THE ALLIANCE.
PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY MORNING.
BY TIIE
ALLIANCE PUBLISHING CO.
Lincoln, - - - Nebraska.
J. BURROWS, : : : Editor.
J. M. THOMPSON, Business Manager.
" In the beauty of the lillies
Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in his bosom
That transfigures you and me.
As He strove to make men holy
Let us strive to make men free,
Since God is marching on."
Julia Ward Howe.
Laurel crowns cleave to deserts,
And power to him who power exerts."
" A ruddy drop of manly blood
The surging sea outweighs."
Emerson.
' He who cannot reason is a fool,
He who will not reason is a coward,
He who dare not reason is a slave."
EDITORIAL.
Get Ready for the Work.
Keep the Ball Rolling.
next fall.
Some policy politicians who are all
things to all men who promise but do
not perform who are people's men at
home and railroad men at Lincoln are
to he laid away to dry.
Some honest men, who know the
truth when they see it, and never turn
their hacks on it who are the same to
day, to-morrow and always who can't
be bribed, bullied or deceived are to
be selected and sent down here to rep
resent their neighbors in the next legis
lature. Every Alliance man in the state should
be thinking about it arid figuring about
it. The men are to be selected. Such
men as 3-011 want will not select them
seves. Every organizer in the state should
organize at least three new Alliances
between this time and the 15th day of
May.
Fifty thousand farmers should read
The Farmers' Alliance from this
time on. Men of the Alliance, Ave de
pend on 3'ou to reach them. Get the
paper into new hands as fast as 3011
can. Without a paper to represent you
you will he at a great disadvantage. So
push the work.
The railroads have a well-organized
literary bureau, equipped with your
-money, to manufacture public opinion
.against you. You must meet them on
their oavu ground with their own wea
pons. - T TV TV-X o x tp o
ALL ALLIANCES
Binder Twine.
The Alliance State Agency
arrangements for a supply
twine for the harvest of 3890.
has made
of binder
Full par-
ticulars as to price, shipments, &c, will
be sent at once in a confidential circu
lar from the state secretaiy. Estimates
.should be made at once of the amounts
needed by the different Alliances, and
iorwarded to the state agent, so that
the full amount needed can be known
at an early day. Wherever a county
agencjT can bulk all orders for a county
it should be so done.
The Australian Ballot System.
In response to many applications for
the Australian ballot law we have pro
cured an official copy of the law adopt
ed last year in Massachusetts. As it is
too long for our paper we propose to
publish it in pamphlet form. We ask
all who are willing to aid in distribut
ing this law to send us at once on a pos
tal card the number of copies of the
pamphlet they will take at $1.00 per
hundred, sent post paid from this office.
By this we will know how large an edi
tion to order.
No better work can be done than to
circulate this law. Its adoption will be
the severest blow that can be given to
the machine politics that has taken pos
sion of the country; An examination
of the law itself is better than an' de
scription of it.
The Agricultural Department and the
Fish Commission.
Washington dispatches sa3r that Sen
ator Paddock is trying to increase the
influence of the agricultural depart
ment by adding to it the fish commis
sion. This is purely a political scheme. The
increased "influence" is to be political
influence in the form f patronage to
be at the disposal of the sharp politi
cian who now presides as secretaiy of
agriculture. iSo one will thank Sena
tor Paddock for his efforts in this di
rection certainly not the farmers of
the country who have been disappoint
cd in the results of raising the agricul
tural department to a cabinet position
Silver on the Home Stretch.
There has been a great change in sen
timent in Washington on the coinage
question. This change is most noticea
ble in the senate. The flood of peti
tions from the west and south demand
ing free coinage and monetary reform
have opened the eyes of some of the
senators, and they are getting in out of
the storm. As a straw showing the
turn things are taking, a possible presi
dential veto is spoken of. But it is
liardly likely that Benny would have
the sand to veto a free coinage bill, if
one should be passed. And it is very
possible that one raay be passed. The
money question is overshadowing all
other questions in congress now. This
is as it should be. The petitions are
not all in yet. We have a large batch
to forward to-day.
THE
Nebraska
Farmers and Nebraska Con
gressmen.
If Nebraska members of congress
were half as zealous for the welfare of
the farmers of this state as they are for
the supposed financial credit of the
state among eastern money loaners and
land speculators, some valuable con
gressional work might be looked for.
Senator Paddock prints a long com
munication in Bradstreets, quite ably
written by Wm. Aunin, which is of
very little value to his constituents.
One notable fact is alluded to by this
manifesto, viz: that the "notes of dis
content" as to hard times come not only
from all parts of America, but "are
swelled into a diapason of protest from
the various countries of Europe."
This fact we have before alluded to,
and have sought to find some adequate
cause for these universal hard times
which could be universally applied.
Senator Paddock does not seek for any
causes for the general depression which
he admits exists in "all the states of
Europe;" but he attributes the hard
times among our farmers to large
crops, a "very great advance in ocean
freights," and a faulty system of agri
culture, lie wants our farmers to mar
ket "a larger proportion of corn on the
hoof instead of on the cob;" to engage
in the culture of flax and other fibrous
productions, and in the cultivation of
the sugar beet.
This is about all there is to this great
pronunciamento from a railroad U. S.
senator to his farmer constituency; and
it is all that could be expected. Mr.
Paddock was not elected by farmers,
and does not represent them, and no
one ever supposed he would.
When Mr. Paddock asserts that high
ocean freights decrease prices of Ne
braska products he gives his old-time
friends of the U. P. an unkind cut.
Onl3T a little while ago John M. Thurs
ton and a miscellaneous job lot of other
railroad officials were down here as
serting that a lowering of freight rates
would not advance prices. Now Sena
tor Paddock asserts that an advance of
freights lowers prices. This seems to
be a case of a house divided against it
self. As a matter of fact both parties
are wrong Mr. Thurston is his bad
economy, and Mr. Paddock in assert
ing that there has beeu any apprecia
ble advance in the cost of taking farm
products to Liverpool.
In the first place he cannot apply a
purely local remedy to a disease that is
general, as he correctly says this one is.
If he knew anything at all about farm
ing he would not recommend flax-growing.
Even at the high price of flax last
year it is not remunerative, and is at
the best only a temporary expedient al
lowable while land is new. The most
cursory examination of the sugar beet
industry, as carried on in France and
German3T, and as it must be carried on
in this country, will convince him that
any hope of relief in that direction will
tirnvft ft. flal"o. Tlic oiiljr mcu ? liv
will get rich in that business are the
capitalists who receive gratuities in
bonds, and the manufacturers who re
ceive double bounties. If raising sugar
beets is so profitable how does it hap
pen that the sugar districts of France
and Germany are to-day feeling the
pressure of hard times quite as much as
any other sections.
When Ave consider the iind of distress
which may be found among Nebraska
farmers, a glimpse of the nature of the
remedy needed may be obtained. These
farmers are not distressed for food.
Their granaries, their poults-yards
and their dairies afford them an abun
dant supply. They are not distressed
for fuel. They can burn corn But
when the interest on their mortgages,
or the mortgages themselves, or their
taxes, are due, then the pressure is felt.
Or when they need something which
calls for mone3T something which they
must have and must pay maney for
then there is a pinch. Old debts call
for money, or a new note with interest
compounded, which soon again becomes
an old debt. These debts are taking
the best colt, and the best calf, and the
best bushel of potatoes are eating re
morselessly day and night, week-days and
Sundays, three hundred and sixty-five
days in the year, and are rapidly whit
ening the hairs of four out of five of the
farmers of Nebraska to-day. And Mr.
Paddock's private Secretary coolly
says "The allegation of existing dis
tress among the farmers of Nebraska,
in the sense of wide-spread want and
apprehended poverty, can only be met
by honest denial."
If by "existing distress" he means
only hunger and cold, perhaps that is
true. But as a matter of fact it is a lie.
A man may feel the most poignant dis
tress, and have a full belly. He may
see a shadow growing over his home
he may see the day surely approaching
when his wife and children will be
homeless and houseless, and may feel a
torment of consuming dread daily and
hourly without being either hungry or
cold.
Money which would raise prices, lower
interest, and open the channels of trade
money to the farmer on the same
terms it has long been furnished to the
banker would relieve this kind of dis
tress. But such an idea as this has
never entered the innocent old noddle
of Senator Paddock. Or if it had he
would never have dared to utter it
without the consent of Bradstreets and
his other Wall street masters. He
thinks money is a product of nature,
probably, and has to be dug out of the
earth like gold and silver. The idea
that money is a creation of law would
probably strike him with holy horror;
and the other ida that prices, which are
of such vital moment to producers, bear
a certain fixed relation to the volume
of money, would very likely surprise
him.
The following gem shows the trend
of thought of Senator Paddock and his
versatile and able private secretary:
"The causes of the present agricul"
tural depression in which Nebraska
FARMEBS' ALLIANCE: LINCOLN, NEB.,
shares, but through which it suffers far
less than is generally believed from the
exaggerated accounts of discontent
originating with P'.1 farmers and
demagogues and published in the east
ern press, are largely of general appli
cation." "Political farmers and demagogues"
is good, coming over the signature of
A. S. Paddock, one of the most success
ful "political farmers" in the country.
For a man who would as likely as not
try to hatch calves out of porcelain
eggs or graft potatoes on apple trees
for a railroad attorney who is repre
senting a farming community at $6,000
a year for a man who proposed to lo
cate a U. S. marine hospital at Nebras
ka City to make that kind of a fling at
"political farmers" is certainly amus
ing, f Senator Paddock would gather
his brood of "political farmers" under
his wing, and keep them out of the
wet next fall, the farmers of Nebraska
would get along very well, albeit it
would be pretty tough on the poor rail
road cappers and the Wall street money
loaners.
If Senator Pacdock would broaden
his vision a little, he would see that all
classes of laborers and producers are as
much distressed as farmers, and that
some general cause besides an overpro
duction of food and clothing which
neither feeds nor clothes any body must
be found to account for the situation.
Senator Paddock's lame denials about
the mortgage indebtedness of Nebraska,
and his efforts to convince people that
it was all made for improvements, go
for nothing, and are not borne out by
the facts. We refer him and his Wall
street friends to the official figures re
centby published in Saline county. We
venture to say that four out of five of
all the farm mortgages now in force in
Nebraska were originally made for
purchase money, and that an investiga
tion will so prove.
Twin Crimes.
The house post office committee has
agreed to report favorably a bill to ex
clude from the mails as second class
matter all the various libraries and pub
lications of like nature, embracing com
plete novels, works on political economy
and all other works commonly pub
lished in that form.
The McKinley tariff bill proposes to
double the tax on the wood pulp from
which all the white print paper in this
country is manufactured.
The first of these infamies is probably
instigated by the Express companies,
who care nothing for the blow it will
strike at the cheap literature which is
such a boon to poor people all over the
land, but hope to secure the carrying
business which goes to the post office.
The second one is probably instigated
by the paper combine composed of
Warner Miller, the Rochester Mills, the
Glen Falls Mills, the Hudson River Pa
per Co., the Remington Co., and other
paper manufacturers. All that stands
in the wav of .eieantie paper trust
which will make our dollar weeklies im
possible, and will advance the price of
every newspaper in the land, is the
cheap wood pulp which is imported
from Norway.
There is not the shadow of a public
necessity for these two crimes. One
will strike a deadly blow at our cheap
literature, and the other quite as serious
a blow at our cheap newspapers. The
republican party is the sponsor for both,
without a pretence of public necessity
or a shadow of public demand. Both
acts in fact will be in the interest of mo
nopoly, and directly against the inter
est and welfare of the people.
It is in the interest of labor that all
raw material upon which labor may be
employed should be admitted free of
duty. The Alliance has repeatedly de
manded this.
Can Ave ever hope to reach a plane of
intelligence that will enable us to apply
to our international trade those princi
ples which make our inter-state trade
so successful.
Death of Samuel Randall.
The demise of this eminent man ex
cites no surprise, as it has been daily
expected for some time. He entered
congress in 1863 and has been a mem
ber for twenty-six consecutive 3rears.
He was before that a member of the
Philadelphia council four years and of
the Pennsylvania state senate in 1858
and '59.
Mr. Randall has won an enviable re
cord as an able, upright and incorrupti
ble statesman. There is no doubt what
ever of his sterling honest3' and integ
ritv. As a democrat he went counter
to the principles of the democratic
party on the tariff, when by accepting
them against his conscientious convic
tions he could have had the highest
honors in its power to bestow. He was
respected and honored "by men of all
parties. He was a man of iron will,
an experienced and readv parliamen
tarian, and these natural and acquired
qualities made him a natural leader.
During the war no patriot was firmer
for liberty and the Union.
With the last movement of his lips he
uttered the sacred word "mother," ad
dressed to his faithful and loving wife.
An honest man, true to himself, his
country and his duty, his life is an ex
ample for our young men to emulate,
and his death an ordeal from which no
man having lived such a life need
shrink.
Wholesale Foreclosures in Kansas.
The .Yon-Conformist, of Winfield, Kan
sas, says: We have on file in this office
a copy of last week's Kingman Leader,
containing one hundred and thirty-six
foreclosure sale notices. This is an
item for the immigration bureau.
The B. & M. Journal says, "It is just
possible that the action of the Topeka
convention in regard to Mr. Ingalls may
be repudiated by the Alliances of the
state."
Don't lose any sleep on that account.
It isn't at all probable.
The Truth Beginning to be Recognized.
For many years the editor of this pa
per has in various ways, and on all ap
propriate occasions, been sounding a
note of alarm on account of a contrac
iton of the money volume of the country.
Long ago we recognized the deprecia
tion of values by a change in the rela
tions of population and wealth to mon
ey, and showed that a contraction of
money could be just as actual and harm
ful by an increase of production and
population as it could by a positive de
crease in the sum of our currency.
Taking up the subject of price, we
showed that price was only the expres
sion of the relation of money to other
things; that prices all the time bore a
fixed relation to the volume of money,
and that it was vital to the welfare of
all producers and laborers that prices
should be maintained above the accumu
lating power of interest, or wages would
be entirely destroyed.
What we prophesied in this connec
tion actually took place. As popula-.
tion and production increased prices
and values sunk lower and lower, until
the margin of profit or wages the mar
gin of production above a bare subsis
tence entirely disappeared. Added to
this relative contraction there has been
an actual contraction within a short
time by the withdrawal of national bank
notes of over $150,000,000. These
things have caused a depression that is
felt not only by farmers alone, but by
all classes of business men. The good
that is to come out of it lies in the
fact that the prime first cause of the de
pression is being recognized by leading
public men and leading newspapers,
who are now taking exactly the same
ground long held by the editor of this
paper and many others, and for the
proclaiming of which we have been de
nounced as cranks and lunatics. It is
being discovered that money is a crea
tion of law, as Mr. Cernuschi declared,
and not a natural product;that increased
purchasing power does not compen
sate for decreased prices; that no mi
ally low interest in times of depression
does not indicate abundance of money,
but the reverse; that prices must be
maintained above the level of accu.
mulation by interest or wages would be
destroyed and all interests suffer.
These truths are being recognized.
The army of cranks is being reinforced
by an accession of sensible men. These
see, as yet, through a glass darkly; but
having found a glimmer of the truth,
they are likely before long to become as
crazy as the cranks. The Omaha Re
publican has been "in the path" for
sometime. We are glad to welcome the
Omaha Herald as an accession to the
ranks of the redeemed. We are de
lighted to see that these papers, seeing
the truth themselves, do not fear to pro
claim it from the house tops, no matter
whose prejudices may be offended. We
have before this quoted the Republican
on this question. We give below an
article rrom the Herald. The article is
so exactly in line with what we have
long been teaching that it might have
been copied almost literally from some
of our articles. 'The Herald says:
If this congress fails to provide a more ade
quate volume of money it is safe to 6ay that
the financial question will reappear in poli
tics and exert a powerful influence on the
next election. The pinch for money is be
coming: so great that a general recognition of
the absolute necessity for a greater volume of
it must be formed. For years now when we
have been enormously enlarging and expand
ing business and increasing in population M'o
have been contracting our currency, whereas
it should have been materially increased
in volume. The result has been that the
value of money has steadily risen : its scarci
ty has given to the dollar an unusual and un
natural value. The increase in the value of
a dollar is only another name for the fall of
prices of commodities. These commodities,
except those controled by trusts and monopo
lies, have fallen year by year, and the great
est decrease has been in farm produce, be
cause the farmer has not bt en able to resist
the tendency as other classes, a dollar will
now purchase nearly twice as much farm pro
duce as it would ten years ago. The farmers
income has therefore been greatly curtailed.
But the feature of the shrunken money
supply which is worst of all is the crippled
condition in which it leaves the debtor class
How are they to pay their debts? Certainly
only in money. How can they get the money?
Certainly only by selling something. What
shall they sell? Is it cattle? If so, the herd
won't bring what it once would. It requires
more cows and calves to pay a $1,000 debt
than when the debt was contracted. Is it corn
or wheat? It takes vastly more grain to pay
off the debt than when it was contracted. Is
it a farm? Well, have farms increased in val
ue while grain and live stock have been fall
ing.
Of course, to say that the great shrinkage
in value of the circulating medium has crip
pled and is bearing hard on the debtor class is
to say that it is bearing hard on the west, for
the west is the money borrower and the east
the money lender.
And this is the reason that the west is so
loudiy demanding that Uncle Sam increase
the volume of currency in circulation.
A Straw Burner.
We have received from W. II . Ellis,
of McCool, a letter of inquiry about a
straw burner which is being sold as a
patent right, and said to be manufac
tured at Beatrice. There are a dozen
straw burners, and of course many pa
tents. But no patent concern is neces
sary. The process is very simple. The
Russian colony of Mennonites west of
Beatrice have a simple furnace in which
they burn straw and all kinds of waste,
and have ever since they settled in that
locality. The price of the burner al
luded to by Bro. Ellis is extortion ately
high, which is excused by the patent.
The man who pays a cent for a patent
on a burner will be swindled. Some
parties in Gage county were badly let
down with this same patent burner. It
is quite safe to let traveling patent ped
dlers severely alone.
To W. A. Mansfield, of Gaudy, and
others who have written us on political
questions, we would say, action in the
direction suggested is being taken, and
the results will be published as soon as
expedient. Also, ten thousand Alliance
men who do" not take it, should sub
scribe for1 this paper at once, when we
could very easily buy a press.
SATURDAY, APRIL 19,
Wanted, an Issue.
The Omaha Republican is the leading
republican organ of the state. In mat
ters of party policy it is supposed to
represent and foreshadow the actions of
that party. In one of its late issues
there is a leading editorial entitled
"Party Policy," in which it very con
cisely and plainly defines what are not
or ought not to be party issues, and
fails entirely to state what are or should
be such issues. And strange as it may
appear it selects the live questions of
this time the questions upon which the
people of the state are thinking and de
bating, and upon which they are get
ting ready to vote next f all.and declares
that they must not be made party issues.
First it takes the railroad question.
After defining the different positions
held on that question, it says:
"The duty of republicans is to find the
middle ground between the extremes
that will come nearest to doing justice
to railroads and people, and no man or
paper, or organization has the right to
denounce any man as not ueiug a goou
republican because of his views on the
railroad question."
This twaddle about a middle ground
that will do justice to both sides with
out hurting either is . just the kind of
stuff they have been putting into repub
lican platforms for the past ten years.
If the above means anything
it means that the party must
be good Lord and good devil on the
railroad question, and that no issue
must be made on it for fear of discord
in the party or in other words, for
fear the railroad bosses, when they find
they cannot rule will go in to ruin.
Next the Republican takes up the pro
hibition and license questions and
reaches the same conclusion in regard
to them. Here is the way it states it:
"Within our party are men occupy
ing very extreme views on these ques
tions, but who has the right to denounce
a newspaper or a voter oecause of its
or his views on the question of prohi
bition or license? These questions are
not party issues, and a voter or a news
paper may take either side and still re
main in good fellowship with the re
publican party."
We hold very different views. It is
the duty of every great party to deter
mine what is the right policy in regard
to every public question of sufficient
magnitude to need a legal solution, and
having determined the right policy, to
vigorous7 pursue and enforce it until
it either becomes law or is condemned
by popular suffrage. The party which,
through cowardly policy, will ignore or
palter with great public questions
which fill the popular mind and move
the popular heart, deserves defeat, aud
what is more will achieve it.
In the earl3r daj's of the republican
partyr no such cowardly councils pre
vailed. No cowardly, faltering half
way utterances were heard in those
days, but its bugle voice rang out like a
shrill clarion in favor of the right as
soon as the right was known.
Should it adopt the cowardly policy
outlined by the Republican, and there
is little doubt that it will, we will wel
come the grand old party of Nebraska
to a humiliating defeat that will herald
also its national disruption.
The Republican fails to indicate any
question upon which an issue shall be
made by its party. Certainly the re
marks it makes about prohibition and
license apply with equal force to tariff.
Civil service reform it has abandoned.
With the propositions now pending in
congress for expenditures it can make
no pretensions to economy or retrench
ment. Inspired from Wall street, it
dare not touch the money question. In
fact if it follows the Republican, it will
be a party without a policy and without
an issue an aggregation of innocent
voters devoted to the memory of a name
and a good record, led by a set ot de
signing politicians intent on public
plunder. From such a party good
Lord deliver us.
Our State Agency.
Our State Agent, Mr. J. W. Hartley,
is a thoroughly good business man, and
is indefatigable in his efforts to benefit
our members in all business matters.
He does all kinds of buying and selling
for them. He has an unlimited stock of
machinery and implements to draw
from. There are some embarrassments
connected with publishing full informa
tion; but we invite Count jr Alliances to
send committees to investigate our
facilities and report to their members.
We supply Glidden wire.
Labor and Capital Advanced in Price.
We have been offering Labor and
Capital, by Edward Kellogg, as a pre
mium for subscriptions to The Alli
ance, giving the book with each $1 sub
scription. The New York house which
publishes this work has been absorbed
in a combine and prices advanced, so
that we are now compelled to put the
price of The Alliance one year and
the book at $1.10. We shall continue to
furnish it, as it is a book we desire all
farmers to read.
The Bee and Wall Street.
The Omaha Bee has gone into the
service of the money power, body, soul
and breeches. Like all new converts it
out-IIerods Herod in its devotion to its
new master. In its daiby issue of Sun
day last are two long editorials devoted
to the destruction of "fiat money mani
acs" and defending the interests of Wall
street. One is entitled "Fiatism
Rampant." It bristles with such
gems as "fiat virus," "ignorant
money quacks," etc., etc. The
other is an editorial canard about
the fearful financial condition of the
Argentine Republic, caused by currency
inflation. This terrible crisis is con
jured up in the editorial room of the
jjee a veritable tempest in a tea-pot.
Query, does the Bee print these editor
ials in its weekly edition where the
farmers might see them?
The conversion of the Bee to be the
champion of the money power will be
remembered hereafter. -
1890.
The
Railroad Literary Bureau and
. Alliance.
the
One George H. Mendal.
That the railroads have organized a
literary bureau to aid in their political
work there is no doubt. Superior seems
to be a sort of headquarters of the thing.
The vile resolutions of its so-called board
of trade, which is probabljr composed of
some merchants who think they are
getting special railroad favor, is fol
lowed now by a long interview in the
B. & M. Journal with one George II.
Mendal, said to be a member of the Al
liance. "This is given as "the voice of
a farmer." It has abundant ear
marks of the squeal of a railroad cap
per. Any member of the Alliance who
will go to a low-down monopoly organ
like the Journal with an interview which
in almost every particular is against the
Alliance, ought to be kicked out of the
society at once. We know nothing about
Mr. Mendal; but we venture to guess,
from his interview, that he is engaged
in some kind of business in which he
can receive favors from the B. & M. K.
R. Co., and that under a fair construc
tion of the constitution he is not eligible
to membership in the Alliance.
We cull a few gems from his inter
view: "From whom does this talk of repu
diation, oppression and discrimination
in railroad rates come?"
"I am sorrv to say that these questions
are discussed by political aspirants who
have been repudiated by both old par
ties." "In my judgment and from long ex
perience in the state on the question of
transportation, I think that Nebraska is
not as yet read3' to demand as low rate
as that now in force in Iowa."
"We farmers are in favor of a lower
rate of interest, but the usury hurrah
largely comes from men of no credit.
The intelligent farmer recognizes in the
national banking system a security that
is unsurpassed in the world's history.
"I am disgusted that would-be politi
cians should endeavor to use the Farm
ers' Alliance for the furtherance of their
own political operations."
How about railroad cappers? Ed.
"I have carefully read the procedure
had before the commission. I do not
think that Attorney-General Leese has
maintained the position in any respect
which he so blatantly proclaimed to the
world he intended to do when the com
mission came to Nebraska. It looks to
me as if Attorney-General Leese's mind
had been warped 13T political aspirations,
and in his pretended zeal to benefit the
farmer he has overreached himself by
making professions which he neither had
the ability nor the means to enforce. It
is 1113' judgment and the judgment of
many that efforts of Mr. Loose, while
good in some respects, have not shown
themselves practicable, and which he
never intended to carry out, but which
can only be characterized as political
buncombe."
"Who has been promoting the agita
tion that we see continuously in the
newspapers pertaining to the Alliance?"
"It is usually the aspiring curb stone
politician that does it."
An interuiew like the above appearing
in the Journal is an insult to every
honest Alliance man in the state. We
are curious to know whether the Alli
ance men of Nuckolls count endorse
this man Mendal.
The Omaha Bee and the Money Ques
tion. In its issue of Sunday, the 13th, the
Bee, in pursuance of its attack upon
The Alliance in its demand for more
money, as made through the thousands
of petitions sent to congress in the last
two months, presents a rehash of Secre
tary Windom's report, trying to show
that there has been a great increase of
currency since 1878. We quote the
statement of the Bee, to be perfectly
fair:
The rerort of the secret&rv of tho tronsnrv
showed on March 1, 1878, a total circulation of
eigne n una red ana live million seven hundred
and ninety-three thousand eight hundred and
forty-seven dollars.
The active circulat ion on the first day of the
wruBeiii iuumn was composed as ioilows
uoiu coin,
373,824,488
Standard silver dollars,
unsicuary silver coin,
Gold certificates,
Silver certificates,
Greenbacks, -National
bank notes,
5!1,1IK4,172
i:m.J8.07
2!H),fl05,5tt2
339,761,359
186,589,030
Total, - - - - f 1,437,404,052
Would it not have been candid for the
Bee to explain why the year 1878 was
selected for the purpose of a compari
son? If it had done so it would have
shown that that was the year of contrac
tion for the purpose of resuming specie
payments, ior this purpose the treas
ury had taken in over $830,000,000 of
7-30 bonds which were issued in small
denominations to be used as money, and
replaced them with bonds not usable as
money, so that by 1878 when payments
were resumed there had been retired
$1,230,990,086, leaving only about the
amount named by the Bee for use.
As a matter of fact there never has
been a time in the present century when
there was so small an amount of money
per capita in circulation as now. The
selection of 1878 hy the president, the
secretary of the treasury and the Bee
for comparison, is a piece of demago
gur3r, as we propose to show.
In 18CG there was a circulating medi
um of $1,990,000,000. Population 31,
000,000. Currency per capita $04.
In 1889 we have a total paper and coin
issue of $1,403,000,000. Population 05,
000,000. Circulation per capita $21.40.
But of this $1,40.j,000,000 given by the
treasurer as the circulation now a large
amount is held as bank reserve. This
reserve is variously estimated. The
amount required hy law in 1888 was
$312,000,000. Deducting this reserve
from $1,405,000,000 leaves $1,093,000,000.
With a population of Co, 000,000 this
gives $10.53 per capita circulation in
1889. In 1878 the money volume, at the
secretary's own figures, was $706,000,
000. The population was 45,000,000,
leaving a per capita circulation of $17, or
thirty-seven cents per capita more than
in 1889, or the present time.
So taking the year 1878 for compari
sonthe one most unfavorable year
since the war the one vear when every
energy of the country and ever3' spark
of patriotism was appealed to to reduce
money and resume specie payments
and we have shown that even in that
thaa there
is now.
After publishing its table as alxve
quoted, the Bee adds: "This is exclu
sive of money and bullion in the nation
al treasury, which on the first instant
amounted to six hundred and tdxty-six
million six-hundred and forty-threo
thousand two hundred and sixty-one
dollars."
Nothing could be more unfair than
this; and it shows to whvt desKrate
straits and misrepresentations the Boo
is driven to to make out a case. To bo
correct the amount in the treasury must
be reduced by the total amount of gold
and silver certificates, as given by the
Bee this sum is counted twice over.
As a matter of fact and any compe
tent accountant or banker will admit it
there should be deducted from the
Bee's statement of "active circulation"
the following sums, viz:
In banks and U. S. treasury, - $700,00lVX)
National bank notes
una
green-
backs lost and destroyed.
- 4."i,0t,(0
Coin lost, melted and removed for
Asiatic trade,
lVl.OHO.OitO
Total, $S!r,omUWQ
This would leave a per capita circula
tion of only about $8.34; and this is very
nearly the correct figure to-day.
The Bee has joined the monopoly and
Wall street press in giving advice to the
Alliance ami the farmer. We may al
lude to this advice in another article.
Newspaper Interview.
The interviews that are appearing in
the Bee and Republican, of Omaha, are
mostly the mere inventions of the re
porters who send them. One in the
Republican of the 11th makes (i. W.
Burton, of Orleans, say that President
Powers is pledged to (Jov. Thayer.
Perhaps Mr. Burton said so. and per
haps he did not. If he did he lied: if he
did not, the reporter lied. They can
chew it up between them.
In the Bee of the 11th is an interview
with one C. K. Adams, of Hastings,
whom the reporter introduces as a
"capitalist." The reporter and Mr.
Adams together give the Alliance a
very bad send-oft". The statements at
tributed to Mr. Adams are without ex
ception vile lies.
This matter is of no moment, only as
showing the animus of the papers for
whom these interviews are got up to
order.
Silence is Golden.
Gi'cat anxiety is manifested in cer
tain quarters to obtain correct informa
tion as to the membership, plans, etc..
of the Alliance. Howards hae been
offered to certain parties for desired in
formation. Silence is golden. Our af
fairs arc our own. Information of ihi
sort is not sought in the interest of the
Alliance, but in that of its opponents.
Remember, "Silence is golden."
"Put none but Americans on guard
to-night."
Railroad Legislation. "
The railroad men have the universal
sympathy of the working community in
their attempt to get relief from some of
the especial hardships of their calling.
An idea of the danger to which rail- 1
road employes are subject can le gained
from the records of the Brotherhood of
Railroad brakemen. One in eighty-three
of its 10,000 members are killed annually
and one in sixty injured. A brakemau
has only one chance in 4.7 of being al
lowed to die a natural death. laseu
ger train employes are comparath elv
free from danger, the great majority 1m
ing freight train brakemen. who are re
quired to perform the most perilous
feats in couplingears and setting brakes.
Long hours and low bridges should
both be abolished. Railroad corpora
tions should be made to adopt improved
safety appliances for coupling. It should
not be necessary for a brakemau to le
an acrobat in order to be permitted to
live. It is not a fair test to put human
life against the expenditure of a few
thousand dollars. Boston Labor I.radrr.
Politics and the Alliance.
The cry goes up that the Alliance
must not discuss political questions, for
that will break it up.
Well, if the Alliance people are not
permitted to discuss the great question
of reform.how can they vote intelligent
ly on these questions?
The farmers and laboring men of our
country are inaugurating the greatest
reform movement that waseer inaugu
rated in the history of our country, and
if they do not thoroughly understand
this movement they will make a failure
of it, and to understand it thoroughly
they must have a thorough discussion
of it.
The intelligent discussion among our
selves of the great questions of reform
that now agitate the mindsof the Amer
ican people, will simply make our order
stronger ami unite us more firmly in the
object of reform.
The object of the Farmers' Allianee.
summarized, is to unite the farmers for
the promotion of theirinteresH.socially.
politically and financially. And how
can they promote their interests socially
without understanding their social cou-
dition, and how can they promote their
political interests without understand
ing their political condition, and how-
can they promote their iinaneial inter
ests without understanding their finan
cial conditions,and howcaii they under
stand these conditions without a discus
sion of them?
Hear Both Sides.
A meeting for the discussion of fi nance
was held in New York not many even
ings ago. Ex-Postmaster (icneral
Thomas L.James presided. He said
upon taking the chair, that he had al
ways been inclined to the belief that
"values should be measured by a gold
yard stick." He was williug to hear
both sides.
Mr. Warner, one of the principal
speakers, in the courso of a lengthy ad
dress said: "In the quarter of a cen
tury before us we shall be encroaching
on the present stock of gold in the
hands of man for the arts and dentistry.
In less than three decades the popula
tion of the United States will have in
creased to 1,300,000,000, and the pro
duction of gold will not give 2 j cent
apiece to all who dwoll here."
Another speaker said: "You who
listen to me to-night, well clothed, well
fed, whose sleep will be perturbed by
no care for to-morrow, do you know
that not only upon tho bleak prairies of
far Dakota, but on the banks of the
Mississippi and tho Missouri, on tho
shores of tho great lakes, and in the
valleys of Maryland and Virginia, there
are thousands of people hungry to
night, not because they have been idlo
or dissolute, but because the crops they
have raised have not sold for enough ta
pay the cost of production."
year there was more money