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About The farmers' alliance. (Lincoln, Nebraska) 1889-1892 | View Entire Issue (March 3, 1892)
THE FARMERS' ALLIANCE, LINCOLN, NEB., THURSDAY, 31 Alt. 3, 1MU2. Cfct Jaron:' alliance, PuhUahod rr tettirtUr by Thx Alliakcx Pubusudto Ca Oor.UU tad M 8l,Luxln.Kb. THOXPSOX A FlRU, PBonuiTou. "Ia the beauty of tbe Hllles Christ to born across the tea, With a glory in hU bosom That transfigures yon and me. As he strove to make men holy Let u atrlTe to make them free. Since God U marching on." Julim Fori Eovt. "Laurel crowns cleave to deserts. And power to him who power exerts. A ruddy drop ef manly blood The surging sea outweighs. Emtio. "He ho cannot reason is a fool. Ha who will not reason is a coward. Be who dare not reason is a slave." N. K. P. A. TO CORRESPONDENTS. AddraM all business eemnanioatloiis to AMrM matter for publication to SdKor Varaon Alliance. .... ATUOiea wnooB on km . ?r"' aaaaot ba used. Terr long oommunloattons, aaruW oannotboud. . Ex-GoTKRifoi St. Jobk of Kansss made a very apt remark when he said, "The republican and democratic parties are calamities that Justify the people in bowling." We Intended to have some sport bit ting Rosey with his Feb. 2flth double leads, but at the last moment we find we have lost that copy of the See, so he escapes this time. We call attention of our readers to a communication in this issue from Jos. Haycock of Gering who calls onr spec ial attention to the defenseless condi tlon and danger of farmers in the irri gation belt of Nebraska. We shall apeak editorially in their behalf next week. Petih D. Smith, a colored man in 8priogfield, O., has invented and se cored a patent on a new self-binder, which dispenses with the use of twine. The band is made of straw twisted by the binding machinery of the reaper Several large firms are examining the machine with a vlow to manufactur ing It. iss;!;ss T. V. Powdeblt and A. J. Cassatt, on Thursday of this week, were to ap pear before the attorney general ot Pennsylvania to show cause why the courts should interfere with the Read lag railroad combination to rob the people. The law is probably not strong enough, and will not be interpreted to protect coal consumers. Jasoh Edwards, Hamlin Garland1 latest published work rev lowed at length In this issue is on sale at thh office. The author dedicates it "to the Farmers' Alliance whose high mission it is to unite the farmer and the artisan, the north and the south, the blue and the gray under one banner, marching iu continent-wide battle-lino against the denial of equal rights," and with it, "IU Implied hatred of all ipeoial privileges." A bill has been introduced into the New York legislature requiring ever can of baking powder containing ammonia offered for sale in thestate to have "contains ammonia" printed in plain type and made conspicuous on lt. . label We do not know the effect oi this ingredient, but it Is supposed to b Injurious to health. Under the presout struggle between those who prepart food products for the people and adult erate or cheapen to keep from being crushed by stronger competitors, our lives are all endangered: our health it at tho mercy of merciless grcod. Db. Pakkhckst, of New York, two Sundays ago preached a powerful snr mon against the city government ar conducted by its corrupt officials, and made specilio charges against the mayoi and some of his principal assistants, lie showed that they were in tho pav .of the criminal classes, that they regu larly collected money from the gam blers and others who paid to be let alone. Be also named the men, some of them, who were paying llu bribed, boodle gang, and told that tht mayor dare not displease them for po litical reasons. The New York M'orla later Illustrated the sermon with nicsl graphic scenes in New York official life. All the street car drivers and con 'ductorsof Indianapolis are out on s strike and not a car is moving. On Tuesday, our latest Information, tu mn!tuous thousands were on the princi pal streets keeping as close to tho pend ing conflict, expected to be precipitated by an effort on the part of the street cat company to start the cars. Nearly 500 extra police had been swtrn in. Eighty five strikers were arrested Saturday, and their cases Tuesday were being arbitrarily held by the police judgt contrary to the law limiting his juris diction. Tho strikers demand that President Frenzel of the company be re moved and that their differences be ad justed by arbitration. The mobs on the streets ot Indian pous February 87 numbered 10,000 men, and a dozen riots occurred during the day. brought on by an attempt to ran the cars in the face of the opposing strikers and their sympathizing friends Competition between the strong and the weak and voluntary organisation to op i . .. ... i . i i eritably to such conflicts, and tends steadily en through scenes) cf blood shed toward complete barherism and anarchy. The only remedy is a reoog aition of the equal, inalienable rights of men (rights which title deeds euaot dispose of) together with lain securing to each equal opportunities to work, nd enforcing an equal necessity of working upon each and all. TIE ADDRESS ASD PLATT0BM. The address to the Americas people prepared and set forth with appended demands by the February Sid national congress, "representing ail divisions of urban and rural organized industry," is the grandest declaration of truth and right, cf Just principles and noble pur poses, ever framed by the mind of man rhe declaration of Independence was the morning star of freedom, bat it pales from sight ic the midst of the far- flashing splendors of a now mora clearly defined light of justice. Its full-orbed rays reveal with painful distinctness the hideous present shapes of hoary evils, but the new sun has risen with promise and power, "with healing in its wings Evils tbonght desd, taking new shapes and developed by ail the forces of in (Tenuity aid modern invention, have grown to. enormous size and power, even behind the trotted bulwarks of American liberty. Our fathors taught us, and we have seen 'these truths to ho self evident Fbat all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their ere ator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men. Now what Is life and so called liberty if the means of subsistence are mono polized r Hunger-scourged the de pendent laborers mast accept the wages that Independent employers choose to offer, and the wages are made so low that the dependent eannot be- lonie Independent. More are reduoed to dependence than rise to independ ence. The army begging work is every year increasing, the small capitalist is being crowded down into the ranks of the wsge earners by bigger, richer bus iness rivals, and capital is concentrating and drawing to itself all power. Half a million poor emigrants from Europe are also each year pressing into our work-begging dependent class and the steadily increasing competition can no longer be relieved by goiag west. All land which the poor can make a living on is taken. Railroad kings have also risen with power under presentlaw to exact slav ish and impoverishing tribute from all and gold, by devilish lnvontien genius has been made to fetter r.nd rob and ruin at the will of the bankers, and the creditor and capitalist class. The people, . the producing - classes. have arisen; they havo spoken; and thoy ill perform. To secure their rights this government was instituted. Bead care fully the torrefied platform of 8t. Louis which we print on our first page. The platform we printed last week was takonfrom the associated Dress dis patches and contained a considerable number ot errors, one change In tho first plank providing money at cost, (2 percent) being of vital importance. NEBRASKA AT ST. LOUIS. While the Nebraska delegation was one of tho most orderly and well be haved in tho St. Louis conference, our state was well represented In every im portant committee connected .with its labors. ' ' - Our worthy President J. H. Powers, was one of the first to be selected by the N. F. A. to represent it on the commit tee on demands. J. W. Edgerton was also Kelectod a member of this Impor-I tant committee. j Bro. O. Hull, of Lancaster county was made a member of the committeo on' credentials. Fred Jewell, the popular i secretary of tho Platte county Farmers' Alliance, represented Nebraska on tho sonimittoo to draft an anti-option reso- ution and was made secretary of fhe ' committeo, reading its report as noted elsewhere. Bro. Jewell is a worker, and a useful dologato representing tho state with credit. His genial nature and ready wit made him deservedly popular with all. ; J. H. Powers and C. II. Van Wyck, ere named, on tho committee to confer with the National Ex. Committee of the peoples party and the latter appointed member of the committeo of five to propose au addross to the American people. ... . - Bro. Warrick Maunders of the Platte Center Argut was ono of the assistant secretaries of the conference. Or W. Blake acted as chairman of the Nebraska delegation and Prof. W. H. Jones ot Hastings, Secy. The deliberations of the delegation were hnrmonlous throughout and they were all seeking for the greatest good to the greatest number. THE POOR MADE DESPERATE. It is in the interest .-of tho capitalist class to have as many men as possible nit ot work and seeking it in order to keep and force wages down by making competition fierce between those seek ing work and those employed. But un employed, hungry men are an exceed ingly dangorous element to socioty, as Emperor William ot Germany has been audiug out during the last week. Last Thursday "for several hours a mob of several thousand unemployed working mon was In practical control of the city, the emperor was hooted and jeered, - 1 t . uccr Buioons ana DaKerics were wrecked, scores of people were seri ously hurt, scores of others were im prlsonod, and it was only the good judgment of the emperor in refusing to permit the military to be ordered out that prevented great bloodshed." la the afternoon 3,000 to 4,000 unem ployed men met in a public square and passed a series of strong resolutions de nouncing their employers and the sys tem of government which enabled the latter to crush Jtho workingman be neath the iron ht el of capital, and call ing rtpon the government to protect the Interests of the working classes. They then marched in a body toward the Untcr den Linden, crying: "To the castle, to the castle; tho emperor must receive us!" The emperors namo was received with howls of derision, 5.000 tongues burling bitter curses and fear ful insults against him. They reached the gates ot the palace; sang in thundering tones La Marseil laise, and called for the emperor to ap pear. But when the garrison had beeu sufficiently reinforced the police charged on the crowd and a series of the most desperate hand to hand lights followed. The people, by hunger made desperate, were beaten down with batons, the flat of swords and ri stocks. Une Hundred arrests were made, and the Imprisoned men saued their prison bread to be taken la their tlaruing vines and children. The sum ber first gathered at the palace in creased to 10,000, many women being among them. With the darkness the mob which had been driven back and somewhat scat tered, Increased in numbers and baker ic were pillaged by the bait famished peoplo, the city being in tho hands of the mob. Smaller riots occurred the next day, bakery shops being broken into to feed the famishing. Tho proposition of the socialist depu ties, members of the Reichstag, that the government give work to the unem ployed, seems a most reasonable plan, and In fact the only way to help tbem. They do not want charity, they are ready and anxious to work; they are strong and capable; but the capitalists, whom they are now at the mercy of, make it to their own advantage to have large number of the poor unem ployed, in order thai their hunger and nakedness may lead them to accept the lowest living wages. If tho gov ernment should employ them in any kind of productive labor it would di vide among , them their , entire product, asking nothing in the shape of Interest and divldonds. If the government allows the strong and the privileged to monopolize the na tural means of subsletance and so have in their power to fix wages and even refuse work to those in greatest need. it cannot itself do less than give these willing but helpless and starving thou sands such work a, will enable tbom to provido for themselves. If men have a right to live at all, they have a right to a place to live and the natural means by the use of which with labor they may live. A government should go down which allows ono class to prey upon another class till the? are madn hc.a- r, . Pi gars and wanderers with no food and no place to honestly obtain it by their own free honest labor. Not only should go down, but forces nre at work which will bring it down sooner or later it justice is not dono. Injustioe is the breeder of anarchy. THE 00NDITI0H 0E THE SOUTH. Tho American Missionary organ of the A. M. Association, cays in its current number, after referring to the society's narrowing means: Millions in our mission , fields from Georgia to Texas are in distress. The cotton crop, tneir main dependenoe, is the lowest price for forty years. While the depression Is general, tho condition of the colored people is pitiable. Ia some cabin homes hunger already im pends. Parents full la the school sup port of their children. Pittances pain fully spared for school Or church have- to go for food. Pastors' families lack tne means of living. 1'unils have to give up school . This Is the condition in the vast ro- glon cf our country included in tho cot ton states. And our financial solons tell us and them that their poverty and suffering Is caused by "over-production." They have been working too bard, they are too rich, they have pro duced too much intrinsio wealth, and society as now constituted cannot al low the producers to hcapup anything. The capitalists will kindly tako their cotton off their hands for halt what it oost them, or a trifle more, and so they may pay off part of the yoar's accumu. luted dobts. But If the eight or ten million ether workers In the 'country had been justly paid for thoir work, thoy would have had money and stocked up in cotton goods, and emptied the cotton market at a good living price to the cotton raisers. Or if the government had furnished warehouses, and given them greenbacks for warehouse receipts, much of the world's staple could have beon hold by its prcducors and the market pries kept good ar-.d uniform. But that would havo been "class legis lation," legislation to protect the poor producers from tho rich speculators. Sorioasly, It is high time that the de mands of justice should be understood, ana that laws be enacted which shall bind together intrinsic and commercial values, so that he who works hardest, and produces most of real value shall be proportionately rewarded. It is timo the people sought out the reason why, with abundance of food and cloth ing produced, millions of men and women and children of America go cold and hungry for lack ot money Willing to work, hundreds of thousands seek work in vain, and having nothing, suffer. And millions more, after work ing a year and marketing a magnificent crop, must also hunger. Think on these things. The Boston Tlerald says: Some day all the railroads in tho United States are likoly to be consolidated and oper ated by the people, for the peoplo, and this likelihood offer a fine opportunity to guess by what stages It will bo brought abut. We don't have to guess. It will be brought about by electing to power the new party which demands the govern ment ownership and operation of tbo railroads. Grkkd reaches oven into the grave and plunders mourners unmercifully, well knowing that they will never in dividually resist or combine. The cot fin trust has just been reorganized and now practically controls the whole bus iness of tho country. So an advance ot prices averaging 80 per cent has burn ordered to take effect in thirty da. AS AVERAGE ILLS. -I iwmu that tbo builder no tooper To mo (ball be low tbaa tbo plan. Henceforward bo fuerdon and (lory And life for too averse man." For the first time, we believe, the average man has been selected by a novelist as his leading character, and it proves that the author who chose Jsscs Edwards and his story to awaken the interest and call forth the deepest sym patbyand profonndest admiration of the reading public, has discovered that the real heroes of this world are not in dividuals of rare talents, of superior. special gifts. They are not fortune favored, nor are they even protected by the laws. They are not those who climb upon others backs to places of ease and power. They are not rich men's sons, inheriting through despotic laws a prince's - privilege and levying luxurious incomes out of the enforced labor ot the working classes; but they are of the class, rather, upon whom all wrongful burdens of society are heaped, the poor, the defrauded, the over worked and underpaid, those itho are preyed upon to male "success" for others. For each gain without labor there is of necessity labor without gain. Eaeh idler with an income must have toiling laves, in each exchange the one who takes more value than he gives, is a thief or a robber. If seems strange that the world through all the ages past has honored the individuals who by superior strength, or cunning, or foresight, or advantage of position stolen and forti fied by law, were enabled in dealing with others to rob and rule them, to gel the best end of the bargain and so grow rich from the toil and sweat of many un justly requited. Such " "success,' in stead of being respected and doffed to, should have been execrated, despisod and punished as the principrl crime. But the moral sense of mankind has been blurred and blinded. Selfish men and unselfish men, the good as well as the bad, who have been forced by indi vidualistic conditions to cultivate sel fish ness, have been slow to perceive the full requirements of justice, and few have traced the present enormous social evils and unequal opportunities to their criminal cause. However, we are re joiced to see that the mists of selfishness are lifting, and this book of Hamlin Garland's, depicting the present and increasin&oppressions ef "the common poople," their anxieties, deprivations, temptations and crushing burdens, will mightily arouse all who have in them a love of liberty and hatred of injustice. Jason Edwards, the hero ot Mr. Gar lands last published realistic novel, is one of many. He fairly represents the masses who by unjust exchanges, mo nopoly seizures and robber titles trans ferred, have been disinherited, crowded millions can only on the necessary earth by ing rent and usury to These stay pay idle er absentee landlords, "their heirs and assigns forever." They must humbly beg for a place to labor and pay mono polists for the privilege out of each day's labor product. The landlords refuse them even froe air and sunshine, by high rents and low wages forcing as many as 820,000 to live on one square mile in heaped-up, close-together, disease-breeding, murderous tenements. God has delayed punishing the men who blasphomously forged I AM to the first title deeds of coal lands, oil fields, and tho rest, so It is assumed that this common wealth is rightfully possessed in fee simple by the uncommon few, the favored chlldren.JTho disinherited work ers can buy coal and oil, and the rest, but they must pay the monopolists more than theso necessaries of life cost them, and thoy aro not allowed to work in the mines and have what their labor gath ers. And this Is not all. Steam and electricity, the tireless giants which God gave to do much of the work of the world and equally re lieve the workers, have been seized by the rich to work without pay for them alone, and they evon use them to force down wages and still farther enslavo the poor by throwing them out of em ployment into the fast-swelling ranks of the dependent, competing, job-seeking wage-earners. Steam and its swifter mate as harnessed steeds must trans port all products now, and so their plutocrat pretended owners are able to toll at will all marketed goods, the pro duct of each man's labor, that of the hithorto independent farmer with all the rest. Mr. Garland's hero was a Boston me chanic about 50 years of age. He bad been a hard-workiug man all his life, sober, honest and self-respecting, strong and patient. For twenty years, as we know has been the caso the country over, his wages had been from time to time forced down and his rent raised. He had been obliged to leave K street for a poorer place on Carver street, and here his little boy died. From Carver St., he was later forced to a worse ono, with his wife and girls taking rooms in a hot, shabby, rotten, unhealthy, crowded tenement, with the worst social sur roundings. He was here barely able to pay his rent and provide for his family, and with the impossibility cf paying it staring him in the face he again re ceived notice that his rent was to be raised. Tho author here exhausts his rare descriptive talent picturing tho montal feelings of a man thus crowded to the wall, an honest man who had done his utmost and who loved his wife and children as true men do. But; no pencil can convey the reality to those who have not suffered this utmost stress and strain of earthly trouble. In his despairing stato of niird a thought of the west, "tho golden wesi," the droam land of wealth and happiness, came to him. Ho read tho railroad guides picturing most deceptively a wonderful country, nnd taking his few hundred dellars saved he landed In Boomtown, bought land of a ladd and mortgage shark, put him up a shanty and with his girls helping him wcrke ' . 0 ' harder than ever. But be cuno west too late, after the free land and good land had all been taken, and three years of interest crops with light yields of grain, low prices and culminating drouth took all be had. The strain of imagined dishonor, of debt that he conld not pay, and the future he could not yrepare for, crushed him. His story is that of one of the many who go down that millionaires may rise. Wrong is still "on tho throne." Bat truth as thus pictured by Mr. Gar land, "8wars the future. And behind tbe dim unknown Standeib God within tbe shadow. Keeping- watch above his own. A FDrASCIAL SYSTEM FOR ALL. As stated by the Bee the national trade balance for the last six months including January is "in the neighborhood of 1 170.000,000 in favor of the United States." We affirm that this balance, if the figures are correct, is against the United States. We did not get gold in exchange for this. We got nothing, absolutely and undeniably nothing. We simply paid our annual outside-interest debt, a debt tchich does not grow less by paying it. And during the year we lost over 130.- 000,000 of gold, our business basis, besides. All this represents a drain, an immense Joss. And the drain is in creasing. Every English syndicate in vesting in American securities and they have bought up and are investing in hundreds of monopolies, businesses which pay big dividends and tax the people at the manager's pleasure every foreign syndicate is a huge leech suck ing out and. carrying away our wealth, our resources. And as they drain away our gold, reducing its volumo, they in crease the purchasing power of what is left, making each dollar harder to get and reducing the value of our farms and products; and so every debt Is being made correspondingly greater, or more difficult to lift. We are getting into debt deeper and deeper to foreign capitalists, and the measure of values by which we meas ure our debts and products is changing its length in the interest of our credit ors at home. Thee are plain hard facts. But the capitalist class, taking advan tage ot the peoples' past ignorance, have used tho figures which measure our loss, our dependenoe, our slavery, to measure what they call proof of our wealth and prosperity. " 1 ' The national people's party compre hends the situation, and its platform of demands contains tbe remedy in its proposal to increase the currency to meet the needs of business, in making the government everybody's banker and loaning money to those who need it at cost, and in taking transportation and communication into the bands of the people. Instead then of losing $200,000, 000 worth of our products each year to pay interest and dividends to foreign capitalists we shall be able to exchango them for the same value of goods which we do not produce.and having that much more to enjoy each year. We shall ale cut off tbe power of American Capital lsts to exact more for the use of their capi'.al than tho governuisnt cost rate is Seventeen sheriff deeds of farms in Custer county, Nebraska, have been secured for tbo lenders of moneyrfrom the farmers who were compelled to boiTOw, during the three months prior to February, secured by foreclosure proceedings. The mortgage tilings in tho same time have increased over re leases $145,101.09. And this after rais ing the largest crop in the history of tho county. Rev. Frederic Stanley Root of Park Church, Hartford Conn , is preach ing a series of twelve sermons on indus trial questions, his first subject boing "Christ's Christianity as Applied to Economic Questions." Other subjects are: "The Lesson of a Recent Colossal Strike of London Decks," "The Tramp Problem in New England," "Tho Labor Question from the View Point of the Workingman," "Tho History of the Doctrine of Socialism," and "Why tho Working Classes do not go to Church Partly Told from Their Own Lips." The Philadelphia Press, and all the newspapers of the city, instead of act ing as the peoples tribur.es to guard them from tho grip and greed of the ab solute anthracite coal monopoly of the Reading railroad combination, have favored and defended it, because see ing it would benefit Philadelphia at the expense and by the coal-price enslav enment of tho . whole country. Tho poet asks, when God is going to save, not their rulers, but "the people." It Is, apparently, when they get sense enough to use unitedly tbe ballot which has beeu placed in their hands. You should have been there. I mean at St. Louis. If you are an Independent yon should havo bean there to enjoy it. If you are still a democrat, or a repub lican, you should have beon there to see yourself as others see you. It was a kind of looking-glass affair an art ex hibition a photograph gallery; whoro men and parties were re Hoc ted, painted and photographed true to natnro, by the best artists ot the country. The old partly loaders and bosses might not have recognized themselves, tlioro painted, but the pictures were wonder fully trao just tho same. They were woe fully accurate and hideously correct. Tho only troublo was to toll the pictures of tho two old parties apart. There was a wonderful similarity in tho pictures. They looked enough, alike to be twins. But you would have had little choice as to which was you. But republicans and democrats were not there to any extent. Independents were there in vast num bers. Would that all could have been there. It was the grandest meeting of tho century- Its membership was grand; its object was grand; and its work was grand but grandest of ail w ill be its fin al culmination. , The cotton mills of Canada are likely j to be consolidated into one company lor toe iiencnt or capitalists Tiik farmers are la favor cf a na tional nnion but not the National Un ion Company of capitalists. Eutkt owns and operates her rail roads, and in 1888 tho receipts were nearly two and a half times the ex penses. The McKinley bill with its reciprocity tail has been declared constitutional by the supreme court of the United States. The "People's Gas Company" of Chicago is a big monopolistic combine of capitalists, and the people's only part in it is to be skinned by the merciless greed of tbe gas bill dictators. Till Oxnards find the farmers cannot be compelled to grow beets at. the prices heretofore fixed arbitrarily by the man ufacturers, and so announce au advance in price tor beets for tbe coming year. Lack of capital is given as the cause of one-third of the business failures last year. It is becoming harder and harder to start in business and succeed with small capital. The big fish are swallow ing up all the little ones. Ton "Richards jackass battery of Fremont" is kicking Rosewater as high in the air as the Harter almanac man. He has not yet discovered a safe place to light, but will probably double over the fence with his face to the farmers. The imprisoned rioters - of Berlin saved their prison bread to give to their starving wives. Such a state of things as this indicates is fearful to contem plate. Who can wondor that heads ot families unemployed and so reduced, should become furious. The National Cordage Co., known as the twine trust, reports a profit of $1,400,000 for last year, and the price of binding twine is to be raised, it is stated 8 to 4 cents a pound. The trust is said to have no effective competition and controls all tbe American patents for twine machinery. . Axx'the other Pennsylvania-entering railroans and coal companies outside of the Reading, Jersey Central and Lehigh combine, have signified their intention of working io harmony with ' those inside it, so competition is entirely killed and tho people must accept mo nopoly prices for hard coal or fight for thoir rights. The anti-silver men are seeking to di vide the free coinage forces by an nouncing that all the nations with Eng land included, have consented to join in an international bl-metallic conference. Who cares whether they have or not? Aro we a pation and have we power to do as wo please with our own finances? Or must we wait for the European dog to wag tis as it will? , The Buffalo Electric Light Company asks the city for a three year contract to light the city tor forty cents a light per night. Fublie sentiment is however strongly opposed to the contract, says a member of the city council. The Ex press is quoted by Bellamy in this con nection as saying editorially that "mu nicipal Ownership is the only solution of the lighting problrm." The Chicago Xews thinks there is but a srnau cnance mat tne unicago gas trust can be brought to terms by the quo warranto proceedings. It is prac tically a trust, out technically not a trust, the business being conducted by a highly ingenious nnd dusive sort of committee which performs all of the functions of a trust without, perhaps, laying itself amenable to the anti-trust laws. The new starch machine Introduced into the collar and cuff "factories of Troy, New York, will throw 1,000 girls out of employment. The girls should petition the legislature to recognize and securo to them by statute law their right to an equal Individual share in tbe God-given steam power net pro duct, which tho capitalists monopolize. God s last will and testament does not bequeath steam and its working energy to the idio, or to reduce the needed l.i bor and increase the wealth of a cer tain class only. The whiskey trust has been indicted by the Boston grand jury for violating the Sherman anti-trust law, and the officers including the directors have been ordered arrested the charges being that they have unlawfully combined to monopolize the manufacture and sale of high wines, etc , and that they have charged and exacted great sums of mo ney from Dexter R. Mills, and others, contrary to law. The Sherman law is accomplishing nothing, however, but to drive trusts into a more perfect elu sive form which evades the possible grasp ef the law. Theke is a big electric lighting war in Cincinnati. The Public Wolfare so ciety is circulating a petition reciting that under municipal ownership the city caa tie lighted at cost, and as citi zens of Cincinnati they respectfully petition the board of Legislation "to tako immediate steps to secure or con struct and operate a municipal electric lighting plant, entrusting tho same to classified civil service, originally an pointed by impartial proscribed tests. promoted by record combined with seniority, and removal only for causn Twenty thousand were added to the petition and sent in last wock. and tho Wsajsoac hundred thousand more can be secured. Nearly every property owner nnd tax-payer to whom it bas been presented has signed It. and 9000 organised laborers endorsed It. No one except reprenenUtivcs ot the electric lijht companies oppose it. A Workingman Addresses Workingmen- Editor Fabmies' Alliance: If tbe workingman who may be nDdecided as to bow to vote at an approaching elec tion will observe on which side trusts and corporations are arranged, he need not hesitate to take the opposite side, and ninety-nine times in a hundred be will find that he is right. For capital and labor, althongb mutually depend ent on each other at this stage of . the world's career, are still to a considerable extent antagonistic, labor trying to get all of wealtb it can for energy expended, and wealth leaving no means untried? to accumulate as much of the products of labor as it can, with the advantage in itt favor of its inherent power, together with the assistance it can purchase from congress, tbe different state legislatures and national and state officials. As soon as a measure is proposed in congress that will affect the finances of the country for the benefit of labor, the trusty and wily agents of capital are on hand, backed by millions, bribing and lashing members into doing their bidding, and as many of the members elected by the old parties are creatures of capital, it is generally an easy matter for those agents to stop tbe wheels of just legislation and have laws enacted that will suck the blood cf labor to fill the veins of corporations and trusts. Thousands of individuals in the east are rapidly accumulating immense for tunes, far beyond what they could pos sibly accumulate by legitimate business,, and bear in mind, fellow workmen, every dollar of their ill gotten wealth was earned by somo man's hands, for there is no other way, nor can tbe mind conceive of any other way by which a dollar of wealth can be created but bv labor. But says the old hide-bound democrat or republican, they get their money by legal means and it is nobody's business but theirs. Very true. They get it by legal means and it is to this condition that we work ingmen strennonaly object. We want the laws so changed and extended that It will be beyond the power of dishonest, money kings to extort from , us . the products of onr labor without giving us an equivalent in return. If congress for the last twenty years had kept in view tho interests of labor as well as capital three thousand mil lions of dollars which baye been (ac cording to my catechism) stolen frona. the hands that earned it, would now be standing guard over tens of thousands, of homes throughout the country as a perpetual safe guard against adversity, sustaining the old who have grown feeble in the harness, and feeding, shel tering and educating the young. Yes, they legally stole from us our hard earnings and are loaning it back, to us at a percentage for interest triple that of the percentage of increase of the wealth ef the country. Unless the mighty working army of the country will throw off their affili ation -to the old parties and awaken to a full realization of their condition and duty, and through the potent ballot demand their constitutional right to equal consideration with the wealthy In the laws, we will soon be in the same condition that England is, our government an oligarchy, a nation of wealth yet a nation of poverty. Democratic and republican speakers are hired to tell us en the approach of general elections that we cannot under the constitution prevent the accumula tion of the country's wealth in the hands of a few, but they lie and they know it. Let congress remonetize silver, re establish tree coinage, turn those silver bars that are locked up in vaults all ever the country into dollars, and let us. have them to do our business with. This country novor suffered, nor have we any reoord of any other country having ever suffored from too many large round 00. per cent pure silver corns. So arrange onr monetarv svatnm that speculating in the circulating medium of exchange will be an impossibility. Stop all gambling in stocks also in grain, cotton, meat or any of the pro ducts of the country. Prohibit monopolies by the combina tion of corporations into trusts for the purpose of securing the exclusive con trol of any branch of industry. Repeal for a time If necessary all tariff laws and every hydra-headedtrust will die a nationl death. These measures will give labor its just proportion of its products; then the wiuespreau aiscoatent that now pre vails will pass away, the peoplo will again prosper and be contented, two conditions necessary to the stability of any government. It is all bosh to sav that trusts and gambling in futures cannot be stopped in this country for the government is by the people who can do what they choose; the constitution will not stand in tho way of doing right, for if it is faulty it can be amended, if deficient it can be extended to meet the reqaircments of the times. It would take four figures to enumer ate the number of persons in the country today who are living in luxury, idleness and profligacy, amassing for tunes reaohing into tho millions; and who make all their money by operating inthoso chartered institutions of in iquity, the Chicago and Minneapolis boards of trade and the New York Stock Exchange. They gave nothing whatever to labor in return, and their hirelings elected by the old parties have the gall to sUnd in the halis of the con grusu of an educated people and assert that gambling in the necessaries of life is beneficial to both producer and con sumer. If justice reigned such mei would be tried and imprisoned for perjury. A year ago last fall the g. o. p. gov ernor of Nebraska was so frightened by the little platform adopted by the inde pendents that he issued a call for a special session of the legislature for the purpose of heading off the independents by doing what thoy proposed to do and thus weaken their strength. Such an acknowledgement by a stil wart of the defects of his party Is, or ought to be enough to open the eyes of members of that party and cause them esfi!,Ste ? "J0? int0 the Principles new forth by the independents The American lwrmin and when they rise up as they did a year ago last November it is not with ont a cause, and although they may be held down for a tim th miu relinquish their cause till a great revo- vlonin Amcrican politics is accom plished and laws enntnH tho shield neither the gamblers nor mono polists in their unholy work. . Peteb McFadden. The New York World, of February 27, " reported Jay (kmld as very nick. Fri day last he was seized with a violent hemorrhage and at his own request a second physician was callod in for con sultation. It is more than likely, how ever, that his reported sickness was either a newspaper take or an effort to disturb the stock market. At the rcuaion of the blue and gray on Wednesday morning in the exposi tion building at St. Louis, 108 ex-unton and 50 i ex-confederate soldiers gathered around the grrnd old flag and responded with cheers to the announcement by Colonel Polk. "Ne south, no north, but one common country." It was a scene long to bo remembered.