR IS HELL-LET THOSE WHO WANT WAR GO STRAIGHT TO HELL! Uncle Sam is mobolizing troops on the Mexican frontier. Does anybody, know what for? The men selected by the special interests to manage the affairs of the country inform us that the ' troops are being sent to the Mexicon frontier to protect Americans and Americans interests. "Interests," yes. Americans, no! Mexicans who have wearied of the tyranny, the inhumanity and the greed of Diaz and his cohorts are struggling for release. And they seem to be making head way, too, This does not suit a lot of ex ploiters from the United States who have made deals with Diaz for the exploitation of Mexican peon labor, so Uncle Sam is massing troops in the vicinity. To insure fair play for American interests in Mexico? Not so as to be visible to the naked eye. To lend at least the moral influence of this republic to men fighting for freedom from autocratic rule? Fudge! This republic quit that sort of thing when it refused to recognize the Transvaal Dutchman, and turned its back squarely on its traditions when it bought "Yellowbellies" in the Philippines at $2 a head and gave us the new doctrine that gov ernments derive their just powers, not by the consent of the governed but by right of barter and sale of its people. So do not imagine for a minute that Uncle Sam is giving a second thought to men who are battling for liberty. He did that sort of thing when he was young and foolish, but he has learned "money sense" since then even though, in the acquiring of it he lost knowledge of some things far better than money. Sympathy and principle, and re gard for human rights, for instance. Far be it from Will Maupin's Weekl? ix remain passive while the owner of the prize porker or the superlative steer is being dis criminated against. Down with the greedy corporation that would add one jot or tittle to the burdens now being borne by the Ne braska farmer who is wondering how on earth he is going to add a few more broad acres to his holdings and thus enable him self to raise more corn to feed more hogs to make more money to buy more land to raise more corn to feed more hogs to make more money to buy more but we pause to again demand the abasement of the afore said greedy corporations. But, just the same, Will Maupin's Week ly doesn't hold the blooded Birkshire, the delightful Duroc, the handsome Hereford or the prize assembling Polled Angus in a bit higher esteem than it does the wage earning men and women of Nebraska who seem unable to get as much consideration at the hands of a Nebraska legislature as a hcg or a steer. For something like six weeks the legisla ture of Nebraska has been masticating the woven remnant over the question of stock yards regulation, which simply means that hog and cattle raisers want to make an extra dime on each head of live stock sold at South Omaha. And so violent has the dis cussion become that practically everything else has been lost sight of by the wise law makers. The mere fact that a hundred thousand wage earners are demanding some legal protection for life and limb does not seem to attract a bit of attention. We hear a lot of discussion about hog cholera and Uncle Sam is massing his troops on the Mexican border, not to protect human rights, but to protect dirty dollars. Uncle Sam has looked at the little yellow money discs so long hat he has grown color blind. Time was when he could see the first drop of human blood shed in the cause of human liberty, and he responded quickly. All that he can see now is the milled edge of the money disc. Time was when his ears were attuned to catch the first plea for justice wrung by tyrants from the lips of men and women. Today he can hear nothing but the clink of the coin or the snip-snip-snip of the shears as they clip the interest coupons. The first thing we know the subsidized press will be telling us that a criminal scheme is afoot to destroy a sister republic and call upon us as patriots to interefere. Then a million men of patriotic hearts and not enough gray matter in their craniums to weigh a feather's weight will rush to arms and proceed to shed a lot of blood. What for? To preserve liberty? Stuff and nonesense ! To protect the dirty dollars wrung from the sweat and toil and tears of the comrades of the men who have been deceived into fighting while the men who cooked up the criminal scheme remain secure in their financial fastnesses and pile up more wealth. Wars will never cease until the men who bring them on are compelled to fight them. Carnegie may offer his blood-stained dol lars in never-ending stream to purchase uni versal peace, but there will be no universal peace as long as money-mad .men are able to bring on was and then profit by them while their dupes fight and die on the bat tlefield. "War is hell!" Let those who want war go to hell! legislative appropriations to wipe out the disease, but not a bit of discussion about the one thousand or two thousand Nebraskans who die of tuberculosis every year because they are compeled to work in unsanitary shops and mills and factories. Why don't they work elsewhere? To be sure! Why work at all? Why not just starve to death and be done with it? Plenty of laws providing for the proper sanitation of pig pens and dairies not a single legislative enactment compelling em ployers to provide sanitary factories. Kill a man's hog or cow by accident and the law provides a remedy for the stricken owner Kill a mechanic by refusing to safeguard the machine about which he must work or starve, and his widow and orphaned chil dren may go to the poor house so kindly provided by our always just and humane communities. Humanity hasn't made very much pro gress since the day that Jesus of Nazareth drove. the devils out of the Gadarene and into the herd of swine. The swine rushed down a steep place into the sea and were drowned. Then what happened? "And they that saw it told them how it befell him that was possessed with the devil, and also concern ing the swine. And they began to pray Him to depart out of their coasts !" Catch the point? Rather than have any more stricken men healed at the cost of a few hogs, the hog owners insisted upon the Healer getting out of the country. Sounds natural, eh! What is the life of a factory worker com pared with the well-being of a money-bringing porker? What time for considering the well-being of the men and women in our mills and shops as long as there is a hog to conserve or a steer to protect? Some day, perhaps, when the Nebraska mind is capable of raising above the level of the hog or the steer, we will be able to secure from a Nebraska legislature some consideration for the men and the women who work amidst dangerous machinery, in noisome shops and unsanitary factories. But people haven't made much progress since the day of the little incident in the land of the Gadarenes. Sunday Base Ball Again The Editor of Will Maupin's Weekly has always considered Paul about the biggest, brainest and best man that ever lived, save only one the Master whom Paul served with such loyal devotion. Paul was not a man of one idea not by a long ways. He was a skilled mechanic, being a tentmaker by trade. He was a lawyer, and one of the best, as is evidence by his masterly defense of himself before Agrippa. He was the greatest preacher of Christiantity the world has ever known. Perhaps Paul was competent to say some thing authoritative on the Sunday question. Of course we are not going to declare that Paul was nearly so competent as some peo ple today to judge of certain matters. We doubt not that should Paul drop down into Lincoln today and repeat some of his ad monitions he would be either burned at the stake figuratively speaking or churched for heresy. But, just the same, Paul may be accepted as pretty fair authority, even on so mooted a question as Sunday amuser ments. So, with some hesitancy, it is true, Will Maupin's Weekly ventures to quote Paul: "One man esteemeth one day above an other; another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind" Romans 14 :5. "I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteemeth anything un clean, to him it is unclean. But if thy brother be grevied with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably. Destroy him not with thy meat, for whom Christ died." Romans 14:14-15. The mechanic who is struggling honestly and tirelessly to provide for his little family, working six days a week when there is work can not enjoy a day off without los ing wages. If he loses a half-day's pay it means a little less meat on the table, fewer potatoes in the basket, a pint of milk for the kiddies instead of a quart, little feet a few - days longer peeping through ragged shoes, another season for the little wife's already old-fashioned hat. And yet there there are those calling themselves Christians who would deprive this industrious me chanic of an opportunity to rest as he pleases upon the only day of the week given to him. Of course they did not play baseball, in Paul's time, but we opine that if they had, Paul, wouldn't " have arrogated to himself the right to deprive men of the opportunity, to see the games on the only day of the week they could see it without depriving the wives and babies of food and raiment. HOGS VS. MEN-CA TTLE VS. WOMEN