conclusion that tho people of Porto Rico can
entrust their rights to the protection of- an un
restrained congress?
Justice Brown is a citizen of the state of
Michigan, and Michigan also has a constitu
tion and a hill of rights. Is Justice Brown
willing to go before tho people of his own
state and tell them that their legislature should
he vested with full and unrestrained power
to act on all questions affecting the rights and
property of the citizens? If not, why. not?
Is a Congress more reliable than a state legis
lature? Is a representative body morp trust
worthy as it gets farther away from the people?
Is delegated authority more carefully exercised
in proportion as the seat of government is far
ther removed from the voters?
Tho position taken by Judge Brown would
be ludicrous if it wore not so serious. It
is strange that his language is not challenged
by republicans. Two republican Judges out
of six dissented from this position; have the
republican newspapers less independence than,
the judges? Have the rank and file of the re
publican party, who are under no obligation to
tho party, less independence of thought and
action than the justices who hold their commis
sions from republican presidents? Unless the
people aro wholly absorbed in money-making
and entirely indifferent to that constitutional
liberty so highly prized and so dearly bought
by our ancestors. tliere will be so emphatic a
protest, against the imperialistic utterances of
the; court that no body officials on the bench
or elsewhere will soon again disregard- the
spirit of American institutions " --..
' ' vy
"The Best Form of Giving."
In addressing a Sunday school class re
cently, Mr. Rockefeller of the Standard Oil
Trust said that ljiis organization paid twenty
two millions a year in wages, and that in thirty
years it had paid out between six hundred and
seven, hundred millions to laboring men.
"This," ho added, "I regard as the best form
of giving."
There is no doubt that remunerative em
ployment is more helpful than charity, but
Mr. Rockefeller can hardly credit his charity
account with the amount paid out in wages.
During tho past seven years the dividends de
clared by the Standard Oil -Trust have
amounted to $252,000,000. Thus it will be
seen that the dividends for seven years amount
to more than one-third of the wages paid dur
ing a period of thirty years. Mr. Rockefeller's
eharo of the dividends for the past five months
are said to amount to ten millions this is at
the rate of twenty-four millions a year. " If
Mr. Rockefeller can make twenty-four millions
(not to speak of tho dividends paid to other
stock-holders) by paying twenty-two millions
in wages he has found a very profitable invest
ment, oven though it cannot properly be de
scribed as the "best form of giving." As Mr.
Rockefeller gets more out of it than the thou
sands of men who do the work, and as ho could
get nothing out of the business but for the work
done by the wage earners, it is evident thattho
day laborers aro doing somo "giving" them
' selves. Mr. Rockefeller has tho reputation of
The Commoner.
being a very liberal man, but it is quite evi-
dent that ho is giving away some' one else's!
money. If the employes aro not receiving
wages enough ho is giving away their money or
money which should bo paid to them, and they
should be credited with his donations. If the
employes are receivingwages enough it niuBt bo
apparent that the consumers of Oil aire paying
too much, and therefore they should be credited
with Mr. Rockefeller's donations. Some one
has described the Chicago University as a na
tional university, because it is supported' by
money collected from all the people, by that
most successful taxgathercr, the Standard Oil
Trust.
As a matter of fact, tho payment of wages
is not "a form of giving." You do not speak
of giving a man a horse when you receive for
.the horse as much as it is worth. There is much
less reason for describing wages as a gift be
cause the wage earner not only earns all he re
ceives but he earns for his employer a profit
besides. But even if the ordinary wage earner
could count his wages as a gift it would be a
perversion of language 'to say that Mr. Rocke
feller was giving to his employes when the em
ployes give back to Mr. Rockefeller ail-that he
pays for wages and more than one hundred per.
cent profit on the wages besides.
When Mr. Rockefeller is ready to render
an account of his stewardship, he will not find
the amount paid by him in wages standing to
his credit, but he will find some charges made
against the amount which, he has received. A.
part of his enormous income represents money
which his employes ought to have received
and a part represents money taken from the
public in violation of human as well as divine
laws. Not only will he find it impossible to
obtain credit for wages paid to employes, but
he will find that much that he has given to re
ligion, to education and to charity, has been
set down in the "incidental expbnse" column
and not under the head of benevolence. Tho
money which he has paid to subsidize tho press
not money paid to proprietors of papers,
but money expended in such away as to silence
criticism and to provoke eulogy, the money
paid to prevent ministerial denunciation of
trust methods not money paid to the min
isters themselves, but money given to religious
enterprises, and money used to corrupt col
leges and to support professors who will de
fend, or at least deal gently with, monopolies
all these expenditures are" not given to char
ity but are a part of the business. Mr. Rocke
feller has given so small a part of his income
that he has become fabulously rich in a short
time. Measured by tho rule laid down by the
Master in the case of tho widow who gaye in
two mites, Mr. Rockefeller is a miser. Thou
sands have given more liberally in proportion
to their income, although their gifts have not
amounted to so much in dollars. If Mr. Rocke
feller had given, not a small per cent but all of
his income to church and charity, he could not
have compensated for the harm he has done,
nor could he have justified tho criminal moth'
ods which he has employed. Mr. Rockefeller
cannot boast of his giving, least of all can ho
boast of giving to his employes.
He Misrepresents the South.
The editor of the Macon (Georgia) Tele
graph discusses the recent supreme court de
cision in a vein which not only misrepresents
southern sentiment but gives the republican
papers of the north an excuse for slanderiug
the people for whom the Telegraph assumes to
speak. The Kansas City platform denounced
imperialism as an attack upon tho declaration,
of independence and the principles which un
derly our form of government. Whatever dif
ference o opinion may have existed on the
money question, no difference of opinion was
manifested on the question of imperialism. Every
southern state, excepting Maryland and West
Virginia, gave its electoral vote to the candidates
nominated on that platform and nearly every
representative of the south in the senate and
house of representatives endorsed the princi
ples set forth in. that platf orra. Senator Bacon
of Georgia, whose home is at Macon, intro
duced the resolution which the party supported.
The supreme court by a narrow majority of
one sustained the republican theory, while four
judges, two democrats and two republicans,
supported the position taken by the democratic
platform. And now, instead of viewing tho
court's position as an attack upon the dootrino
of self government and constitutional liberty,"
in this country as well as Porto Rico, the ed
itor of the telegraph uses the occasion to uttei4
a tirade against those who" a generation ago opJ
posed the doctrine of secession.
The question involved in imperialism is -a
very different one from that involved in- the
civil war. The doctrine of secession was .
harmless so long as it was merely theoretical,
and it never would have become a practical
question but for the fact that slavery became
interwoven with it. As the north grew in pop
ulation and political influence, it became appar
that slavery was doomed unless tho right of
secession could be established. While Lin-J
coin's fight was not against slavery itself but
against the extension of slavery, the abolition
sentiment was growing so rapidly that far
sighted men could- see that it was only a ques
tion, of time when the issue would be joined
The war, however, seemed unavoidable ; passion
and prejudice made amicable settlement impos
sible. Jt is needless to recount tho horrors of
that war. The fire of battle consumed the. sys
tem which had separated th,e two sections of the
country, and terrible as were the wounds of
that conflict they have healed. As time goes
on tho animosities aroused between '01 and '65
are disappearing, and the people, north and
south, are able to recognize what they did not
recognize immediately, namely, that the sol
diers on both sides fought with equal bravery
in defense of convictions equally honest and
sincere. Now that slavery iB abolished tho
people of the south would not restore it if they
could, and the editor of tho Telegraph does in
justice to his own people when he insinuates
that they are less attached to tho constitution
and tho declaration of independence than the
people of the north.
The question in 1801 was whether we should
have two republics or one; the question now
K
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