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About The weekly independent. (Lincoln, Nebraska) 1893-1895 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 5, 1895)
. fj Weekly Independent JtOOFER TEAR IN ADVANCE ISSUED IVEKY FBIDAY. 11 EMI Y Hl KIS, PnbliHlier. THURSDAY, SEPT. 5, 1805. Eatered at the post office of Lincoln, Neb., as second class mail matter. People's Independent State Ticket. For Supreme Judge, SAMUEL MAXWELL. Regents State University, J AS. II. BAYSTON, ELLA W. rKATTI E. Tfco People's Independent County Ticket. For District Judge: A. S. TIBBETTS. II. F. HOSE. J. C. McXEIlXEY. For Clerk of District Court: ' ELI AS BAKER. For Sheriff: FU EI) MILL Ell. For Treasurer: A.1I.WEIK. For County Clerk- (iEORGE II. WALTERS. For County Judge: GEORGE AV. VERGE. For County Superintendent: II. S. ROWERS. For Coroner : L, W. LOWRY. For County Commissioner: R. E. RICHARDSON'. Assessors: First Ward, T. E. COX X ELL Y. Third Ward, C. G. BULLOCK. Fourth Ward: C.A.COOK. Fifth Ward, A. C. SIIERICK. Sixth Ward, J- W. EMBERSOX. Seventh Ward, W. T. RuLOFSOX For Constables: JOIIXMEAXOR. J. V. TRAVIS. WILLIAM CIIIXX. For Justice of the Peace: S. B. I A MS. GEORGE W. BLAKE. Send us the news from your county to let the friends know how the work progresses. We would be pleased to have all our populist friends throughout the state call when in the city. They will all find a hearty wel come. No matter what the old duffers and plutocratic editors may say the facf is, that the Lincoln girls who wear bloomers "are just too sweet for anything." , The populists of the Twelfth district have nominated VV. L Green for judge. There will be. a hot race out there but green, will be the winning colors. A :ou reserve in the treasury is simply a plan to contract the cur rency Sioo.ooo.ooo and make money dear. That is why Sher man, and Cleveland and Carlisle fight for it. Uncle J ake Woi.ke says he did sot get set down on hard enough at the late convention to keep him in good humor. Have patience Uncle Jake. Doubtless the next convention will do the job up in better shape. - Mk. Beemer says he will take $3,000 for his salcry, and furnish his own clerk. Mr. Beemer knows that there are several republican ex-ofhcials in the pen that will make excellent clerks and they will only cost 30 cents a day. Sh rewd Mr. Beemer. Several leading republican dai lies had last week precisely the same editorial on what was claimed to be the exposure of a conspiracy between ex-Mayor Hopkins and Debs. Brains arc getting very scarce in the republican party when they have to plate their editorials in the big dailies. If they had had any brains, they would not have advo cated the senseless theories- they have for the last twenty years. We offer all the consolation in the shop to the western free silver republicans over the knockout of Don Cameron and tree silver in I Pennsylvania, and if there is any left, the free silver democrats who ; read in the Washington dispatches I that Grovcr and the national com mittee will recognize the rump i convention can have it. The fact 1 is, that all the consolation there is (for these poor fellows in the whole wide world, is to l.c found in the populist party. Once in thepopu Jtst party they can down Grover. 25c "till Jnuary 1. THE FENITETIiRT C03TSACT. The Beemer contract which is printed in another column is sub mitted to the calm consideration of citizens of the state. The books of the penitentiary will show that since the beginning of Gov. Holcomb's administration the cost of feeding the convicts has been 1 1 4-5 cents per day and that, including guards, salaries and all otherexpenses it has been less than thirty cents. Any intelligent persons, after a moment's thought upon the exceedingly low prices now prevalent, will concede that 30 cents is sufficient for that pur pose. The state appropriated 40 cents, based upon the higher price then ruling. The constitution and statutes of the state provide that the governor shall appoint the warden, deputy warden and other necessary officers, under whose management the con victs are to be controlled and em ployed. Out of 340 prisoners, 240 can be hired out for an average of 30 cents per day, the other 100 being sick and those employed to do the work of the prison. Warden Leidigh stands ready to give a bond of $50,000 that he will take the prison and feedinc the prisoners for the next two years at a cost to the state of 15 cents per head, including the sick and those employed in the prison. These are undisputed facts. We ask republicans of this state to in vestigate and see if it is not a true statement. It is true, and- yet four men elected to important offices by re publican voters and sworn to obey the laws and the constitution, un dertake to create a new office in the penitentiary unknown to law, with a $3,000 salary attached, called a superintendent of the prison, and not provided for in any appropriation bill. Becoming satis fied that even a republican court would not sanction that, they abandoned the project and are now attempting to do the same unlaw ful thing by pretending to let a contract, and the contractor to draw a salary of $3,000. It is more viscious than the first plan. There is the probability of vast frauds in this contract as it adopts the plan of giving into the superin- uent or contractor's hands all of the state appropriation of 40 cents a day for each convict and all that the convicts can tarn, with only the promise on his part that he will return all, except his salary of $3,000. No business man in the world would make such a contract and the record of the past is uniform in declaring that where such con tracts have been made by politi cians, not a cent has ever been returned to the state. Twenty or thirty years ago this was the favorite scheme of the boodlers all over the Eastern states. Char ters of all kinds were granted to corporations, providing that the company should return to the state or municipality a 1 profits above ten per cent. Not one dollar has ever been re turned to the public treasury under contract or charter having this provision in it. One of the most conspicuous examples of this kind of contracts is the Brooklyn, New York, Ferry company. Their char ter provides that all profits above ten per cent should be returned to the public treasury. The company has grown to be immensely weal thy. The directors are all million airs, but the company's books never ..I 1 snow a proiu 10 exceed ten per cent. Some years ago when the writer of this was working on a New York daily, he was assigned to the work of investigating the Brooklyn Ferry o. 1 ne dooks showed large amounts expended in improve ments. Five hundred thousand dollars for repair of piers and slips. An examination of the piers and slips showed that only a few new planks had been put in them. Everywhere all over the eastern states, this was the result of that kind of contracts, and years ago they were all abandoned. Now comes the Hons. Churchill, Rus sell, Piper and Bartley trying to re-establish in the state of Ne braska this old three card monte game of politics, which has been exposed so often that even the Tammany thieves had to give it up. They must take the voters of this state to be a lot of country greenies. They will find that they are mis taken. The governor, under the law, holds the keys to the state penitentiary. We have faith to believe that the doors will never be opened to admit thieves, save those duly convicted in the courts. ALLEN ABO THE 0. A. R. The plutocratic dailies had their pages filled with rather a larger assortment of lies about Senator Allen and the G. A. R. reunion at Hastings last week than they have been capable of collecting in one week for some time, The truth about the matter is this: The managers of the reunion sent Senator Allen a letter asking him to make a speech. When the old soldiers assembled, there were on the grounds ex-Senator Man derson, whb had been a soldier, Senator Thurston, who never car ried a gun or smelled gun powdet, and Senator Allen who had served four years in the ranks, and had been vice commander of the state, When the managers announced their program it was found that they had given the ex-senator un limited time, the senator who had never seen a foe,- was given un limited time and the senator who had served four years in the ranks was given ten minutes, said ten minutes to begin about 11 o'clock at night. Of course Senator Allen understood that this was intended to be an insult to him and the nearly 80,000 citizens and voters of the state who were of his way of thinking on politics and govern ment, and among whom are many thousand old soldiers. To get even with them, Senator Allen told a little story. It illus trated the manner in which a man could be approached with protesta tions of the greatest respect when an unguarded movement displayed a concealed dagger. It was a rapier like thrust and the howl that went up from the dailies showed that the disreputable republi can leaders, who were making of the G. A. R. a republican ma chine, had been cut deep into the quick. The result of this thing will be that the independent old soldiers will hold their own campfires and reunions, where every old soldier, whether republican, democrat or populist will be treated with the re spect due to men who tor years breasted the storms of war to save their covntry. WHO PAYS FOB IT 7 The popa are feeling pretty blue over ther late convention and many arc dropping out of the fold. in Maryland also, the democrat are taking to the woods and acknowledging that they have no chance in the cimiing election State Journal. It is a well known fact that the plan upon which newspapers were printed in the days of the great independent editors like Greely and Raymond, forty years ago, has long been abandoned. The capital in a great newspaper plant is put in for the same reason that it is put in a cotton mill or iron foundry, that is, to make monev. The cot ton mill the iron foundry and the newspaper furnish wares for sale, and each try to meet what they deem to be the public demand. Newspaper men are as sharp and intelligent as any other classof busi ness men. Of course they are liable to make a mistake as to what the real demand is, the same as a cot ton mill might print a quality of of calico that no one wanted. Others have a standing order from the banks and corporation for a line of stuff. The matter is written and the bills are paid and that is all there is of it. Cer tainly the bright men on the State Journal would not write such stuff as appears at the head of this col umn unless it was ordered. The Sunday edition had over two col umns of it. Those writejs do not expect any sane citizen of Nebraska to believe that the democrats of Maryland are running about declar ing that they are going to join the republican party, or that Nebraska populists have all of a sudden changed their political principles, left their party and are flocking back to republicanism, bank rule and corporations. Tiny would smile if one should ask their, if they oenevea it tnemselves. Again, that of kind writing can have no commercial value. Not even the rankest republican wants to pay money for the priviledge of reading that sort of twaddle. But it never would be printed unless it was paid for. The owners of the State Journal do not furnish ink, paper, type, presses and pay writ- i ers and compositors, either fori glory or patriotism. They do it i for profit. When they constantly put out stuff that has no commer cial value, and keep it up without a break for five years, it is fair to ask who pays the bills. It is quite possible that our freight and pas senger rates might be much less in this state if the railroad managers didn't have such large newspaper bills to pay. For five years the State Journal has been printing columns of items declaring that the populist party was dead and that "many were dropping out of the fold. " No one wants to buy and pay for such stuff. Who does pay for it? LET US LEARN WI8D0M. When Wm. H. St. John ap peared before Bill Springer's com mittee on banking and currency the committee room was packed with gold bug bankers from Bos ton, New York and other large cities. Before he began his state ment he turned his back to the committee and face to the bankers and in substance said: "The newspapers are fond of announcing that 1 am the only na tional banker in New York who is in favor ol the nnlirnitcd coinage of silver. I want to say to you that I know of twelve national bankers in New York who heartily agree with me, but you gentlemen would crush them in twenty-four hours if you knew who they were. But you can't crush me. I have i!a myank $11,000,000 of depos its and $4,500,000 in gold coin. The other day the New York Mercury asked for a vote to be given on coupons cut from that pa per on this question. Shall the United States government open its mint to the free coinage of allver without waiting fcr agreement with Oreat Britain or any other Eu ropeatrjnation, and at a ratio of 16 to 1. The editors of great silver pa pers like the Atlanta Constitution and Ciccinnatti Enquirer de nounced the attempt to take such a vote in New York City as foolish. Every man who voted had to have a copy of the Mercury and it cost him a two cent stamp to send it to the Mercury office. When the votes were counted, there were 35,716 votes for free silver and 1,966 against it. This shows that there are thous ands of men in New York City who will vote for an increase in the volume of our money by the coin age of silver. Why not present that question to them? Why weigh it with theories and issues which they will not support. Why not get into power by the aid of such votes and get hold of the govern ment printing office and franking priviledge so that we can send them tons of literature free, like the old parties do, educate them on our other doctrines of reform? After they get the free coinage of silver, they will learn thai, the me 11. m lenium nas not come ana we can talk to millions of them through the government printing office and franking priviledge where we can reach only hundreds now. When John Sherman wanted to establish the gold standard, he did insist on putting it in the platform. Let us learn wisdom from our enemies. ECONOMIC TERMS. In the popular discussion, now spreading all over the world, of the science of political economy, the terms employed must be always used in the same sense, or great confusion will prevail and no conclusion reached. Many terms the common people never heard before and it is neces sary that the meaning of those used by the standard writers on politi cal economy should be perfectly understood. Many of them are now used with various shades of mean ing, some writers even using the same word to express diametrically opposite ideas. Among the words and terms in use now, causing the most confusion are, credit money, confi dence money, primary money, money of ultimate redemption, agio, seignorage, value, price, elastic cur rency, basis of value, and unit of account. But the most confusion comes from the use of the term, socialism. Here writers seem to wander in a maze that has no out let. It does not help one to go to standard 1 exicions. The deftini- tions there give are not the mean ing of the term as used by the standard writers on political econo my. Many writers seam to think that the public ownership of rail roads, telegraphs, telephones, streets, highways, public schools and colleges is socialism, but if that were true, it would follow that the Czar and the Kaizer would be the greatest socialists on earth, yet no one would think of calling them socialists. What then is the meaning of the term socialism as used by the econ omist? The definition of the term as given by the socialists them selves in the celebrated tenth plank of their platform is accepted: "We demand the public ownership of all the means of production and distribution." As that covers every species of property, it follows that socialism means the abolition of the private ownership of anything and the common ownership of all things. It is therefore plain that a socialist cannot be a populist, and whe:: a populist says he is a socialist it shows that he has a very indeffnite understanding of economic terms. OOLDBDO RHETORIC. The American gold bug logic has, for the last two years, been a source of much amusement to scholars both in this country and in Europe. However funny that is, their rhetoric is still more amus ing. The following from Sunday's State Journal is a sample: The ilxth annual populist state convention of Nebraska marked the going out of the tide. The orator nervously recognized lh wreckage, the floatsnra in the drifting delegate present the jetsam In the absent one. The speaker, from the great whale to the auimalcnlae, graapedjit every pawning ttraw, and blew and struggled to regain deep water. A whale, grasping at a straw, to keep itself from drowning! The wildest populist on earth never mixed a metaphor like that. Fay your subscription. THEY KKOW THEIR FRIENDS. Si That the G. A. K. organization in Nebraska has been captured and is being used by republican politi cians as apolitical machine, no reasonable man will deny. Every patriot and every person in the state who desires to honor the brave men who saved this nation, sincerly regrets this state of affairs, because it is-detrimental to every interest of the war-worn old men in that or ganization. When that organiza tion prescribes men who served four years in the ranks and never wore shoulder straps, but whose subsequent career has proved them to be equal in mental capacity to the generals whose orders they obeyed, simply because they belong to the populist party, it is time for every honest old soldier to protest, and they do protest by the thous and. The republicans used to think that they could make political capi tal by asking the old soldiers in their conventions to stand up and be counted. After the populists had two or three times asked the old soldiers to stand up in their state conventions, and it was shown that there were more veterans in the populist state conventions than in the republican they never tried it again. ' It is a fact that every pensioner remembers to his sorrow, that when the republican party had overwhel ming majorities in Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas, it was almost impossi ble to get a pension claim through from an applicant in these states no matter how deserving he was. The republican managers were too busy in hunting up every , bounty jumper and deserter in the doubt ful states that they might get him on the pension list and thereby se cure his vote. But when these states became doubtful, then, and not till then, could an old soldier get a pension without complying with a hundred rediculous rules and regulations made by republican pension com missioners at Washington. The populist party both north and south have always in their platforms demanded the greatest liberality to old soldiers. Southern populists, who had served in the rebel army have stood up in con gress and plead and voted for pen sions to old soldiers, who by some technicality in republican made law were left to starve, after hav ing been broken down by sleeping in the mud or on the frozen ground and marching, starving and fight ing in the malarial swamps of the south. These men had been sol diers and knew what war meant. When congress is in session the house meets every Friday night in committee of the whole to consider pension bills. The writer of this regularly attended these sessions for the last two years. Often there would be only one or two republi cans present,and some times none. The populists considered it one of their most sacred duties to be al ways present, and many an old soldier, widow or homeless child today has a pension, who was de nied one by the technicalities of law, that they would not have had, had not the populists been there, for no bill can pass if it is not fav orably reported from the commit tee of the whole. The old soldiers know these facts and many thous ands of them have joined the pop ulist party. IGNORANT U. S. 8ENATOR3. That the great, wealthy senators have no knowledge of the strug gles of the great mass of our citi zenship to maintain themselves and families, or are utterly indiffer ent thereto, is shown by Senator Elkins in an interview printed in the Omaha Bee. The reporter asked: "Senator, you have been a very successful man. You started life poor and you have yourself made a great fortune. I want to ask you if you think the chance are as good for money making today ax they were when yoo began." "Of course they are," replied Senator Klkins. "The universal and everlasting Now is full of op portunitic. It fairly bristles with them." The question is: Is a man who will make a statement that every one knows to be so much at va riance with the truth as that is, fit to be a United States Senator? Where are the opportunities? Are they in farming, in woolen mills, in cotton mills, in mining? Where are the opportunities of which your growing sons vill take advantage to accumulate wealth or even a competency? Senator Elk ins, you are either ignorant or a falsifier. From Beatrice, Neb., to Ashland,' Wis., municiple and county officers of the old party stripe are being impeached, arrested, dismissed or are running off to avoid arrest for stealing public funds, but not one populist officer has so far proved either inefficient or dishonest. After the fall ejections many more popu lists than ever before will be en trusted with the care of the public funds. Twenty-five cents 'tillJanuary 1. EOUHD SENSE. The popfllist doctrine I not Intended a some think, to make oeiallu or anarchic, hut on the contrary, u cause men to be men and think and ac t for themselves and to work for the advancement of their condition and that of their fellow mm, Minden Courier. There is no truth that should be more firmly insisted upon or of tener repeated than the above. Every populist editor should have in mind that we are in a hot cam paign, and what we write, should1 not be so much to please "advanced thinkers," as to persuade men who think little to vote our ticket. We are alter votes. In the writing of every item that fact should be al ways held in the mind. Twknty-eive cents will pay for this paper from now until Janu ary 1, 1895. This time the populists presents a platform that even a gold bug re publican can't criticise. The Kansas Citv Sun over the triumph of municiple ownership in. that city. One by one they come trailing in, four or five miles in the rear of the popu list procession. Senator Harris, the democratic free silverite, says that if the dem ocratic national convention nom inates a gold bug he will vote for him, and that is what every one of the free silver democrats in the last congress will do with the exception of three men. It seems that even Queen Vic toria can't write correct English. In the speech she sent to parlia ment she speaks of "the recurrence of of constant disorder." Under these circumstances the brilliant men on the staff of the State Jour nal are excusable. The State Journal calls Senator Allen a whale. One time Senator Allen caught sight of a lot of pluto crats in a room in Washington. He immediately took off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, went in and whaled 'em for fourteen hours and twenty minutes. You hit it that time, Mr. Journal. right This paper will never attack a populist unless he is guilty of crime or repudiates the principles of the party. As to the matter of ap pointments or policies, every mem ber of the party has a right to his own opinion and his motives will never be questioned. Senator Peffer says that the associated press has been doing an immense amount of lying about him lately. He is not for a new party and has not abandoned pop uliet financial views. If there is anything in press dispatches about a populist, denounce it as a lie without investigation. You will hit it right every time. The Republican League club is sending out some of the foulest literature ever printed anywhere on the face of the earth. One writer, signing himself a Post Graduate, not only advocates Malthusianism, but goes even farther and demands the mutilation of all the male poor. If any man comes around this office denying the doctrine of total de pravity he will be kicked down stairs. Satan would blush to read some of this republican literature. On the rim of all the silver dol lars coined up to 1802 were these words; "One dollar or unit. Hua Hundred cents." And then the great gold bug champion, Horr, went to Chicago and argued for a week that Washington, Hamilton and Jefferson never made silver the unit of value at all. There isn't a populist living in the dugouts of Kanas or Nebraska, however poor he may be,but knows more about the laws and science of than the gold bug editors. money The St. Paul Pioneer Press says: "All the leading northern states which have spoken at all have de clared against free silver and have made that declaration unanimous by the concurrent voice of both parties." That news is at least two years old. No one with good horse sense ever expected that they would do anything else. They always were for the single gold standard, low prices, a few great fortunes and many paupers, and always will be. The World-Hearld is disgruntled because, after re-adopting the Omaha platform, the pops did'nt say it over again, and expresses a fear that they are about to aban don bimetalism. One might, with much more consistency, call atten tion to the great vaccuums in the democratic state platform. About allowing banks to issue money they are as silent as the grave as well as many other things. A pop isn't a democrat. He don't say the same thing twice nor leave out what ought to be said.