The Conservative (Nebraska City, Neb.) 1898-1902, October 26, 1899, Page 9, Image 9

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    N
t3be Conservative.
* A '
do for campaign disbut-seinonts if the
trusts did not respond to Choir solicita
tions for money in return for 'favorable
legislation ? Both of the political jtar ies
are opposed to trusts so they say , nt >
least and yet , notwithstanding this ,
neither of them prescribes any other
remedy than the showy and harmless
one of a penal statute.
When Sumpter was fired upon , Mr.
Emerson summed up the cause of the
strife in a single sentence : "Wo have
been trying to do without justice. " And
the whole problem of the trusts today
can bo summed up in the same language
they exist because wo have been try
ing to do without justice. Wo cannot
impose burdens upon seventy millions
of people for the benefit of less than a
million ; wo cannot subject our legisla
tors to the great temptations which
exist when they are allowed to lay
foundations in legislation for the prices
of necessaries , and still hope to avoid
the corruption and injustice which are
sure to follow.
The existence of the trust imperils the
very freedom of our government. It
has already turned thousands of inde
pendent employers into employees. It
is rapidly destroying individual initia
tive in the establishment of business. It
must go , and it will go whenever we
take away the very causes which have
brought it into life.
MSOAYKD
GENTJLLITV. very touching are
the pictures , drawn
from , masterly fiction or from still saddei
reality , of the noble-born and finely
bred , accustomed to elegance and abund
ance in past time , now fallen from theii
high estate , and constrained to all man
ner of degrading offices. One takes up
his now burdens with dutiful resigna
tion , and appears nobler than before , in
his humbled condition. One is spirit-
broken , and can do nothing but mourn
departed comfort hardly greatness , as
that would not depart by outward acci
dent ; one , embittered , cherishes a grudge
against things in general. Another , and
there are many of this genus , seeks to
hide the fact of the decline , from others ,
and from himself. We have heard of
one who continued all the rest of his
life pronouncing orders to a ghostly
valet , which he then fulfilled himself.
By every possible assumption of possess
ing what one no longer holds , it seems
to be supposed that the chasm between
splendor and disgrace may be smoothed
over , instead of kept in more glaring
openness.
But among all instances of such de
cay , the most tragio are those where
loftiness of principle is depraved in its
natural utterance to the base uses o :
vulgarity and greed. All the nobilities of
our nature have to suffer much from" this
degeneration ; religion as the noblest
suffering worst. Love of country isn
woeful victim : whatever sentiment up-
icld the purest ideal of a land in which
all the nations of the earth were to be
blessed , must now bo prostituted to the
mrpose of national pillage. To achieve
iho .independence of that country , to
preserve it from destruction in an hour
of mortal peril , were matters of glory ;
therefore , glory must appear in the form
of mere foreign spoliation. The sacred
flag , which bore the record and reminder
of these consecrated struggles , well
night grow to be an emblem of im-
mssionod zeal and love ; therefore , any
thing done beneath its folds , though it
were the deeds of Tartars , is to be sus
tained and sanctified. The grandest
examples of duty have shown forth in
the course of these national conflicts ;
iciice if the nation or its agents see fit
; o plunder a neighbor , sure of weakness
there which cannot long resist , that
Blunder must be called by the name of
duty. And whereas the history of our
country , its nativity , its rise , it deliver
ances and its progress , call aloud for our
devout acknowledgment to God ; there
fore , in the name of God we advance to
murder and depredation.
It must be very apparent to reason ,
and it is abundantly verified by record ,
that , the more questionable a war may
be in the matter of right , the less dic
tated and compelled by palpable
necessity , the louder will bo the procla
mation of righteousness and holiness by
its advocates. Supply follows demand ,
and it is then that they are most needed.
When we are flagrantly oppressed and
invaded , then we have little occasion
for moral rhetoric , the condition speaks
for itself ; but when there is not the
slightest compulsion to arms , then in
deed it behooves us to work our human
ity , duty , destiny and religion for all
they are worth. If these are not brought
well to the fore , what have we to bank
on 9 "WVipn "Rnrrlnnd wns
against Napoleon , we do not generally
recall much of this phraseology in her
public utterances ; no doubt it was used ,
to round off discourse , but the recollec
tion of it is lost in the grinding stress of
action. To denounce the usurper at
home , and fight him abroad , was the
plain business of the hour. But what
hyinns and pecans arose , about the
sanctity and beauty of the cause , in
prose and numerous verse , when she
took a notion to fight Russia in the
Crimea ; an invasion which English
writers now are apt to refer to as "a
crime. " Just that spiritual whistling
then was needful to keep the inora
courage up. A little account has to betaken
taken of these considerations , when we
hear good men practicing at that kind
of mouth-music.
Ex-Representative Onthwaite , promi
nent among the gold democrats of Ohio
says that "the gold democrats , as a rule
are going to vote against the nominee o :
; ho Zanesvillo convention. They regard
lie platform adopted there as oven
worse than the Chicago platform. Here
n Columbus and at a few other
) oints in the state , a small percentage
may vote for McLean because his friends
mvo urged upon them that ho does not
jolievo in free silver at 10 to 1 any more
; han they do , and that , if successful , ho
will help overthrow Bryan and Bryan-
sm at the next national convention.
Very few sincere gold democrats will bo
caught by that sort of cajolery. "
mb ° r ° f
A nouns ffroRY.
THE CONSERVA
TIVE staff was talking the other day
with a man who owns a horse , and in
order not to apppar ignorant in horse-
matters referred to the one fact that ho
thought he was sure of , namely , that
there are no white colts. For the first
; itno in his life this resource failed him.
The man in question said he had once
owned a white colt.
"I was hauling wood one winter
about r. mile above the water-works , "
10 said , "and I had a bay mare that
was heavy with foal. It was pretty
slippery , and the banks was pretty
steep in places , and the first thing I
knowed , all of a sudden my team went
over the bank into the river. Course ,
I jumped in after 'em and got 'ern by
the bits , and held 'em there till the boys
got ropes and poles and pulled 'em out.
The ice was running and it was pretty
cold , all right. I blanketed 'em and
put a man on each one and run 'em up
and down for a half an hour , and it
never hurt 'em a particle. But , sir ,
when that mare's colt was born , blest if
it wasn't a white colt ; all right in every
other way , only pure white all over.
The old mare was that bad scared , I
reckon. But that's the only white colt
I over did see. "
The men who insisted
HOW ?
sisted upon the
ratification of the Paris treaty which
gave sovereignty over the Philippine
islands to the United States and made
that treaty binding as the constitution
itself upon every citizen of this republic
do not now tell how to reconcile their
lobbying then with their present denun
ciation of the treaty and its cense
quences.
Gen. Victor Vifquain declares that
except for the personal presence and aid
of Colonel Bryan that treaty would .
never have been ratified. Senator
Caffery , of Louisiana , gave a perfectly
correct forecast of the logical results of
bloodshed and waste of treasure which
would follow the ratification of the
treaty. How can the savior of the treaty
and his followers now denounce its
disastrous results ? How can they wash
their hands of a war upon which they ,
insisted and for which they enlisted to
remain until let out by resignation ? A"-