yh tpp ' w """" B ' yet the ordinary games of chance arc innocent amusement in comparison with the greater games played where cliques, corners and false rumors affect the market and drive prices up or down to suit the purpose of those in control No one will undertake to defend gambling from a moral or an economic standpoint, hut why do the crusaders exhaust their energy upon the petty offenders and remain silent in the presence of big gamblers who, besides bring ing ruin to thousands, lend a sort of re spectability to schemes for obtaining something for nothing? The total amount of money lost at the card table, the wheel of fortune and other games which are declared to be illegal is insignificant in comparison with the amount lost in specula tion on the boards of trade and stock exchanges. Then, too, in small gambling the parties to the games and their immediate families are usually the only ones pecuniarily affected, while specu lation upon the market injures the producers, consumers and legitimate dealers who try to conduct their business honestly and who them selves do not deal in futures or options. If the ministers who discourse eloquently on sin in the slums of the cities will arraign the speculating pew holders, they will find it easier to cure the more hideous but less harm ful kinds of gambling. If the educators who have faith in the power of public opinion to remedy evil will endeavor to create a sentiment against gambling in stocks and grain and produce, they will find it easier ,.,to prevent gambling among their students, w The mania for making a fortune in short order ''is corrupting societyand undermining the bus iness integrity as well as the morality of many communities. A Bad Symptom. The Cleveland Leader in a recent issue con fined an editorial which must have grated upon the sensibilities of such of its readers as believe in American principles.- It said: One need not be suspected of the slightest leaning toward any form of hereditary govern ment if he admits freely that many monarchies are far better governed than mosfof the republics of South America. The conditions which are chronic in countries like Venezuela and the United States of Colombia are a reproach to the name of democracy. They burlesque free institutions. It is a bad symptom when a great daily offers a gratutious insult to the republics of South America in order to show its respect for a monarchy. The first part of the item is a very lame apology for what follows and instead of relieving the editor from suspicion shows that he was conscious that his words if prop erly construed would prove him to be. a sympa thizer with the European idea of government. The Worm Turns. The testimony of J. M. Langley of the Merchants Association of New York before the Industrial commission ?vould indicate that the New York merchants are getting a taste of tbe corporate domination which they seemed willing to support so long as people in other parte of the country were the victims. It looks The Commoner as if the worm is about to turn. . Accord ing to a press dispatch he said: The railroads aro a power that amount to arbitrary taxation ard in the mak ing of these classifications, which really amount to rate-making, the merchants have no representa tion. The changes, he said, In the territory south o': the Ohio and east of tho Mississippi, amounted tu an advance of about two-thirds in 200 items of classification and a complaint ho had made was dismissed by the road as too genoral in spite of the wholesale naturo of tho advance. He cites a large number of instances of alleged discrimina tion between carload and less than carload rates vhich he claimed to be unjustifiable. He referred to the system of inspection of freight at transfer points by inspectors employed by the roads and railroad associations, and charges that rates aro often cut by the inspectors "looking tho other way" in inspecting freight for the large and more powerful shippers. This right to open freight consignments, the witness said, was assumed by the road and the merchants did not object. Objection, he stated, would not inure to. their interests. It is possible that discrimination may be come so intolerable that tho New York mer chants will be forced to cast in their lot with those who believe in compelling corporations to treat the publio fairly. W When Harmony is Possible. There is no word more pleasant to tho ear than "harmony," there is no condition more de lightful to contemplate or to enjoy than "har mony"; and there is no phrase more shamefully abused than "harmony." Just now BomQ.mon who wore formerly democrats are pleading loudly for "harmony" and they offer to deliver their particular and peculiar brand of "harmony" post paid to any part of the countiy west and south preferred. Their promises and guarantees read like the advertisement of a sorceresB. "Estranged friends reconciled, waning love revived, obsta cles to reunion removed, lost property found and a happy and prosperous life ensured." " This is but a partial catalogue of the good things held out by the sooth-sayers who ply their avocation imder the guise of reorganizers. No one should be deceived by this pre tended desire for harmony. No process has ever been discovered for welding together into one harmonious party men who differ in con viction and desire the triumph of opposite prin ciples. There can be no difference of opinion among intelligent and honest men as to the basis of real or permanent harmony. In Webster's dictionary harmony is defined as "concord and agreement in facts, opinions, manners, interests, etc." This is the only foun dation upon which useful or enduring har mony can rest. There was harmony in the democratic party until 1892. In that year Mr. Cleveland ran for president upon a platform which was clear and definite on the tariff question, but ambigu ous on the money question. One part of the platform was emphasized in the east and an other part in the south, while in the west the democrats were advised by the democratic na tional committee to vote the populist ticket in order to defeat tho republican electors in states where the democrats were known to be in tho minority. Following theso instructions the democrats helped to carry Kansas, Colorado, Idaho and Nevada for the populist candidates and almost carried the state of Nebraska. When Mr. Cleveland took his seat he sur rounded himself with a cabinet composed of men who, on the money question, dissented from tho views of the majority of the demo crats who voted for him. Instead of calling Congress together to consider the tariff ques tion which had been made the paramount issue and about which nearly all democrats agreed,he waited until summer and then convened con gress in extraordinary session to consider a financial measure proposed by Senator John Sherman a year before. This measure was forced through congress by a disgraceful use of patronage, and received the support of a larger percentage of the republican congress men than of the democratic congressmen. Soon afterwards a bill was passed tocoin the seignor agc a bill which was supported by a majority of tho democrats and opposed by a majority of the republicans. Ir. Cleveland vetoed this bill at the demand of Now York financiers. A little later he made a contract with tho Rothschild-Morgan syndicate for the sale of gold bonds and then asked Congress to ratify tho contract, but a democratic congress re fused to do it. Then came the election of 1894 which gave the republicans a majority of over one hundred and forty in Congress. To under stand the change which took place in two years ,(and that, too before the party standard was placed "in unfamiliar, bands," as Mr. Cleveland would say) it is only necessary to remember that the democrats had a majority of ninety two in the preceding Congress. In this new Congress, elected in '94, New York had only six democrats, Pennsylvania two, Ohio two, Illinois one, and Indiana none. At that election the republicans carried eleven of the fifteen districts of Missouri and Mr.'IIill was defeated for Governor in New York by 150,108. Of the twenty-nine senators whose terms began the following March eighteen were re publicans, ten were democrats and one a popu list. ' In the spring of 1895 it became apparent that the next national convention would have to deal with the money question. On April 13, Mr. Cleveland wrote a letter to a Sound Money League in Chicago defending his own financial views and opposing those which ho knew to be entertained by a majority of his party. Near the conclusion of the letter he said: "Disguise it as we may, the line of bat tle is drawn between tho forces of safe currency and those of silver monometallism." The fol lowing month, Mr. Carlisle, then secretary of the treasury, went to Memphis and attempted to organize the southern democracy in support of the president's position. In June of that year the democrats who fa vored bimetallism sent delegates to a meeting at Memphis arid at that ''meeting the National Silver Committee was appointed. Then fol- -i 'I il srt