FEBRUARY 19, 1D03.
THE NEBRASKA INDEPENDENT.
5
US
f
OUR SPECIAL
We Pay the Freight.
We will deliver the following $10.00 combination to any town in
the state of Nebraska, freight prepaid by us, any time during: the
mouth of January, 1903. Referee: First National Back or The In
dependent. GO lba Rest Granulated Sugar for . . . . $1.00
20 ibs Choice Prunes 1.00
25 bars Good Lauadry Soap 1-00
2 lbs High Grade Japan Tea 1.00
10 lbs High Grade Peaberry Coffee 2.00 -
G lbs Fancy Bright Apricots. .75
4 lbs Fancy Muer Peaches .50
4 lbs Fancy 4 Crown Large Raisins .50
6 lbs Fancy Japan Head Rice 50
2 cans lG-oz Cream of Tartar Baking Powder..... 50
3 pkgs. 10 cent soda '.23
3 pkgs 10 cent Corn Starch 25
3 pkgs 10 cent Gloss Starch 23
1 lb Pure Black Pepper 25
1 bottle Lemon Extract 10 v
1 bottle Vanilla Extract.., 10
2doz. clothes Pins 05
All the abore f or $10.00
Orders for customers outside of the state of Nebraska and on line
of railroad entering Lincoln add 75c to pay part of freight.
as
Branch & Miller Go.
S0
Cor. 10th and P St$. " Lincoln, Neb. f
fl What we Advertise we Da, $!
mjj'jmwiiwiiUWw
3C
EERLESS
MATTHEWS
From a musical standpoint there is no better
Piano on earth than the PEERLESS MAT
THEWS. A careful, unbiased, unpreju
diced examination of the Piano itself will con
vince you of the truthfulness of this statement.
Mattnews
sano
1120 O St., Lincoln, Neb.
Co.,
ished Monasteries and confiscated their
property for the commonwealth.
Although neither the code of the
United States nor the code of any
one of the states contains such a
law, It Is nevertheless valid in this
country, because it is a natural law.
That is the fundamental law on which
our government was founded, it is
expressed in the declaration of In
dependence and reads:
"We hold these truths to be self
evident; that all men are created
equal; that they are endowed by
their Creator with certain inalien
able rights; that among these ara
life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.
That to secure these rights govern
ments are instituted among men de
riving their just powers from the
consent of the governed; that,
whenever any form of government
becomes destructive to these ends, it
is the right of the people to alter or
abolish it, and to institute a new
government, laying its foundation on
such principles as to them shall seem
most likely to effect their safety and
happiness."
This is the primary supreme law
of the United States to which all
other laws are subordinate; it abol
ishes all laws to the contrary. That
law endows the government with fuii
power to control corporations and
even to abolish them if they are de
structive to the unalienable rights for
life, liberty, and pursuit of happi
ness of all men.
Now, ' I believe that the absolute
tyrannical power, which our coal and
railroad barons have usurped, using
coal mines and railroads as the means
to rob the people out of the fruits of
their hard labor, even crippling and
killing every year thousands of in
nocent people and freezing thousands
to death by shutting up the coal
mines, are destructive to the aim of
that law. Our executive, who has
to execute that natural law makes
himself guilty of neglecting his duty
and is responsible for all damages
and losses which accrue from the ex
isting coal famine. The executive
has no right, to escape this responsi
bility by appointing a committee to
arbitrate between coal barons and
miners. In that contest the execu
tive has to protect and defend the
unalienable rights of the people,
which is the most prominent party to
the coal and transportation business.
Now to distract the attention of the
people from the real question and to
prevent the executive from acting In
that matter, our coal and railroad
barons,' who have grown together like
.the Siamese Twins, claim an abso
lute property right in the coal
mines and railroads; but that's only
a humbug to deceive the people.
There is no such thing as an ab
solute property right.
Men have a right to live; and be
cause a man needs different articles
for his sustenance, therefore a man
has a right to acquire the necessary
articles for his sustenance and com
fort; but that right is limited by the
rights and need of all other people
who depend for their sustenance on
those necessities for living. Besides
there are things which can never
become private property of single men
or corporations, because they serve
for the mutual use of all the peo
ple, as for instance, lakes, rivers,
roads, railroads, bridges, etc. To reg
ulate, control, and limit the acqifiii-"
tion of private property is the duty
of the governments, which are in
stituted to . secure their unalienable
rights to all men.
That eminent dominion of the gov
ernment is to regulate and prevent
the accumulation of enormous wealth
by single persons or corporations, to
the "detriment of the masses, and to
readjust inequalities, can not be dis
puted. Moses introduced the fifty
years jubliee, when a new census
was taken and all property was again
divided equally among the- people.
Christ was a communist, the first
Christians had everything in common.
In the eighteenth and nineteenth
century -even in Catholic countries,
monasteries, which under a false
pretense of a divine right, like our
money barons, had amassed all the
wealth of the nations, were abqljshed
and the property confiscated for the
common wealth.
In this country, too private property
was confiscated without indemnifica
tion. Negro slaves were the constitutional
granted property of the slave-holders,
but that constitutional right contra
dicted the supreme natural right of
equality and liberty of all men as
expressed in the declaration of in
dependence, and therefore it wa
void. If, notwithstanding these facts
and precedents, our executives, con
gress or legislatures say that they
have no authority to interfere and
maluT a final decision in the dispute
of our coal and railroad barons and
their employes and laborers, then
It is only a subterfuge to deceive the
people, cheating them of their un
alienable claim on coal mines and
railroads and those members of exec
utive, congress or legislatures are
attempting to evade their disagreeable
duty to accommodate our coal and
railroad barons, to which they have
degraded themselves - as subservient
lagurs.
That coal strike affects the pocket
book of every family in the United
States. You and I have to suffer
and pay at least $20.00 too much for
our winter coal to that unscrupulous,
insatiable gang of robbers, those coal
and railroad barons and we must even
be glad if we can get it at all.
With unpardonable, stupid Indiffer
ence did our government look when
those coal barons a few months ago
shut up the coal mines, although every
man with common sense could see that
it must produce a coal famine and
horrible sufferings in the coming win
ter; but congress was not in session;
secretary of state, Mr. Hay, had to
defend and protect the Tights of the
Roumanian Jews; and the president
had no time to tend to that business,
as he was out hunting bears and mak
ing stump speeches; therefore he ap
pointed a committee for whitewash
ing those coal and railroad barons.
The diabolical malice and obstinacy
of our coal barons, who rejected every
proposition for a peaceable settlement
of the strike of the miners, causeu
horrible sufferings and misery to
thousands of honest, industrious men
and families; they caused losses of
millions of dollars to other industries
and people who must have coal. Not
only that, but reports, from all parts
of the country, are coming in, that
people really did freeze to death, be
cause they could not get necessary
coal, and that is real murder caused
by the Satanic malice of our coal
barons, who arbitrarily shut up the
coal mines; and for these horrible
conditions our executive and congress
are responsible.
Now what are you going to do about
it?
I saw in the "newspapers that a
meeting of delegates of the different
states and cities will ba called ti
Washington to petition president tand
congress for relief;.,but if those gen
tlemen go to Washington they must
be careful and keep off the grass or
they may feel the police club like the
members of the Coxey army, who
tried to petition congress.
What effect will' a petition have on
a president, who gets a salary of
$50,000 to protect the rights of the
people, and then goes out bear hunt
ing when our coal barons are shutting
up the coal mines? What relief can
you expect from a congress, the ma
jority of the members of which are
the owners of coal and railroad shares
and bonds or are dependent upon such
shares and bond holders? But thoso
irresponsible demagogues make and
execute our laws, without our consent
and contrary to our wishes and will,
and these laws are just as effectively
binding and galling as the fetters of
the slave; we are only the slaves of
laws.
The criminal, neglect of their duties
by our executive and congress to set
tle that coal strike and to provide the
people with the necessary coal, which
neglect has caused so horrible suffer
ings and misery to the people, is an ir
refutable proof that that government
has become to be destructive to the
end of securing their inalienable rights
of life, liberty, and pursuit of happi
ness to all men.
The people must now take the mat
ter in' their own hands and command
those hired servants what they have
to do, and settle that most important
of all questions according to the prin
ciples of reason and natural right;
and the only way to do it is. that the
government takes possession of the
coal mines and railroads paying the
shareholders their real invested cash
paid capital, thereby preventing such
horrible calamities and sufferings for
ever and in all future times.
The claims of our coal baron3 that
the coal mines are their absolute pri
vate property is totally false. Coal is
one of the indispensable necessities for
men and therefore the mine3 can nev
er become the privat? property of any
body. Even the whole living genera
tion has not a property right, but only
the right of an usufructuary on the
mines, because those mines are in
tended by the Creator for the benefit
and sustenance of the whole human
race anl thousands yet unborn gen
erations must depend on them. The
new born baby of the poorest laborer
has just as good a claim on those
coal mine3 as a Pierpont Morgan,
Rockefeller or Carnegie.
The living generation has a right to
take out their ; necessary ' coal, but it
has no right to waste t'ae coal or de
stroy the mines to the detriment of the
coming generations; the mines must
be economically managed and kept in
good producing conditions.
I remember a similar case from
Switzerland, where most all timber
land belongs to cities and precincts,
but some private corporations own
some timberland, too, but neither cities
precincts nor even private corpora
tions can absolutely dispose over the
timber. The state Inspector of forests
makes a map of such forests and di
vides them into sections and the
usufructuaries are only allowed to cut
every year the timber of such a sec
tion under strict regulations for cut
ting and replanting, whereby the
rights of the coming generations are
protected and secured. The same law
is valid for coal mines; it is expressed
in the Declaration of Independence,
which says that the government has to
secure the inalienable rights of all
men; therefore the government has
not only authority, but it is its duty
to take possession of coal mines and
railroads and manage them in the in
terests and for the benefit of all the
people, paying the shareholders their
real invested cash paid capital; that
i3 all that they can demand. Those
shareholders are only capitalists like
all others, who loan out money. They
have nothing to do with the manage
ment; they may live in New York,
1 CfTLE. "1 j
tln tSMM Com- j
Stock Nr missloni
1 i sheep '
j ffya & Buchanan Ga,
11 fiOCTH OMAHA, NKBBASKA.
m Best possible service in all depart
n ments. Write or wire us for markets
H or other information.
P Long distance Telephone 2305
HELP WANTED COPYING LET
ters at home, either sex. We pay $15 per
1,000. Send stamp for particulars. Na
tional Supply Co., Poughkeepsie, N. Y
London, Paris, and never see the mines
or railroads; all that they have to
do is to take a pair of scissors, cut Off
a coupon and have it cashed; there
fore their cash invested money is all
that they have to ask for; the people
are not obliged to pay for watered
capital; that's fraud.
F. SCHWEIZER.
Woodlawn, Neb.