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About The independent. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1902-1907 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 29, 1903)
8 THC NEBRASKA INDEPENDENT. JANUARY 29, 1903. Zhe lUbraska Independent Lincoln, Utbtaska. LIBERTY BUILDING. 1328 0 STREET Entered according to Actef CongreSs of March i;9, at the rofcloflice at Lincoln, Ncbiatka.as tecocd-class mail matter. PUBLISHED EVERY THURSDAY. FOURTEENTH YEAR. . $1.00 PER YEAR When rrailrg icmittar.ces do not leave meney ith news sgti:c:es, T.oslmaslers, etc. to te fcrwarded ly them. They frequently forget or remit a difTtrent 8ti:cunt than was left with them, and the tuUcriber fails to gel proper credit. ddresa ell communications, and make all draft, money orders, etc., payable to Zb fttbrtska 7ndeptndnt, Lincoln, Neb. Anonymous communications will not be rctictd. Rejected manuscripts will not be returned. The people of New York city seem to think that the. more bonds they c an issue the richer they will be. For the republican doctrine of "can't," The Independent has the most profound contempt. There have been quiet times on Wall street - for a good while. , "The bulls are afraid and the bears dasent." The Independent is inclined to be lieve that that Chicago grand jury and its indictments of coal dealers are A No. 1 fakes. Judge Lindsey of Denver declares that 50 per cent of Colorado boys are thieves. That shows the effect of keeping such an example before them as ex-Senator Wolcott. The Colorado democrats wanted it .11 3 i V. . MnVln. T Oft fll . n till tt.il U UlCy JL HUlUIUg. U ail Uiuis or two had been given to the populists and by that means their organization recognized, the democrats would have had all the rest. Confining innocent people on small islands and refusing to let their friends bring them food and water is one of the civilizing methods that England, Germany and Italy have brought over the ocean to us. not withstanding the Monroe doctrine. The Independent desires names and addresses of populists and reform democrats from every part of the country. We wish to send them sam ple copies. Readers who will send in such lists lists of men who are in terested in the cause of good govern ment will greatly oblige. Another court, this time out in San Francisco, has sustained the conten tion of The Independent that margin deals are illegal and debts contracted in that manner are gambling debts, not collectable at law. Perhaps in time gambling on the boards of trade nay be abolished. The 31st annual meeting of the Ne braska Press association will be held at Hastings, February 10 and 11, 1903. Editors who have not received a pro gram can secure one by writing to the president, Adam Preede, Hastings,, or the secretary, F. N. Merwin, Bea ver City. Membership fee, 2, which includes a year's dues. The Independent never had a very high opinion of the intelligence of the farmers who would vote the republi can railroad ticket, but it never thought that they were so silly as to present petitions to this, a republican legislature asking legislation concern ing railroads instead of presenting them to John C. Baldwin. Who do these simpletons think runs this legis lature anyhow?- FUTURE POPULIST POLICY When a man looks back over the policy of the 'democratic party for the last six years he cannot help feel ing astonished at the folly of its man agement If after the St Louis con vention democrats had shown the least consideration for the honest con victions of southern" populists, the votes that Bryan lacked In the north to elect him could have been easily obtained, and obtained in spite of all that Mark Hanna, Dave Hill and Cleveland could do to prevent it. That was a lesson that the managers of the democratic party should have learned, but they learned nothing and four years afterward they perpetrated a worse folly at Kansas City when they turned down the brilliant and pa triotic Towne. By that action all the fire and vim was taken out of thfe campaign in the northern states and especially in the west and northwest. Any man who had common sense knew it would. The populists and freo silver republicans who were at Kan sas City when that silly thing was done, saw at once that defeat was inevitable. The editor of The Inde pendent met Senator Teller within half an hour after Stevenson was nom inated and he said: "The action beats us, but we will make as good a cam paign as we can, save what it is pos sible for us to save." The populists, patriotic and as un selfish as always, withdrew their can didate for the vice presidency, but they did it with the full knowledge that there was no hope of success in the campaign. Everywhere when the populists have given away to the management of the democratic party, defeat has followed. But still the Mad Mullahs of the democratic party rushed on. They learned nothing from constant defeat. Out in Colorado they tried their old tactics, with the never failing result, and lost everything. Here in Nebraska when the populist policy was adopted, victory perched upon the united banners and when the democratic plan was followed wi, were beaten out of our boots. Twice the democrats have insisted on having the head of the ticket and each time the result was disaster. They learned nothing. from the first defeat and the second defeat did not change their opinions. That sort of management, and there seems to be no indication that it will be changed, is what has led a large number of populists who have been willing to co-operate with the democracy to give up hope of accom plishing anything by such co-operation. They do not believe that such management has been by the advice of Bryan. He was altogether too large a man for partisan democrats to comprehend. He has ever been courteous and willing to listen to the opinions of populists. Neither does it alter the fact that if the trusts and the republican party are to be over thrown that all those who oppose plu tocracy with all its robberies and piracies upon the common people, must vote for ihe same candidates for president, vice president and members of congress. After six years of failure to get the democratic party to treat its allies with the respect and consideration due to an ally, after its insistance upon a policy that has always resulted in de feat, a good many men think that the time has come to drop all attempts at co-operation with a party so blind to its own interests as the democratic party has been. If it will insist on a policy that is certain to result in de feat, what is the use of co-operation? What the final populist policy will be is by no means certain at the present time. If it is true, as has often been charged, that the democratic party never learns anything, then, of course, the populists will have to change their attitude towards co-operation. About the funniest paragraph that ever appeared in a paper was an ac count "of how some Jefferson county farmers petitioned this present rail road legislature to make the railroads furnish them with cars so they couH ship their own wheat instead of pay ing 20 cents a bushel to the elevators to ship it for them. A more ridicul ous thing never happened in this state. WYOMING COAL Out in Wyoming there are inex haustible mines of coal of the very best quality thousands upon thou sands of acres of it lying upon or near the surface. Rock Springs coal can be put on tne cars at 70 cents a ton and the Hanna and Sheridan coal at $1 a ton. After that coal is hauled over a level road six or seven hundred miles, it i3 sold in eastern Nebraska at eight, nine and ten dollars a ton. The freight on a ton of this coal in northeastern Nebraska is from four to five dollars a ton, and the roads so restrict the shipment that it is very difficult and much of the time impossible to get it at all, even at those extortionate prices. There are thousands of men willing to dig and handle that coal at reasonable prices, but the railroad management will not permit it to be done. " aiow much money is ground out of the farmers of Nebraska by these methods, which consist of restraint of trade if there ever was such a thing, it would be hard to tell, but the farm ers have to raise many hundred thou sand bushels of corn and wheat, which, after exchanging them for money, they hand over as tribute to these robbers. In the cities and towns the laborers have to work many a day to get the money to pay this toll to the railroad barons. This Wyoming coal could be sold in eastern Nebraska at $4 a ton and give a big profit to miner, coal dealer and railroad. More than twice that much is charged. These are the facts and they are known to every intelligent man in the state. Yet a majority of the vot ers insist that the state government shall be placed in the hands of the railroad managers. They are willing to suffer . cold and toil long and hard to give them a monopoly of the coai trade. May God have mercy on these fool people, and not make them suf fer too much for their idiocy, for those who suffer the most are toiling wives and little children. With gov ernment ownership of railroads we could have coal in eastern Nebraska for $2.50 a ton. NOT THE RIGHT WAY A certain farmer is very much dis gusted because The Independent has not made a special feature of the ef fort among the farmers to organize and appoint agencies for handling and selling their own grain, and given prominence to it in the columns of this paper. The reason that The Indepen dent has taken no part in the matter is because there is nothing in it. The money that the farmers spend in this way is money thrown away. The railroads will not give the space on their right of way for elevators, they will not furnish- cars on the sidings so that the farmers can load them with. grain from their wagons. The farmers elected a legislature and state officers nominated by the railroads and now they will have to accept what the railroads are pleased to give them. As long as a majority of the farmers of this state insist on voting for railroad nominees, they will have to pay their tribute to the elevator trust and the railroads. They cannot escape by forming little organizations in the various counties. Rates have been raised since the election as ev ery man who had common sense knew they would be if the roads carried the legislature and elected the state of ficers. Little organizations among the farmers will never force the elevator combine and the railroads to do jus tice. That is not the way to go at it to get justice. T. TflE COLORADO MUDDLE The Independent has said but very little about the attempt of Wolcott and the corporations to South Ameri canize the state of Colorado. In the first place while it has the greatest admiration for Senator Teller it has the, most profound contempt. for the democratic . party of that state. Be fore the election, under the . inspira tion of ex-Governor Thomas, the dem ocrats declared that they would have nothing to do with the populists and refused to recognize them in any way. The populists, patriots as they always were, thereupon resolved that they would nominate a separate state tick et, but would, although rebuffed by the democratic state convention in the most-insolent way, fuse on the mem bers of the legislature so as to insure the re-election of Senator Teller. The consequence was that the democratic state ticket was badly beaten from top to bottom, but a legislature was elect ed that had 12 majority for Teller. - From the very beginning, "one fac tor in the case was ex-Senator Edward O. Wolcott. With him in the cam paign, with his' pronounced corporation and plutocratic tendencies, his infam ous record, his disgraceful family re lations, the republicans felt that they could, not win, even with the advant age that the refusal of the democrats to recognize the populists gave them. So Wolcott was kept out of the state during the campaign and the republi can speakers everywhere announced that if they carried the legislature Wolcott would not be a candidate. No sooner was the election over than Wolcott returned to the state and or ganized a plan to unseat enough dem ocrats and replace them with enough republicans to elect himself instead of Teller. The house had two republi can majority while the senate was heavily democratic. The house pro ceeded to carry out this plan, arid ejected enough democrats to elect Wolcott, whereupon the senate ejected enough republicans to give Teller pn joint ballot one majority. Then th3 few republican senators with the lieu tenant governor at their head, left the chamber and organized a rump senate all by themselves. ' On the first joint ballot it was found that Wolcott had bought one democrat and Teller failed of election by one vote. By the next day Wolcott had bought six democrats. But the re publicans are themselvas divided into two factions, a portion of them being L intense haters of Wolcott and refus ing to vote for him. At this writing the house is held by the anti-Wolcott republicans and democrats, all heav ily armed the dispatches say each member has a couple of revolvers on his desk while repeating shot guns and rifles are stacked up around the hall. The whole thing taken together is South American politics with a little more chicanery and a little less force than the .Spanish republics generally employ. It is another demonstration of the statesmanship and common sense of the populist demand that senators shall be elected by a vote of the people and not by a legislature that can be bribed and intimidated. At the bottom of the whole thing is the desire of certain great corpora tions to have another senator upon whom they can always rely. The cor porations, with Hanna for their spokesman, are using every means in their power to get Wolcott back into the senate. Hanna has sent dispatches out there rallying the cohorts to the support of Wolcott and there is all the money ready that Wolcott can employ. Three state, legislatures are now in a deadlock over the election of a sena tor. Colorado, Washington and Del aware. In all of them the vilest measures are being used. Delaware has been without any senators at all for two years, because the members of the legislature are swayed by Ad dicks money, but so far he has not
