Lead us gently, Father Time, as you take us to the portals of the New Year.

We know not what may be within; and our souls are burdened with fear as we stand here at the door.

Lost, forever lost, is the Confidence with which we used to go bounding into the New Year—as revellers hasten to the feast.

We have met the Unforeseen so often, have mourned where we thought to rejoice, been trampled upon amid the horrors of panic and defeat where we had so stoutly fought for victory and reward, that our hearts are sadly subdued, Father Time.

***

We did not SEEK this awful life-woe, Father Time.

Thrust, from some great outer darkness, into the hurly burly called Life, we gaze upward at the stars in helpless ignorance of what it all may mean; and some Irresistable Force pushes us, pushes us, swiftly, inexorably, onward to another outer darkness that fills us with speechless awe.

***

Have mercy on us, Father Time. We have been beaten with many stripes, and are covered with many wounds.

God! How we have suffered!

We knew nothing at the beginning, and we know but little now; and, for every lesson that we have learned, we have been made to pay in heart-aches and scalding tears.

Always struggling, often down, always anxious for the Morrow, often in torture Today, we have stumbled forward, Father Time, still looking for the smooth road and the sunny sky and the bright Companionship of Success and Peace.

Shall we NEVER see Carcassonne, Father Time?

***

We shudder when we think of what you did to us during the Old Year, Father Time.

Ah, but you were hard on us—bitter hard. Our little ones panted for a breath of fresh air, Father Time; and they died like flies, in noisome, reeking, crowded tenements, because there was not, in all God’s Universe—where there’s light and air for every flower that flecks the field—a breath of fresh air for the little children of the slums.

Ah, it was pitiful, Father Time!

Our feeble ones, young and old, perished miserably of cold and hunger, in the midst of a land that worships the Good God, and amid such an accumulation of wealth as was never known before since the Morning stars looked down upon a newly-made world.

Poverty, Crime, Vice, Drunkenness, Riot, War, Famine, Pestilence, Earthquake, Conflagration have glutted their awful appetites upon us during the Old Year, Father Time. To WHAT are you leading us in the New?

Will the heart of the world grow harder and harder, Father Time?

Will the greed of human avarice demand still larger sacrifice of human lives?

Will the Selfishness of Class gorge itself still further upon ravenous conquest, and remorseless exploitation?

Shall the cry of the White Slave NEVER reach Heaven, Father Time?

Shall the song of the angels who hung over the infant Christ, NEVER throb, a living principle, in man’s government of man?

Is the Reformer always to be the Martyr, Father Time?

Is Wrong NEVER to be dethroned?

***

Oh, Father Time! We tremble as we feel you leading us toward the door of the New Year. Beyond that portal we cannot see, and we dread it—as children dread the dark.

Deal gently with us in the New Year, Father Time.

Give us strength to bear the Cross—for we know that we must bear it.

Give us courage for the battle, for we know that we must fight it.

Give us patience to endure, for we know that we shall need it.

Give us Charity that thinks not evil of the Just, and which will stretch forth the helpful hand to lift our weaker Brother out of the mire, rather than the cruel scorn which passes him by, or thrusts him further down.

Give us Faith in the Right which no defeat can disturb, no discouragement undermine.

Give us the Love of Truth which no temptation can seduce and no menace intimidate.

Give us the Fortitude which, through the cloud and the gloom and the sorrow of apparent Failure, can see the distant pinnacles upon which the everlasting sunlight rests.

Give us the Pride which will suffer no contamination, no compromise of self-respect, no wilful desertion of honest conviction.

Give us the Purpose that never turns and the Hope that never dies.

And, Father Time, should the New Year, into which you are taking us, have upon its calendar that day in which the few who love us shall be bowed down in sackcloth and ashes, let THAT day, like all the other days, find us ON DUTY—faithful unto the end.

---

Mr. Bryan and Mr. Watson.

When I was in Nebraska in 1904 Mr. Bryan showed me every courtesy; therefore, it was most appropriate for me to reciprocate at the first opportunity. When Mr. Bryan reached the State of Georgia, during his recent tour of the South, I wrote him a note which he gave to the press, and which our readers have doubtless seen.

Not long afterwards the following personal acknowledgement was received:

***

Mr. Bryan says: “It is gratifying to know from what I have learned that we are going to be able to act together in the coming contest.”

Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to see the National Democratic party undergo a general casting out of the unclean spirits that have taken possession of it. If it should become truly Democratic, if it should return to the principles of the fathers, if it should renounce Hamilton and all his works, if it should rebaptize itself in the creed of Jefferson, if its National organization should expel every tool of the Trusts, every agent of Wall street, every beneficiary of special Privilege—then the Democratic party would stand for substantially the same things as The People’s Party.

That being so, why should we not be able “to act together?”

Party names are nothing. Principles are everything. True reformers think more of having the work done than of getting the credit. Many Populists condemned me in 1905 for advising them to support Hoke Smith for Governor of Georgia. No Populist condemns me now. Everybody realizes that there are more Populists in Georgia today than there ever were before.

Read once more the strong, manly letter which Hoke Smith wrote for the first issue of the Weekly Jeffersonian, and then remember that thirteen years ago the writer was a member of Cleveland’s Cabinet—then you will realize how immensely the man has grown.

Well, his Democratic followers have grown with him, and we Jeffersonians vastly outnumber the moss-backs throughout the State of Georgia.

***

As Mr. Bryan says, a great change is coming over the people. Doctrines which were scouted a few years ago are shouted now. Radicals who were hooted, howled down and rotten-egged a few years ago are getting bouquets now. The Hearst editorials and speeches read like Populist harangues of 1892. The Bryan platform of 1906 embraces what was considered the wildest plank of the People’s Party platform of 1891.

“Act together,” William? Why not—if you take our principles for your creed and reorganize your old party to fit your new faith?

***

That all true reformers may find a way to “act together” is a consummation devoutly to be wished. A conference between Bryan, Hearst and myself for that purpose was suggested immediately after the election of 1904, but neither Mr. Bryan nor Mr. Hearst seemed to approve.

What may happen between now and 1908 no one can foretell, but I am still hoping that some honorable plan may be hit upon which will enable all true-hearted reformers to “act TOGETHER” and overthrow this fearful system which enables the privileged few to plunder the unprivileged many.

---

Socialism at War with Love of Home and Country.

In a recent issue of a leading Socialist paper the following gem of thought is to be found:

“‘Patriotism’ is a nickname for ‘Prejudice.’”

Do you know why the Socialist flouts patriotism and calls it prejudice?

Think a little, and you will see. You love your country because your home is a part of it; and you love your home because it is your individual haven of refuge from the storms of life—the individual kingdom in which you are lord and master and in which you enjoy, with your wife, your children, and your friends, whatever happiness life can give.

The man never lived who would NOT fight for his home—HOWEVER HUMBLE.

The man never lived who would fight for the tenement house in which he chances to be a lodger. The home is ever sacred—the hotel never is. The reason is plain enough. The home is yours, individually; the hotel is everybody’s generally. Now, the Socialist strikes at individualism. He doesn’t want to own your home by any title that gives you individual control of it. He wants everybody’s home to belong to you, and your home to belong to everybody. In other words, the homes of the people are to be owned collectively. If society sees fit to say to you “Move on,” out you go. Society will substitute its title for your title, its will for your will, its control for your control. The home that Socialism will permit you to use this year may be allotted to some one else another year.

Under these conditions no man would love his home any more than he would love his room in a hotel. Under these conditions, the citizen would have no greater inducement to make permanent improvements upon his home, than he would have to make improvements upon the hotel.

Love of home being destroyed, love of country would also be destroyed. Patriotism, being founded upon love of home, would perish under Socialism, for the simple reason that the foundations would be gone. Under Socialism, the most beautiful feature of civilized life would disappear. Home life, as we know it, would be impossible. The song of “Home, Sweet Home,” would thrill no responsive chords in the human heart. The tender pathos of Burns’ “Cotter’s Saturday Night,” would not be felt. Socialism would answer with a universal YES, Sir Walter Scott’s ringing challenge,

The Washington Post is authority for the statement that the President will, in his next Message, again urge upon Congress the necessity for Currency Reform.

The MONEY QUESTION, as you will remember IS SETTLED; it is only THE CURRENCY that needs REFORM.

Bryan says THE MONEY QUESTION IS SETTLED; ditto Roosevelt; ditto Secretary Shaw; ditto the big bugs of BOTH the dear old political parties.

Yet, with equal unanimity and fervor, they all say that THE NEED OF CURRENCY REFORM is something fierce.

Peculiar, isn’t it?

***

When the people want financial legislation that will restore the system of The Fathers, it is THE MONEY QUESTION, and it’s SETTLED. The old party leaders, one and all, agree upon THAT.

Politically, therefore, THAT question is Res Adjudicata, and must not be spoken of any more.

But when the corporations want financial legislation which will tend still further to make our National Treasury a huge Reservoir from which the National Banks and their allies can draw strength, support and profit—why, THEN, it is a matter of CURRENCY REFORM, and if Congress doesn’t give the Money Power everything it demands, the Country will go to the “demnition bow-wows.”

That’s how it is, my son.

The moguls of high finance declare that what our currency system needs is greater “elasticity.” The India rubber quality is wanting, it seems. The present system doesn’t stretch readily enough. The Moguls declare that the “rigidity” of the currency system threatens us with calamitous conditions at the prospect of which the imagination becomes exhausted and quits business.

Those two words, “elasticity” and “rigidity” are being featured in all the Mogul talk, all the Mogul papers—and are being dutifully repeated by all the Mogul Senators and Representatives.

***

Yet, there isn’t a particle of sound common sense in all this cant about elasticity and rigidity.

When the currency system of the body-politic is healthy and normal, there can be no question of elasticity and rigidity. Like the circulation of the blood in the human body, the circulation of money will take care of itself.

Once get the system right, and nature will do the rest.

If the Physician tells you that YOUR CIRCULATION IS BAD—you KNOW what that means.

Your system is out of order. The blood goes about its business, without any help from YOU, PROVIDED YOUR SYSTEM IS KEPT IN ORDER.

You don’t have to pump blood away from center to the extremities; THE BLOOD WILL GO THERE, OF ITSELF, IF YOUR BODILY SYSTEM IS IN THE PROPER, NORMAL, SOUND CONDITION.

It is just so with, the circulation of money in the body politic; if the system is RIGHT, THE MONEY CIRCULATION WILL REGULATE ITSELF BY NATURAL LAWS.

***

Elasticity—Rigidity—two words that are cunningly employed to disguise the purpose of the Moguls of National finance. Those conspirators mean to drive the Government still further away from the Constitutional system of the Fathers. They mean to push still further the usurped power of the National Banks to create and control the supply and distribution of the Currency.

“Currency Reform” means nothing more nor less than that.

***

Government loans to the common people, at four per cent, or even at two per cent, would seem to be more statesmanlike, in all respects, than this eternal lending of government money to Wall Street without any interest at all.

Why should Uncle Sam furnish gamblers money to speculate with? Can any good reason be given for it? Does it seem to be fair to legitimate business men? Is it just to the taxpayers? Can it be RIGHT?

Yet the Wall Street gamblers got nearly ($30,000,000) thirty million dollars from the U. S. Treasury in one lump. Upon this huge sum of public money, the speculators will pay no interest at all.

Is it right?

***

According to the official statement for Nov. 12th, 1906, THE GOVERNMENT has now increased its loans to the National Banks to the stupendous TOTAL of $147,000,000.

Never before has the gratuitous loan been so large. Who can defend such a policy? Who would not BE ASHAMED to appear before an audience of intelligent voters to advocate the wisdom and the propriety of such GOVERNMENTAL FAVORITISM as this?

You laughed at the Farmers’ Alliance when it favored government loans to the people, on the best of security, at two per cent interest. Yet you say nothing against government loans to a few pet National Banks FREE OF INTEREST, and upon DOUBTFUL SECURITY.

Part of that LOAN OF ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY-SEVEN MILLIONS is secured by Chicago Municipal Bonds, called, I believe, the Sanitary Bonds. Would you not prefer to lend YOUR Money upon a good farm, or upon warehouse certificates for cotton?

***

The farmers would be only too glad to pay the Government FOUR PER CENT for that money which THE PET BANKS GET FOR NOTHING. Four per cent interest upon one hundred and forty-seven million dollars is a tidy sum. Figure it out and you will see, that it is about SIX MILLION DOLLARS. That’s a neat sum to be GIVEN AWAY EVERY YEAR, isn’t it?

***

Consider this also: You, the Common People, are the taxpayers who put that money into the U. S. Treasury. The pet National Banks pay, practically, none of it.

Yet THEY have the use of YOUR money FREE. If YOU get the use of a dollar of it, YOU MUST GO TO THEM FOR TERMS.

Tough, isn’t it?

No wonder the money supply is congested. So long as the Government TAXES IT OUT OF THE POCKETS OF THE MANY, and delivers it over TO THE FEW, there is bound to be congestion.

Yet, the Pet National Banks are moving heaven and earth, RIGHT NOW, to have CONGRESS LEGISLATE IN FAVOR OF GREATER CONGESTION. The power of the Few over the Many must be increased by additional legislation. Otherwise, the bottom will drop out and Perdition will have us by the nape of the neck. When eminently respectable cabinet officers, congressmen, editors, etc., tell you that THE PRESENT SYSTEM OF RUNNING THE FINANCES IN FAVOR OF WALL STREET SPECULATORS AND PET BANKS is safe and sane, and that all we need is to make it a little more so, BELIEVE EVERY WORD OF IT AND VOTE ACCORDINGLY.

On the contrary, when some discredited crank tells you that it is an infernal shame to use the law-making machinery in that manner, howl him down, at once.

Don’t lend to the taxpayer his own money at four per cent. That’s paternalism—and it STINKS.

Take the taxpayers’ money and LEND IT TO THE PET BANKS without any interest.

That’s statesmanship—and it SMELLS LIKE ATTAR OF ROSES.

---

As to Hearst.

The case against Plutocracy gained an advance upon the Docket by the New York gubernatorial contest, but, unless I am much mistaken, two national figures came out of it with mud on their boots.

One of these is W. R. Hearst.

The other is W. J. Bryan.

When Max Ihmsen advised Mr. Hearst to come to terms with Murphy, the striped Tammany Boss, he disgusted thousands of sincere Hearstites, not only in New York but throughout the Union.

The deal was too bad.

It took Hearst out of the class of Reformers and put him into that of self-seeking Politicians.

It created in the minds of his disinterested friends the suspicion that he posed as a Reformer to serve the purpose of a personal ambition.

***

Boss Murphy is a rich specimen of the Boss—the man who is in politics for Money, who cares nothing for Principle, who has no conception of Duty, who would not understand what you meant if you talked to him about Moral Obligation, who amasses wealth by screening from adverse legislation the rascals that rob the Public under corporate names, who makes it possible for invaluable public franchises to be stolen with impunity, and who renders it easy for the robbers that grabbed the property to use it to oppress and exploit the people from whom it was stolen.

I know that Murphy is the worst representative of that class of Bosses because the Hearst newspapers told me so.

I know that he has used his power, as Tammany Chief, to protect such robbers of the Public as Belmont, Morgan, Rogers and Ryan, because Mr. Hearst has told me so with “damnable iteration” and convincing emphasis these many years.

At the breakfast table, he reminded me of it in his morning paper, The American.

At the supper table, he recalled the fact to my memory in his evening paper, The Journal.

In fact, he gave me no chance to forget it.

Murphy, a protector of Crime, Murphy, a tool of the Plunderbund; Murphy, the stuffer of ballot-boxes; Murphy, the ally of Murderers and thieves; Murphy, the inciter to assassination; Murphy, who robbed New York in the interest of Ryan and Belmont; Murphy, who ought to be in the Penitentiary garbed in convict stripes—THIS Murphy became so familiar to me in the Hearst newspapers that I would have felt the loss of something habitual, and therefore necessary, had my friend Hearst ceased to grind the coffee-mill.

Yet Max Ihmsen deliberately planned a coalition between denouncer and denounced, between the Angel of Reform and the Devil of Plutocracy, between the Champion of the “Common People” and the hireling of the Plunderbund, between the man who cried “Stop thief” and the rogue who was making off with the stolen goods.

It was too bad.

It shocked the Sense of Right of ten thousands of enthusiastic Hearstites who had believed in him as an honest leader.***

See the Consequences of this foul and fatal deal:

First—the loss of that most valuable asset, the real reformers of The Independence League;

Second—the revulsion of feeling among disinterested Democrats and Republicans who were supporting Hearst on principle;

Third—the calling back to robust life of the almost defunct Boss, Murphy;

Fourth—the complete rehabilitation of Tammany;

Fifth—the surrender to the Plunderbund of the State Supreme Court for fourteen years;

Sixth—the restoration to his place of power and hurtfulness of Thomas Grady, the most debauched legislative corruptionist in America.

I know that Grady is that kind of man, because the Hearst papers have assured me of it so often that no doubt upon the subject disturbs the absolute serenity of my fixed opinion.

***

As these net results of the New York election loom up clearly above the dust and noise of the conflict, it is natural that Mr. Hearst will be seen to have dimmed his halo very considerably; and the fact that Murphy, after securing to himself and his gang all the benefits of the coalition, turned upon Hearst at the last moment and put the knife into him, will cause no tears ANYWHERE.

That’s just what Hearst ought to have known would happen—for he had said things about Murphy which no man, born of woman, could possibly forgive.

***

But Bryan put a shadow upon his radiance, also.

He swallowed the Hearst programme all the way through—from soup and fish to cheese and coffee. His stomach balked at nothing. The ousting of Democratic delegations which had been elected to the Buffalo Convention; the packing of that Convention with delegations which had not been elected; the throw down of The Independence League; the guillotining of the Independent candidates; the repudiation of the honest labor-champion, Thomas Rock, and the endorsement of the Plunderbund corruptionist, Thomas Grady; the fix-up of the Judiciary ticket in which three Judges were allotted to Hearst while Murphy calmly pocketed seven—Bryan’s gorge rose at none of these things. One and all, they slid down his gullet like rain-water down a tin valley.

Just think if it!

In 1904, Bryan was making 60 speeches a day for Parker—Judge Alton B. Parker—whom he described as “the Moses of Democracy.”

In 1906, he was writing, telegraphing, telephoning and so forth for W. R. Hearst, the exact CONTRAST to Parker.

Heavens, what a leap!

From Parker to Hearst—from Greenland’s icy mountains to India’s coral strand.

Never saw such a jump before in my life.

And Bryan is going to find that it will require considerable dexterity to fit his crown on straight, after that trouser-splitting leap.

Hearst has not changed in principle; Parker has not changed in principle; yet within two short years Mr. Bryan has advocated EACH OF THEM with equal fervor.

Quit playing Politician, William, or you will do yourself irreparable injury.

Fly your flag as Reformer and hold your sword straight before you.

Don’t again call such a man as Parker “the Moses of Democracy.”

Don’t endorse Hearst, when he is WRONG!

Condemn the wrong, and thus encourage Hearst to mend his ways, to retire Max Ihmsen, and THUS MAKE his powerful newspapers, more useful, more effective in the grand cause of Reform.

---

Ornamental Flag Poles—Eastern Insurance Companies.

The Pennsylvania politicians decided that the state needed a new Capitol. The people were told that unless a better state house were erected Pennsylvania would be pointed at with scorn, viewed with alarm, and otherwise treated in a disrespectful and uncomfortable manner.

So, the politicians, contractors, material men, jobbers, lobbyists, dead-beats, plain thieves and so forth, went forward and in due time a new capitol for Pennsylvania was evolved.

Costing how much?

Thirteen million dollars, my son.

The house, itself, cost only $4,000,000.

But, then, you see, it had to be furnished.

The “furnishings” of the new state house cost the tax payers of Pennsylvania $9,000,000.

As a sample of said furnishings, consider the one item of flag staff.

What would such a magnificent new capitol be without a flag flying above it?

Of course, the state house must be surmounted by the flag.

And how can the flag do itself credit, away up there in the heavens, without a pole to fly from?

Of course, there must be a flag pole.

So, the pole was put in place, and the flag was braced to the pole.

At what cost, please?

Why, the flag pole cost $850. Not $8.50, but $850.

So, at least, it appears upon the expense-account.

What was the flag pole made of?

Why, it was just the round body of a large pine tree.

Nothing else, my son.

The probability is that any sawmill in the country would have furnished such a tree for $25.

The labor of preparing the tree for use as a flag pole might have cost another $25.

Fifty dollars ought to have covered the entire cost.

But then, you see, the gang that was bossing the job needed money; therefore, the State of Pennsylvania was supplied with a fifty-dollar flag pole for the moderate sum of $850.

***

But the country is adorned with numerous other flag poles of the same variety.

One of them is Paul Morton, President of The Equitable Assurance Society.

No institution in this land of the free has a flag pole that is more expensive.

Paul Morton costs the policy holders of the Equitable $80,000 per year. Not $8,000—which would be a fair price—but $80,000—which is a gouge.

Just how many men, equally capable, could be found to fill his place at $10,000 per year, it would be impossible to say; but there is no doubt whatever that Paul himself would have served the Society just as well upon a salary of $25,000.

But then, you see, he wanted more. So he took it.

Flag poles come high—under certain circumstances.

***

Life Insurance, properly done, is of vast benefit to the Insured. Life Insurance, improperly done, is of vast benefit,—to the Insurer. Those Eastern Companies got too gay. Their higher officers became corrupt. Under various flimsy pretexts, they began to plunder the Insured. Local agents, who did the hard work, got small pay. State agents and National officers drew princely salaries,—and did little to show for it.

Some of those Eastern Companies have been building Insurance Business on the same principle that gave an exhibition of itself in the building of the new State House of Pennsylvania.

Everybody knows that the taxpayers of Pennsylvania have been robbed. Everybody knows, equally well, that the Policy-holders of those Eastern Companies have been plundered.

From the standpoint of such rascals as the McCurdy gang, the Policy-holder resembled an Irish potato, in that he had eyes yet saw not.

The blind Policy-holder, who could never see that he was being robbed, became a jest among the thieves who spent his money in riotous living.

Life Insurance is all right—when the Insurer is.

Before you allow the Insurance Company to examine YOU, examine the Insurance Company.

---

Abraham Lincoln’s Silly Biographers.

The process of making a saint out of Abraham Lincoln goes bravely on. His latest biographer, Mr. Hill, clears him of the charge of “telling stories just to amuse people.” Mr. Hill—a sober and worthy man, no doubt—produces a witness by the name of Ewing, who being duly sworn, deposes and says:

“I never heard Mr. Lincoln tell a story for its own sake or simply to raise a laugh. He used stories to illustrate a point, but the idea that he sat around and matched yarns like a commercial traveller is utterly false.”

Why should the Lincoln biographers strive and strain to establish the fact that HE NEVER “SAT AROUND AND MATCHED YARNS LIKE A COMMERCIAL TRAVELLER?”

Is it any disgrace to sit around, occasionally, and swap yarns, “like a commercial traveller?”

If so, the men who are TRULY RESPECTABLE are the dull fellows who can neither tell a joke, nor enjoy one. Some of the best and brightest men that ever lived have prided themselves upon their gifts in that very line. To be a good story-teller is to possess the golden key that unlocks almost every social door.

Daniel Webster revelled in a good story; so did Clay; so did Tom Corwin; so did Robert Toombs, and Alexander H. Stephens.

As a mental relaxation and recreation, there are, in fact, few things that serve better than “to sit around and match yarns like a commercial traveller.”

***

The truth about Lincoln is that he was a man, and a great man, but no saint.

The last time I was in New York (November, 1905), my friend, Hon. T. H. Tibbles, of Nebraska, was there, also, and we talked of Lincoln, whom Mr. Tibbles had known.

And one of the very things which Mr. Tibbles had seen and heard Mr. Lincoln do was “to sit around and match yarns like a commercial traveller.”

***

Mr. Tibbles told me how, being at a certain place, his attention was attracted by repeated bursts of loud laughter, coming from a certain room. His youthful curiosity being excited, he followed the sound to the room from which it came. The sight that met his eyes was this: Abraham Lincoln was sitting in a chair, with his big feet upon a table in front of him; around him were grouped a number of men, to whom Mr. Lincoln was telling side-splitting yarns.

Tibbles joined the audience and got his share of the fun.

What of it?

Does that lower Lincoln in any sensible man’s eyes?

No. Let the Miss Nancy brigade go off to one side and talk about the nebular hypothesis, or some other nice, well-bred subject. For my part, I would prefer, occasionally, “to sit around and match yarns like a commercial traveller.”

***

I asked Mr. Tibbles whether the stories that he heard Mr. Lincoln telling were smutty.

At some future time, when I find, after a careful field-glass scrutiny of the horizon, that I have no other row on hand, and am feeling the need of one very badly, I am going to tell you Tibbles’ answer.

---

Shoot, Luke, or Give Up the Gun.

Most men are presumed to have sense enough to know when the sun is up, and when it is down.

To no mortal on this earth is it a matter of vital importance to know the exact moment it rises and sets.

Even if any inquisitive lunatic wanted to know, he couldn’t find out, for the simple reason that the hour of sunrise and sunset varies with every mile of the earth’s surface, and is earlier to the man at the foot of the mountain than to the man on top.

In the military establishments of the world, however, it is considered to be a matter of life and death to know just when the sun rises and just when he sets. So extremely indispensable is this piece of daily information that a gun, a cannon we mean, must be fired to proclaim the tidings.

“Boom!”—the sun is up.

“Boom!”—he’s down.

Whereupon, your true soldier can sleep with a conscience childlike in its freedom from care.

Otherwise not.

If that gun (mind you, a cannon) was not fired, solemnly and formally fired, every time the sun rose and every time he set, the military breast would be racked with rude alarms, and the military mind would be tossed to and fro with dread forebodings.

To fire off a musket wouldn’t do; wouldn’t begin to do.

It would be unconstitutional, if not actually anarchistic and revolutionary.

To start the day without firing a cannon—why the military establishment could no more perform its traditionary functions without a cannon salute to the coming and going of the sun than one of the old parties could exist without stuffed ballot boxes.

Therefore, the custom is fixed—rooted, as it were, in the soil of our civilization. It is one of the greatest advantages we have over our untutored ancestors.

However much they may have yearned to shoot the sun up and shoot it down, they couldn’t do it. They had nothing to shoot with. They were so completely engulfed in the currents of stupidity and barbarism that they just had to trust to their eyes to know when the sun was up, or was down.

You might ask how the soldiers do on cloudy days. You might ask, with unseasonable levity, if the army doesn’t have to go by the clock when the sun is not to be seen. And you might, out of your desire to be smart and show yourself off, ask whether the army couldn’t go by the clock as well on fair days as on foul ones.

But such questions as these will do you no good, and they would cause you to lose friends. They are irrelevant impertinences.

For, you see, when anything has been done a long time, the presumption is that there is sense in doing it that way.

Therefore, all nice and respectable people put salt in the fire when the screech owl twitters, and make a cross mark and spit in it, whenever they turn back in their tracks. We all do this because the custom has age and good sense on its side.

If you think you can prance through the world smashing steady old customs which have been handed down to us from time immemorial, you are in a fair way to get yourself into trouble.

Consequently, if you don’t like the way the armies of the world spend the people’s money shooting for the sun, you had just as well make up your mind to the wisdom of laying low, and paying your share of the expenses.

Every two years, your chosen representatives in Congress approve the item in the Military Appropriation Bill which gives $20,600 to the army to shoot the sun-shoots with.

Now, if you don’t like it what are you going to do about it?

The soldiers are not going to go by clocks or by eyes—they are going to shoot those cannon, at all the military posts, every time the sun rises and every time he sets.

And you will continue to pay the expenses, as formerly.

What else are you here for?

“Boom!”—the sun’s up.

“Boom!”—he’s down.

And it only costs $20,600.

See how great a thing it is to be civilized.

We shouldn’t be surprised if the sun had lots of amusement watching us fools down here.

Boom!!!

---

The Dismissal of Those Negro Troops.

What else could the President have done?

He is Commander-in-Chief of the Army: certain members of a certain battalion “shoot up” a certain town destroying property, terrorizing a peaceful community and committing murder.

The Commander-in-Chief endeavors to discover the identity of the guilty parties. He fails. He then appeals to the honor of the battalion, asking that the innocent point out the guilty. By no other method can the red-handed rioters and murderers be identified and brought to Justice.

The battalion is deaf to the appeal.

The innocent refuse to point out the guilty.

The innocent elect to make a common cause with the guilty.

Therefore, THEY, THEMSELVES, BECOME GUILTY of the highest crimes, as Accessories after the Fact.

In law and morals, there is not an innocent man left in that battalion, whose every member deliberately conceals the murderers, aids and abets them after full knowledge of the crime.

Considering them all as guilty, the President ordered their dishonorable discharge.

Why not?

They had committed crimes involving turpitude, degrading the uniform.

They had sullenly defied the President’s appeal to their honor, and hence his notice to disband them.

The innocent had elected to share the guilt of the guilty, and thus the whole battalion was guilty.

***

Fanatical friends of the blacks say that the President should not have punished the innocent.

Nor did he.

He who conceals a murderer giving him aid and comfort, is himself a party to the crime.

What legal principle is older and sounder than that?

The fanatics overlook it.

The President did not.

Nor will those who consider the facts without passion and seek to judge the case without prejudice.

Apparently, the fanatics intend to convulse the Congress and the country over this matter of the Negro Troops.

Let it not be forgotten that even now the fanatics do not propose that the originally innocent negroes shall be required to point out those originally guilty.

The fanatics demand that the President back down, and that the order for the dismissal of the negroes be countermanded.

Thus, the originally guilty will be forever screened, and the crimes they committed will forever go unwhipt of Justice.

The President has been right and should be sustained.

To allow these fanatics and these negroes to triumph over the President, would be to exalt the criminal and to degrade the Just Judge.

If that had been a battalion of white men, nothing would have been said about it.

But it was a lot of negroes—consequently the fanatics got busy.

---

The Proposed Ship Subsidy

A FAT MAN who was talking loud enough to disturb his fellow-passengers on the train, said:

“What we need now is the Ship Subsidy, and the Panama Canal and”—the rest was of the same sort. He had read something like this in a newspaper, and had SEEN IT THERE SO OFTEN that he had come to the conclusion it must necessarily be true.

In this way some men get what they call their opinions.

Not YOU, of course. You get yours BY THINKING FOR YOURSELF. I know that this is so, because YOU TOLD ME SO YOURSELF.

“We need a Ship Subsidy,” declared the fat man, with emphasis and decision. So “WE” do—but who are the “WE?”

The WE who need a Ship Subsidy are the Privileged, the beneficiaries of Class Legislation, the Trusts which gorge themselves upon unjust advantages.

In order that we may enable the Manufacturing Class to enjoy a Monopoly at home while they undersell the foreign Manufacturer in the foreign market, we have put a fictitious, UNNATURAL VALUE TO THE MATERIALS OUT OF WHICH SHIPS ARE BUILT.

Consequently it costs MORE to build a ship in the United States than anywhere else in the world.

Now, our Navigation laws will not allow the national flag to protect an American vessel UNLESS THAT VESSEL IS BUILT IN THE UNITED STATES.

Result:

The foreigner has come WITH HIS CHEAPER VESSEL and borne off our carrying trade.

Our infernal Tariff and Navigation laws have driven our flag from the seas, by making it IMPOSSIBLE FOR THE AMERICAN MERCHANT TO BUY HIS SHIP ABROAD, OR TO BUILD ONE AT HOME ON SUCH TERMS AS WILL ENABLE HIM TO COMPETE WITH THE FOREIGN-BUILT SHIP.

Isn’t that plain enough, WHEN YOU STOP TO THINK IT OVER?

But the fat man declared that what WE need is the Ship Subsidy Bill.

What IS the Ship Subsidy Bill?

Why, it is a proposition that the Government shall, in effect, take money out of the National Treasury TO MAKE GOOD TO THE SEA MERCHANT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE FOREIGN AND HOME PRICE OF THE SHIP.

That’s the GIST of it, my son.

At your expense, the government has created the Trust which makes it impossible for an American to build a ship that can compete for ocean-going freight.

At your expense, that impossibility is to be abolished. The difference in price between the cheap foreign-built ship and the dear home-built ship IS TO BE MADE UP OUT OF YOUR MONEY.

At your expense, the Trust will therefore be ABLE TO COMPETE for the ocean business.

At your expense, the Trusts themselves will scoop the Carriers’ profit upon the transportation of the Trust-made goods which ARE SOLD ABROAD CHEAPER THAN THEY ARE SOLD AT HOME.

You catch it all around, don’t you, son?

***

Yes, the fat man was right.

We DO need a Ship Subsidy—we Trusts.

We want to maintain our monopoly at home, and we will do it. We want to continue to undersell the foreigner in the market and we will do it. We want, furthermore, to rake into our own coffers the profits now reaped by the foreigner who controls ocean transportation.

We COULD do this by lowering the Tariff, but that would derange our entire Class-law fabric. That would endanger our monopoly of the home market.

Consequently, the only way for us to get what WE want, is to have the Government grant us a Subsidy which will make good to us THAT DIFFERENCE IN PRICE between home-made and foreign-made vessels WHICH OUR TRUST-CREATING TARIFF HAS CAUSED.

Thus we, the Privileged, will unload upon the Unprivileged BOTH LOADS,—that of the Trust, and that of OUR escape from THE ONE CONSEQUENCE of the trust WHICH HURTS US.

***

There is only one incident to the Protective system which is a drawback to the Trusts.

That is THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF CONTROLLING OCEAN TRANSPORTATION.

Every OTHER incident to the Protective System HELPS THE TRUSTS AND HURTS THE PEOPLE.

The one incident which HURTS THE TRUSTS AND HELPS THE PEOPLE must be dealt with.

We must so manage that ocean transportation shall likewise belong to the Trusts.

How?

By giving to the merchant marine a sum of money out of the public treasury, over and above the freight which is earned.

Then, indeed, every incident of the Protective System will present a harmonious color-scheme, for THE TRUSTS WILL HAVE HOGGED THE WHOLE BUSINESS.

And that donation out of your tax money, which is intended to save the Trusts from the injurious burden of their own damnable Tariff System is the Ship Subsidy which the fat man said we need.

So long as the Protective System hurts the Common People it is a national blessing and must be gratefully sustained: but the moment the same system pinches the Protected Interests, they must rob you under the form of Ship Subsidy to get back what they lose by their own tariff.

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An Appeal to Patriotism.

Signs are plentiful that tens of thousands of honest Democrats and Republicans are profoundly dissatisfied with the trend of recent events.

We look to the State, and no beacon light gives us confidence.

The time was when our rulers loved the people, trusted the people, worked for the people. Those were the times when there was light on the hearth, plenty on the board, and hope in the hearts of the people.

Those were the times when our rulers remembered that our forefathers came here to build a temple, a government, differing in all vital respects from the hateful systems of the Old World.

For this very purpose—that of establishing a system entirely different from that of Europe—our forefathers braved the perils of the deep; fought hunger and faced death; battled with the wilderness and the savages it held; determined to die free, rather than live slaves.

In Europe they were fettered by class laws, class privileges, class tyrannies.

They were crowded out from a fair competition for a share of nature’s bounties by monopolies, chartered wrongs, statutory abuses, legalized spoliations.

Braver than we, their degenerate sons, they counted life worth nothing unless freedom went with it, and their coming here was a sublime protest against the Old World system of Class-law and special privilege.

What have we, today, as the result of all their heroism, and suffering and success?

We have our rulers aping everything Europe does, and fitting upon us, forever, the abominable system our forefathers fled to escape.

Where are class laws more insolently dominant than here?

Where is Special Privilege more tyranically exacting than here?

Where are monopolies more contemptuous of law and public welfare than here?

What people are greater slaves to misgovernment than you whose low-priced products must bear the strain of untaxed bonds, useless offices, and a steady growth of ever increasing salaries?

Who pay nine-tenths of all the taxes?

The many who toil.

Who gets the lion’s share of all the wealth produced?

The few who do not toil.

In what country do the laborers, in shop and mine and mill and field, produce more of the good things of life than ours?

It cannot be named.

In what country has nature opened her royal hands with a more regal bounty?

It cannot be named.

Has there been any failure of harvest?

No.

Has there been pestilence, invasion, or civil strife?

No.

Then why is it that the signal guns of distress sound all along the commercial seas, telling of brave ships going down?

Why is it that the feet of the homeless and the unemployed beat the pavements of our great cities with a never-ending march?

Oh, brothers! why are so many hearths chill and dark, so many hungry mouths unfed, so many despairing souls weighed down with the nameless dread of the unknown future?

We have left the beaten track of our fathers. We have let the old landmarks be forgotten. We have gone after strange gods.

We have foresworn the faith upon which our republic was founded, and are being led back to the system our ancestors came here to shun. Why can’t we all see it? Why can’t we all act together? Why can’t we lay down prejudice, pride and passion, and devote our noblest efforts to the salvation of our country?

AN ABSURD PROPOSITION.