MAY 28, 1903.
THE NEBRASKA INDEPENDENT
11
Ttie Elkins Bill
Editor Independent: The Elkins
till may very properly be described as
a kind of homeopathic remedy ap
plied by the political doctors to the
trust disease, in the theory that it
could neither harm the trusts nor do
good to the people,. To prevent re
bates is to swell the revenues of the
trust. ;
, As to publicity, the uncontradicted
statement of a trust, false or true,
what good can it do? The Elkins bill
i3 a sort of mild faith cure applied, to
a disease that is incurable. It is the
punishment of guilty trusts, meted
out to themselves by themselves. It
reminds me of the sly old turtle who
was caught napping by a party of
American ; sportsmen and condemned
to death. The turtle met his fate
philosophically. Only venturing that
as he was to furnish the corpse, he be
allowed to choose the manner of his
taking off. This logical proposition
agreed to. The old reptile suggested
drowning after the sentence had been
carried out He had the gratitude as
he reappeared above the surface of his
native element to say, "Thank you,
gentlemen."
If Mr. Roosevelt's anti-trust meas
ures were calculated for any other
purpose than that of deceiving the
people they may be regarded as a
failure. Why? Because the trust it
self is an incurable disease. The
system for which trusts stand is as
old as this human race. Older than
- Joseph's "corner on No. 2 Egyptian
corn," or the brickburners' strike at
Babel. It is not only as old as sin, but
it is Intrenched behind all human
laws and statutes. In our own free
state and best of constitutions, in the
common law of England, in the ukase
of the czar, in the firman of the
sultan, it is the right of property.
Our socialist friends are wise in
their generation when they begin
their crusade against capital by an
attack on private property, on man's
right to do what he will with his
own. It is fair to assume that this
right will exist just as long a3 there
are two men or two dollars on earth
out of which to form a combination.
This is why labor organization has
kept neck and neck with capital or
ganization, through their whole strug
gle in the United States. Their mu
tual charges of tyranny and oppres
sion being, no doubt, equally well
founded. As 'their agreements are
generally at the expense of the other
fellow, the unorganized public, I con
fess to an absence of prejudice against
either party.
Your plutocrat is an amiable, char
itable Christian gentleman. Your
proletariat is - equally intelligent,
plausible and patriotic, equally quick,
to see and take advantage of opportunity.-
. .'. ..., . , .
It is. the great unorganized scab ele
ment of society that suffers under the
present system. They are ground fine
between the upper millstone, organ
ized capital, and the lower millstone,
organized labor.
When President Roosevelt promised
to shackle cunning, "bridle trusts,"
etc., he simply' made a lying promise
that was impossible of performance.
The only hope I can see for the unor
ganized class is in organization. It is
not only possible for the agricultural
class to organize, it is practical, it is
essential for its own protection. The
live stock branch of agriculture have
already organized successfully. The
farmers" in many sections are doing
the same in a small way forming
joint stock associations, building ele
vators for the marketing of their own
produce. ; -
Experience has shown . that even
teamsters with no other capital than
their whips, can secure their rights.
Why cannot- the farmers in their
three-fold capacity of capitalists, la
borers, and consumers do the same?
Thfi changed conditions under whicn
we live in this 20th century make such
an organization as I have indicated
much easier than it would have been
a quarter of a century ago. Daily
market reports;' daily mail through
the R. F. ' D. ; rural telephones con
necting farms, bring the 20th century
farmer as much in touch with the
world as the merchant behind his
desk. ' ,-: . ...
There is absolutely no help for "the
man with the hoe" in politics aTid
politicians, who, by the way, are or
ganized to deceive, and exploit them.
In the darkest days of feudal tyranny
the free cities of Italy and the
Hanseatic league maintained their lib
erties' by a simple organization of the
different guilds, and branches of la
bor. Why cannot the people meet the
robber barons of the 20th century in
the same way? To depend on a presi
dent, congressmen or senators elected
and owned body and soul by the
trusts, is folly. To depend on courts
to enforce laws made by trust legisla
tures is still greater folly. To adopt
the methods of the trusts to fight the
common enemy with his own weapons
is the only wisdom.
OLD STALWART.
Milford, Neb.
Fact and Fiction
As a specimen of fact and fiction, or
truth and error, the following edi
torial from the Omaha Bee of June 1
is hard to beat. It is a fact that thu
fusicmists in some measure failed to
perform as they . promised but this
was insignificant as compared to the
failure to redeem pledges made by the
republican party. Timidity was tha
prime factor in bringing about fusion
deteat the fear to do this or that be
cause it would bring down the criti
cisms of the opposition. The fusion
legislature was afraid to limit the
clerk of the supreme court to the sal
ary named in the constitution be
cause it might look like a partisan at
tack on the republican clerk. The fu
sion regents were afraid to remove
Dean Reese of the university lav,'
school after he had thrown down the
partisan gauntlet and made the race
for supreme judge, all the while
drawing his $3,000 a year from the
state. The , fusion judges are afraid
to go upon the stump, because some
republican might think -it "undigni
fied" and so on all along the line.
Timidity beat the populists in Kan
sas ; it has done so in Nebraska. Start
ing out with a radical platform and
winning, the officers-elect have tried
too hard, to be ultra-conservative. The
Bee. says: - r
AT THE PARTING OF THE WAYS.
Populism in Nebraska, as in nearly
all the states of the west, had its
crigin in the popular discontent with
railroad domination and extortionate
transportation rates. This sentiment
first took definite shape in the or
ganization of the farmers alliance
and finally culminated in the people's
independent party that held its na
tional convention at Omaha in 1892
and promulgated its principles in the
Omaha platform.
The new party in its declaration of
Independence denounced the existing
old parties as degenerate and incom
petent to cope with the great pro
blems of the hour, but instead of cen
tering upon the paramount issue of
anti-monopoly, it scattered its fire
over a wide field and committed it
self to visionary schemes of reform
that Were in conflict with the nat
ural laws of industrial evolution.
While the rank and file of western
populists were greenbackers and did
not believe in metallic currency, they
temporarily abjured their flat faith
and joined with the bullionaires of
the mining states in the clamor for
the free and unlimited coinage of sil
ver. The railroad issue was thus
sidetracked and free silver made the
battle cry. .
With the same facility of conversion
the people's independent party was
switched by fusion" from its original
third party independence to become
an adjunct of democracy. The party
Jhat had been denounced in 1892 as
the spawn of Tammany corruption
became the right "wing of the reform
army in 1896. In that memorable
presidential campaign Nebraska was
the storm center and populism tri
umphed under the flag of democracy.
Not because Nebraska had been con
verted to free silver, but as the se
quence of calamity in the shape of
business depression and two succes
sive years of drouth. With the return
of prosperity and the exDlosion of th
silver delusion, the only thing that
held democrats and populists together
was the appetite for a division of the
spoils. When the state house and
the majority of the county court
houses were reoccupied by republicans
the cohesive power of fusion gradual
ly diminished and the leaders of the
dislodged parties charged each other
with the responsibility for defeat .
And now the allied forces of reform
find themselves at the parting of the
ways. Ex-Governor Poynter, who
may be considered one of the pop
ulist wheel-horses, has served formal
Dotice upon the Nebraska democracy
that the people's , Independent party
will henceforth travel in the middle
of the road without entangling al
liances. Governor Poynter admits
ruefully that the Impending reorgani
zation of the democratic party will
compel populists to abandon the coali
tion which has proved such a disap
pointment. "The time Is now ripe,"
says Mr. Poynter. "to line im thp wm-
ulist forces on the principles of the
umana platform for the fray of 1904.
Whatever disintegration has -happened
to our ranks has been caused
by our union with the democratic
party, independent action will in a
large measure recover these scattered
forces."
What Governor Povnter savs con
cerning the disastrous . effects of fu
sion on the DODulists is a reflex of
what democratic leaders have been
saying to their followers concerning
its effect upon the fortunes of the
Nebraska democracy. The truth is
that the disintegration of the reform
forces is largely due to the failure of
the f usionlsts to perform as they
promised when they were in power,
as well as to the popular conviction
that the republican party under Theo
dore Roosevelt will grapple with the
monopolies and trusts more effectively
than would the democracy whether
reorganized or disorganized.
Range Fences
Editor Independent: I wish to dis
cuss the range fence question with tha
associate editor. My life, thirty-six
years, has been spent on the public
domain, not as cattleman, but some
times as homesteader, on my father'
homestead and on my own, but mostly
as surveyor; sometimes as deputy
United States land surveyor and as
deputy United States mineral survey
or. The range fence does not always
denote hostility towards the settler,
but often greater safety for the set
tier's stray cattle or horses.
Because it has been made an instru
ment of warfare upon the smaller cat
tlemen and homesteaders does not im
ply that it always is or usually is.
Every, case must have its own merits,
or demerits. There is no doubt but
that men often combine to hold gov
eminent land away from would-be
settlers, but the range fence is not an
aid to such devilish design; it is rath
er a hinderance. For instance, if a
settler gets t p in the morning on a
fenced range and finds his stock gone
or killed he at once suspicions the
owners of the range fence, that sur
rounds him End , every neighbor, and
settler who hears his disaster will sec
ond his suspicions. I cannot explain
the causes of the downfall of the big
cattle companies who stoop to directly
injure a poor man, but I know that a
cattle company cannot long exist in
the face of a cordial dislike among
its neighbors, especially if thos
neighbors are all poor men.
The open range is the farmers'
worst form of gambling; he raises a
few calves on his farm, puts them out
on the range in the spring and get3
them back fat in the fall. This is the
first year, or while he has but one or
two. Afterward when he has ten.
twenty, or more, he usually misses all
the velvet and then to make his lo&S
more complete spends time and money
hunting the lost ones. Permission to
build range fences, if it could be
properly controlled, would be a ben
efit to the email farmer who lives
adjacent to arid pastures.
You certainly do not have a knowl
edge of all the facts when you attri
bute the greater Dart of aridnesa tn
grazing animals Introduced by white
men. Because oats, corn, etc., may
have made a grand crop at some time
and soine place in the arid west doc3
not even suggest that it always would
or that it usually would produce a
crop.
I have been where no cattle or sheep
ever ranged, on the Navajo reserva
tion,; and where few ponies ever
ranged, and the vegetation was very
much the same as in localities where
it had been more closely grazed. II
does not injure most grass to be
grazed, but rather aids in distributing
seed and starting the seed to grow,
because most grass seed will na.
through the alimentary canal of graz
ing animals without Injury. Cattle
men are producers and as such are
the prey as other producers are of tho
speculator ami the trust. Don't lend
your voice to breed hate among the
men who are doing something for us
all; rather help to join all producers
in a holy alliance that we may meet
a common foe and vanquish him the
transportation monopoly.
E. E. CAMPBELL.
, Cisco, Utah.
(The associate editor has no recol
lection of taking any. stand on the
range fence question. It is a subject
he Is not familiar with. Doubtless
Mr. Campbell refers to some com
munication which appeared in The In
dependent Associate Editor.)
Price Went up Next Day
We hope the state of Nebraska will
not sell itself for a few thousand, dol
lars. The Rockefeller donation to tho
university, if accepted, will put Chan
cellor Andrews in an embarrassing po
sition and probably make the people
of Nebraska pay an increased price for
oil. No good can come to the uni
versity through money obtained as
Rockefeller .las obtained his, and the
good people of Nebraska will do well
to place the stamp of condemnation
on such accumulations. George W.
Acker, in Toledo (O.) Independent
EIGHT
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rm NINETY-FIVE CENTS
'BUYS THE GENTS'HIGM GRADE
NEW ISO MODEL BUROICK
BICYCLE. Shinned to tnr ad
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In every way higher grade than any bicycle you caa
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SEARS, ROEBUCK t CO.,Ch.'!M
GREATLY REDUCED RATES.. ..
vis, t
WABASH RAILROADS.
Below is a partial list of the many
Cancers Cured;
why suffer
I pain and death
from cancer? Dr. T. O'Connor
cures cancera, tumors and wens;
no knife, blood or plaster. AddreM
1306 O St., Lincoln, Nebraska.
BUY THE
DOUBLE DEWEY HOG WATERER
from your
dealer or
write us
WE GUAR.
A NTEE
EVERY
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If not satis
factory re,
turn and get another, or your money back.
We make this guarantee to every dealer.
VERY CHEAP THIS YEAR.
THE B-B JIFG. CO., Daren port, Iowa
No! 76 Masonic Temple.
11 I
If you want a pig tight and bull strong
fence inquire for the
BOSS FENCE
manufactured at Fremont, Nebr., by F.
M. Healy.
half rates offered via the Wabash
Railroad:
$32.10 Atlanta, Ga., and return; sold
July 5, 6, 7.
$19.40 Indianapolis, Ind., and return;"
sold June 7, 8, 9, 13, 14.
$13.50 St. Louis,' Mo., and return;'
L sold June 15, 16, 17.
$31.75 Boston, Mass., and eturn;
sold June 24, 25 and 26.
$33.75 Boston, Mass., and return;
sold June 30 to July 4.
$32.20 Saratoga, N. Y., and return;
sold July 4, 5.
$21.00 Detroit, Mich., and return;'
sold July 14, 15. '
$32.25 Baltimore, Md., and return;
sold July 17, 18. '
$32.25 Baltimore, Md., and return;
sold Sept. 17, 18. 19.
All tickets reading over the Wa
bash are good on steamers in either
direction between Detroit and Buf
falo without extra - charge, except
meals and berths. Long limits and
stop overs allowed. Remember this is
"The World's Fair Line." Go this
route and view the grounds.
For folders and all information ad
dress, HARRY E. MOORES, G. A. P. D.,
Omaha. Neb.
The Chicago board of health calls,
attention to the fact that the present
high cost of living will make it im
possible for thousands of mothers to
buy ice during the coming summer
and it looks for, a large increase in
the death rate among infants on ac
count of sour milk. The trusts con
tinue the slaughter of the Innocents
without any compunctions at all. If
the magnates are able to accumulate
millions that is taken as full restitu
tion for the murder of nursing babies.
The full dinner pail does not include
ice to cool the baby's milk and keep
it sweet Vote 'er straight
Special subscription rate to single
taxers, 5 months 25c
f
