Che Conservative.
VOL. III. NO. 36. NEBRASKA CITY , NEBRASKA , MARCH 14,1901. , SINGLE COPIES , 5 CENTS.
PUBLISHED WEEKLY.
OFFICES : OVERLAND THEATRE BLOCK.
J. STERLING MORTON , EDITOR.
A JOUUNAIi DEVOTED TO THE DISCUSSION
OP POLITICAL , ECONOMIC AND SOCIOLOGICAL
QUESTIONS.
CIRCULATION THIS WEEK , 10,000 COPIES.
TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION.
One dollar and a half per year in advance ,
postpaid to any part of the United States or
Canada. Remittances made payable to The
Morton Printing Company.
Address , THE CONSERVATIVE , Nebraska
City , Nebraska.
Advertising rates made known upon appli
cation.
Entered at the postofflce at Nebraska City ,
Neb. , as Second Class matter , July 29 , 1898.
On Thursday ,
ARBOR DAY ISSUE. April llth , 1901 ,
THE CONSERVA
TIVE will issue a number devoted to
arboriculture and forestry.
Arbor day comes this year on Monday ,
April 23nd , and it is intended to fill THE
CONSERVATIVE of the llth with instruc
tive and interesting matter for its com
memoration and practical observance.
Superintendents of schools and teach
ers in all the counties and school districts
of the state should become readers of
THE CONSERVATIVE because it is the
only periodical in Nebraska making a
specialty of tree-planting and forest
conservation.
Many men prom-
RECANTING. inent in the United
States who form
erly advocated high protective tariff
duties are modifying their economic
views. More men are beginning to
understand that a tariff framed ex
clusively for protection affords no
revenue ; and that a tariff instituted
exclusively for revenue gives only a little
incidental protection if it gives any at
all.
all.While
While American ironmasters are sell
ing rails to the railroads of the United
States at twenty-eight dollars a ton , and
to those of Japan at twenty-one dollars
and successfully competing with Eng
land for iron-bridge building in her
colonies , they do not appear as very
helpless infants. They do not really
seem to need the power to tax exercised
in their interests. And so there is quite
a general recantation of the heresies of
protection and quite a popular denuuoia
tion of all trade restrictions.
A part cannot be greater than the
whole in economics any more than in
* * i V
mathematics. A few people make things
out of iron and steel and all people use
hem ; the law should be favorable to all
and not to the few to the whole and
not to a part.
A protective tariff interferes with only
hat trade which is mutually profitable ,
because unprofitable trade between
nations as between individuals stops
tself. Free trade does not compel any
body to trade anywhere , but free trade
permits everybody to trade everywhere
hat they can find it profitable to trade
and nobody will trade elsewhere than in
a profitable market except by compul
sion , under trade restrictions.
The intellectual
WEALTH. and moral charac
ter of a nation is
either its greatest wealth or its most ab
ject poverty. The intelligence and hones
ty of an individual determine his value
to a community , his credit in bank and
the social standing of his family. If Ire
land was on a higher plane of mental de
velopment and abounding in schools
teaching good morals , the poverty of the
Irish people would become a story of the
past. The lack of material wealth
among a people is logically caused by
the absence of mental and moral charac
teristics which , as human qualities , con
stitute the most desirable wealth of the
modern world.
The personal qualities of a free man ,
his intellectual abilities and his estab
lished character
Personal Qualities , for integrity , are
the sources of his
income. They establish his value. Upon
them he relies for a living. He sells
in the market , where services are demand
ed , his efforts at a higher price than is
given for those of an ignorant and
characterless man. The slave does not
own his personal qualities and they are
a subject of barter and exchange at the
will of his master. But if the slave has
good intellectual ability and a markec
honesty and truthfulness he is sold or
hired out , at bigger wages than are given
for the ignorant and vicious. Persona
qualities are therefore wealth ; and per
sonal capital in education , honesty and
industry , draws larger dividends in the
United States today than all the capita
in all the corporations of the country
which represent merely material things
And upon the immaterial wealth of edu
cation and good morals the prosperity of
tliis republic depends for conservation
and perpetuation. When America be-
omes , bankrupt as to intellectual and
moral capital it will be pauperized in
deed ; for material development and the
accumulation of tangible wealth depend
upon cultured brains and good hearts.
Sometimes society mistakes material for
mental wealth. Sometimes dollars are
so multiplied and concentrated in a per
son that the careless observer , or the
; oady , recognizes in them great intellec
tual and moral forces. That is no doubt
one of the reasons why Clark of Mon
tana is sent to the United States senate ,
and possibly a cause of the return of
Quay of Pennsylvania to the same body.
Recent eructa-
THE CONSENT tory declaimers ,
OF THE GOVERNED , endeavoring * to
create discontent
among the American people , have been
interpreting Jefferson , who held about
seventy slaves , to have literally pro
claimed the consent of the governed , in
cluding negro slaves , to bo essential to
government.
The same declaimers , however , sup
port their brother in populism , Tillman ,
of South Carolina , in all his sayings and
doings to the end that negroes , who are
not slaves , in the southern states , shall
be governed without their consent.
The same disturbers of contentment
allege also that Washington , himself the
largest slaveholder when the United
States government was established , be
lieved that "the consent of the governed"
was extended to all men , bond and free
alike.
How long before these vagarists will
demand that the government of the jails
and penitentiaries shall be based upon
the consent of the governed ? How long
before they will proclaim that all births
ought to depend upon the consent of the
born ?
The lawyers of
LAWYERS. the United States
hold and exercise
great power in the social , commercial ,
and political life of the country. They
are as a rule men of intelligence and
commendable character for integrity. If
they lack any one essential element of
fairness and justice it may possibly be
found in the partiality they sometimes
show for unworthy members of their
own profession who have betrayed
clients , cheated litigants and outraged
confidence.
