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About The Conservative (Nebraska City, Neb.) 1898-1902 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 24, 1899)
Conservative * Recently , in I- . . , , , CAN SULTAN. speaking of the oriental polygamist - mist with whom the McKinley folks have been making a treaty , in which that multi-married sultan and ruler of two millions of dual-wived , triple-wived and quadruple-wived Mohammedans is guaranteed the protection and perpetu ation of the harem business , the New York Evening Post says : "How completely 'wo have changed all that' appears in the news from the island of Sulu. General Bates is nego tiating a-'treaty' with the sultan. This is a new business for the United States to make a 'treaty1 with one of its own subjects. But the fact of the treaty is not as startling as its contents. It pro poses to leave a Mohammedan despot in absolute control of territory belonging to the United States. Not oven moral or religious interference is to be allowed , as one article of the treaty specifically bars out missionaries. Slave-holding is to be continued , though the sultan agrees , as a concession to silly American prejudices , to allow slaves , when able , to buy their freedom. The only hitch is over the question what flag the sultan shall fly when on his journeys. He wants his own ; at last accounts , General Bates was still urging him to adopt the American. We hope there will be no yielding oil this point. The idea of hav ing any other flag than the star-spangled banner floating over the sultan's harem and slaves must surely be quite intoler able to McKiuley. " THE SOCIAL UANGKKS. 1. Ignorance ( not limited to the wage-earning and unfortunate classes by any means , but most dangerous in the leaders of industry. The acme of ignorance is to be found in the clergy , teaching bodies , politicians , reformers and walking delegates. The best intel ligence of the country is to be found on the press , though often perverted be cause owned and tyrannized by the bus iness end of the institution. ) 2. The first fruit of ignorance is that pestiferous altruism which proclaims "equality , fraternity , liberty , " as infal libly founded in natural law and the constitution. y. Immigration , and the unchecked multiplication of the irresponsible , fos tered by altruism , the clergy , reformers and unscrupulous politicians. 4. Machine politics and boss despot ism. 5. The general political indifference and patriotic depravity of the self-sup porting classes. 6. The saloon. 7. Universal suffrage. 8. The protective policy. 9. The utter defiance of the consti tution by the party in power. 10. The ever augmenting severity of the struggle for existence through the multiplication of the loss-fits and unfits which finds its support in and supports the previous dangerous conditions. In an intelligent and strictly ethical self-protective sense no man is the friend of another unless he finds in that other some kind of support to his power of self-maintenance and preservation. Tlio intelligent man will continually study the balance of the community and interest himself in its welfare that bis own may be increased thereby , and not in any self-assumed duty to anybody or anything but himself. The only "Golden Rule" is to make others as use ful as possible by making one's self of all possible use to them. There is a gen erally accepted truism that he who is true to himself must be equally true to others. He who is "true to his rational higher self" is true to the law or force of self-preservation to the most intelli gent degree. There is nothing "higher" than self to him who really knows him self. Ho who knows himself is a man "in the image of God" and recognizes no higher power than himself. Only the ignorant indulge in self-worship , or bow , or cringe to a higher power. There is no "higher power , " no greater force than the force or ability to self- preservation when intelligently applied. The altruistic madness which holds up the self-supporting , or millionaire , abil ity of the nation to the hatred of lesser ability is done in abject ignorance of the profundity of the force of individ ual preservation. The so-called self-made millionaire is born with the desire to Dursue wealth and the ability to obtain and maintain possession of it. No such men are "saints. " Earth has no place for such. Ignorance asserts that such men are "abusing their trusts. " What trusts ? Who or what gave them any such re sponsibility ? Nothing but vanity or superstition ! It is a very dangerous thing to assert that the millionaire has not a just right to the fruits of his abil ity. Fortunes made in wind-stock gambling are to be condemned , but it takes ability to win even then. Who is to blame , the stock gambler , or the people ple who permit it ? Stock-gambling , and every other vice , is the sign of a weak people that allow strong men to profit by their weakness. The same is true of a weak or corrupt government. No government was ever usurped except when the people were weak. Indiffer ence is a fatal form of weakness. No tyrant ever prospered ; treason never reared its serpentine head in a nation of strong and actively intelligent people Justice places the blame where it be longs. He who leaves the stable door open should not blame the thief. The door of the public stable is wide open to the suffrage of the ignorant , while the key is in the hands of the unscrupulous politician and traitor. Where is the immorality in the self-maintaining abil ity of the strong ? Where is the crimin- ality in the nou-self-maiutaiuiug ability of the weak ? The real conflict of the strong is not ngaiust the weak as re formers assert but between themselves. Trusts , labor unions , have been inaug urated by the strong to mitigate the conflict between themselves. This must result to the benefit of the community , if intelligently conducted. The trouble is it is not always so conducted. Active business is as much a "dog oat dog" com bat as it is between the wage-earners for bread. Trusts and labor unions are en deavors of the dogs to muzzle themselves to their bettor preservation. In the more complex business organizations the dogs are bigger and stronger and the battle fiercer. Unfortunately , the wage- earners and the public are often caught in the maelstrom of the conflict and sometimes submerged thereby. Are the captains of industry and capital entirely to blame therefor ? They , alone , are not to blame for our uneasy and turbulent social seas. They did not make them. They found themselves cast on the stormy waters at birth as the rest of us. Why blame them if borii capable of navigating their own ships ? The uiiin- telligence of lesser ability , the rabid deinagogism of unreflecting reformers , unscrupulous politicians , and parasitic socialistic agitators , are a thousand times more to blame than the conserva tive self-maintaining ability of the cap tains of industry , whose greatest fault is that they mind their own business too much , and are indifferent to the public welfare to their personal injury. Why not blame the poor and unfortunate for being born with a minus of self-niaiu- taining ability , and not seek to make the ricli responsible for that over which they have no control ? Admitted that men born with a sur plus of self-maintaining ability ore sel dom saints ; admitted that they carry their aggressiveness to a degree danger ous to themselves , and often shutting off othera from opportunities which in most cases it is doubtful if they could apply to their own use ; admitted that in their mutual struggles they adopt methods which often lead to mutual injury and destruction , and thereby injure others ; still that is no reason for holding the captains of industry up to those less gifted as "thieves and robbers ; as men who will not hesitate to maintain them selves with force and murder if neces sary" as is too often done by those who know not the truth. Where is there one case where an intelligent man has attempted such business suicide ? A little honesty and common sense is a most valuable property oven in human itarian reformers and social agitators. FRANK S. BILLINGS. "It is the money NOT nONOK. in the office and not the honor which I seek" said Col. William Jennings Bryan when ho first began making a fortune out of politics. " " "