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for a disastrous panic—it would be well
for him to consider that Wall Street
threat.
H *
Senator Clay *s Letter.
Elsewhere in this issue will be found a
letter from the junior Senator from Geor
gia. To the readers of the Jeffersonian it
will carry the good news that the prin
ciples for which many of them have work
ed so long are marching on. The recent
financial crisis, which is far from being a
thing of the past, has startled the most
indifferent—creating throughout the
world a desire to know “what’s the mat
ter.” ' ■ : - i di
Crops have been bountiful, business
good, railroads and manufactories and
banks and sawmills and mines increasing
their earnings, and apparently we had
every cause to be prosperous and happy.
Yet, like a bolt from a clear sky, there
came a blight which shriveled business
as the hoar-frost shrivels the tender
leaves.
All at once money disappeared, collec
tions stopped, loans ceased, factories shut
down, tens of thousands of laborers lost
their jobs, banks burst, railroads fell
into the hands of Receivers, and melan
choly crowds of depositors collected
around the holes into which they had
poured their savings—only to find that it
is vastly easier to pour money into such
holes than to pump it out again.
The Government itself had practically
no cash for daily expenses; and when the
disbursing officers drew on New York,
against tlhe sums standing to their credit,
the drafts went the way of all the others
—they were unpaid.
Then New York, Chicago and other
money centers began to flood the coun
try with nasty, illegal, dishonest, dis
graceful soap-wrapper notes, until more
than $100,000,000 of the worthless coun
terfeit stuff had been accepted as genuine
money. Why accepted? Because our law
makers had tied us so hard and fast to
Wall Street that we could not help our
selves.
How had our law-makers done this
thing?
(1) By passing laws which required the
paper currency of the Government to be
burnt.
(2) By surrendering to the national
banks the tremendous profit and power of
supplying the country with paper cur
rency.
(3) By passing the laws which changed
our Constitution and threw the country
on to the Single Gold Standard.
(4) By adopting the foolish policy of
keeping $150,000,000 of idle gold in the
treasury.
(5) By passing the law of Reserves
which concentrates the money .of the. na
tion in New York and a few other big
cities. ' : -• • ■■
(6) By permitting such a reckless sys
tem of banking that bogus money, by the
THE JEFFERSONIAN.
billion, was afloat —drawing compound in
terest —when the volume of actual money
in circulation had been shrunk to such a
small sum that it was totally unable to
meet a demand for real money, should
such demand arise.
Only one billion of dollars were in act
ual circulation—how could it possibly be
enough to carry on all the business of
such a country as ours? No wonder the
banker supplied the demand with his own
paper, and raked in compound interest on
a greater sum than the entire cash supply
—available for circulation —of the whole
world.
Senator Clay’s letter proves that, at
last, our law-makers intend to study this
question from the stand-point of the peo
ple.
It is time, high time, that this be done.
Wall Street monarchs, like J. P. Mor
gan, have come to look upon the national
treasury as an annex to Wall Street. As
such, these Wall Street rascals have been
using it. When they need millions to
gamble on, they wink at the Secretary
and get what they want.
<• Year in and year out, they keep from
one hundred millions to two hundred
and fifty millions of the public money.
They never pay a cent of interest. These
scoundrels pay practically no tax them
selves, and they amass fortunes by get
ting the free use of the taxes paid by the
rest of us.
When they want bonds they say so, and
they get them. They not only get new
bonds when they want them, but they
don’t have to pay out any money to get
the/n. They “credit” the Government
for the purchase money, and the actual
cash does not pass at all. But when pay
day for principal and interest on the
bonds comes, the Government has to pay
in cash.
And it generally pays the interest in ad
vance.
The Jeffersonian is rejoiced to note
the stand which Southern Congressmen
are taking on the financial question, and
we hope that Senator Clay will persevere.
He is headed in the right direction, and
has a splendid opportunity.
A 'Remarkable “Editorial.
So far as we know, the Houston, Texas,
Chronicle is considered an orthodox Dem
ocratic newspaper.
It whoops Bryan, wears the party col
lar, votes the straight ticket, spanks the
other Twin, on paper and does all the
stunts necessary to keep in the swim
That is—we are under the impression
that it does.
This being so, we call attention to an
editorial leader which appeared in this
safe and sane Chronicle on Friday, Jan
uary 24, 1908.
It reads almost like one of those “piec
es” that we Pops used to write. In fact,
it fits our -columns to*a gnat’s heel; and
we are going to slap it in, headline and
all..
It’s good enough for us.
POLICE CLUBS ON CHICAGO
HEADS.
In Chicago Thursday two hundred job
less men lined up in a public street to
march down to the city hall and ask for
work. Police Chief Shippey, ably main
taining the brutal average of his prede
cessors in that office, hurled a battalion
of policemen against the regiment of rag
ged petitioners and beat them with flail
ing clubs into inglorious flight.
Now these jobless ones, oddly enough,
were walking upon their own property —
a public highway —when the police clubs
bloodied their skulls and bruised their de
fenseless shoulders. Moreover, they pro
posed no violence, no breach of the peace.
Byway of giving the public mind an ob
ject lesson, they started as a body to ask
the city government to employ th&m,
since no one else appears to have work
to give them, and they naturally wish to
live.
“Back to your holes!” shouted the po
lice clubs. “Get off the streets! Get off
the earth, if you like, but don’t try any
of your right-of-public-assembly, right-of
petition dodges on us!”
Chicago is notorious throughout Chris
tendom for the bitterness of her labor
wars. It is Rome with her surging ple
beians and haughty patricians all over
again. Big capital has dominated Chica
go’s government, stolen her streets, plun
dered her public services, debauched her
public servants and debased her police
force for years on years.
The plebeians’ first significant revolt
took the form of an attempt to make pub
lic property of the street railways. The
proposition carried repeatedly at the
polls, by overwhelming majorities. But
the patricians, controlling the courts,
state and federal, have managed to cheat
the popular will.
It is one of the grim humors of life that
the only way Mr. Homo can learn some
things is to have them beaten into his
head with a club. Without at all intend
ing anything of the sort, the Chicago po
lice chief, true to the thuggish traditions
of his office, is doing more for the socialist
propaganda in Chicago than all the par
ty’s orators.
You would naturally suppose that the
great daily newspapers of Chicago would
condemn police brutality of this kind, but
they do not. They are true Bourbons—
learning nothing and forgetting nothing.
London, older and sadder, has learned
better how to manage these affairs. When
the jobless thousands of the world’s cap
ital decide to parade their want before
their masters, the London police protect
them, show them the most distinguished
consideration; the jobless assemble in
Trafalgar square, shout the story of the
wrongs against the sky, and work off in
words the burden of their bitterness,
while the patricians pass calmly along
(Continued on Page Twelve.)
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