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THE ATLANTA GEORGIAN
Published Every Afternoon Except Sunday
By THE GEORGIAN COMPANY
At 20 East Alabama St., Atlanta, Ga
Entered as second-class matter at postoffice at Atlanta, under act of March 3, 1*75.
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| A National Platform on
I Poverty
HMM
setne of the Problems Political Conventions Fail To Solve.
I
For two weeks this country has listened to lhe talking and
planning of the two great parties that pretend to provide na
tional welfare.
In Chicago and in Baltimore those supposed to know what
the country needs have met and fought and intrigued and
“dickered.'’
They have written their platforms and denounced what
they considered the great evils.
On? set denounced the high tariff because it makes living
expensive.
And the other set denounced the suggestion of free trade
because it would destroy the workman’s opportunity to get good
wages.
Gigantic trusts, great organizations, monopolies, the modern
dinosaurs and mammoths, received attention.
One single state in thia Union could provide for the needs of
all the people in the country— and for many more—if the state
were cultivated properly and the products properly distributed.
The manufactured products of another great state in Amer
ica have increased in a short period FOURTEEN HUNDRED
PER CENT; the production of wealth of valuable needed manu
factured articles of that state has increased TEN TIMES AS
RAPIDLY AS THE POPULATION.
That is the state of New York. Yet. while the production
of wealth has been ten times more rapid than the production of
human beings, the happiness of the people has not increased.
Wealth multiplied by a percentage ten times greater than
the increase of population should mean the multiplication by ten
of wellbeing and general happiness But that does not happen.
The added wealth goes to the accumulation of wealth, goes
constantly to increase the store, of those that have TOO MUCH,
and little, if any, of it goes to make happier the lives of those
that carry the burden of TOO LITTLE.
This is the real problem of the world, the distribution of
wealth and the increase of happiness. And it is the problem
about which, although they may talk of it and think that they
plan Io remedy it, the so-called big politicians and statesmen
feel not at all.
Their plans are for those that have enough. They try to pro
teet the man fairly well to do against the man very well to do.
They are deeply interested in the mechanic who has five dollars
a day. and in the manufacturer who needs five millions to in
crease bis business.
But not one of them thinks or plans sufficiently for the man
who has a dollar or a dollar and a half a day, for the children
whose playground is the gutter, whose only knowledge of govern
ment is the policeman with his club telling them that they must
not play and must not be happy.
We have a nation in which men are kept down because wom
en compete with them in their labor, glad to work for starvation
wages. And, each competing with the other, the men are kept
too poor to marry, and Jhe women are kept too poor for happi
ness and health.
And nobody plans seriously to change that condition.
What shall he the tariff on steel and on lumber?
How shall we punish that combine to change five millions
of profits into fifty millions by freezing out competitors?
What shall we do to the railroads that give better rates to
nne company than another?
These aye the questions that our conventions and our “states
men" deal with.
But they do not deal with these other questions.
What shall we do to prevent forty thousand children in one
year. IN ONE SINGLE CITY, being infected with the taint of
tuberculosis?
What shall we do to protect the health of children and of
mothers that see the children die unnecessarily?
What shall we do to arrange the distribution of the earth's
products so that a fair day’s work by those willing to work will
give a decent living to a wife and her children?
What shall we do to protect those that are herded in tene
ment houses, living without lierht or air—and living unnecessar
ily?
What shall we do to make life worth while to the vast num
ber of human beings to whom it is only a worry, a curse, a sorrow
and a discomfort ?
The few have TOO MUCH. the many have TOO LITTLE—
yet there is PLENTY for both, if it were only distributed.
What party, what convention, what gathering of wise men
will work earnestly to solve that problem THE INCREASED
DISTRIBUTION OF THE WEALTH OF THE WORLD, now
that the problem of PRODI (TION has been solved absolutely?
Slowly the problem will be solved, and the dreadful contrast
become a thing of the past.
But the change will come very slowly. For it will come
only as men are lifted up as a whole, not lifted in classes, as
one might lift the roof of a building and leave the foundation
low.
Education, intelligent voting from below, unselfish iction
from above., the use of machinery as the slave of all the people
and not merely as the profit earner of a few. will settle the ques
tion in time—A LONG TIME.
j All Hail the Army Mule
Attempts by sordid innovators to tear down one of the most
sacred institutions has failed, temporarily, at least. The atari
eioiiß hands of commerce have been stayed, and those who love
the old-time idols of the Republic can sleep in peace
Colonel Getty, who has been making tests as to the compara
tive value of the automobile as compared with the good old
army mule has reported in favor of our long-suffering four
footed friend. An exhaustive exp. riment has been made bv the
provisional regiment which Colom l Gett.\ commands, ami Ins
finding js that it would he unwise and unsafe -unsafe, mind von.
’hereby meaning that the very fabric of the Union would be in
'Unpr-r io substitute benzine buugies for mules
Glory hr' Let us hope that that faithful long-suffering and
pi nirfw.pK element of army life will remain with ns forever.
The Atlanta Georgian
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These are the days that we’d like to go There's something nice in unlimited ice
Up in the snow with the Eskimo, And the dripping seal has a cool appeal.
, . tint business calls from the skyscraper walls
weaving the heat of the baking street, That the Eskimo has his pile of snow.
Dusty under the shutting feet. . But we must hustle a pile of dough.
The New Fashion of Smiling in Faceof Ad
versity-—Growth of Feminine Optimism
Beatrice Fairfax Thinks We Are Becoming Nation of Optimists and
Learning to Look on Bright Side of Things
"I find earth not gay but rosy.
Heaven not grim but fair of hue.
Do 1 stoop? 1 pluck a posy.
Do 1 stand and stare? All’s blue.”
Browning.
I’S the world becoming more
philosophical? Tears are no
longer a dally sight, and I re
fuse to credit their absence to in
difference.
There was a time when preacher
and player alike had an easy time
reducing an audience to tears. In
these days, the tear f« seen as little
in the church as in the theater.
There may be a choking of the
throat, a feeling ns if the tears
must come, but they are sup
presseti.
It is n<> longer in as great evi
dence at funerals, and is seldom
seen at weddings. though (here
was a day when tradition and
custom demanded that the mother
of the bride cry during the ccre
motl).
Misfortune and Sorrow
Faced More Bravely.
It was the compliment the world
expected her io pay the departing
daughter.
Whatever the orca-lon. there is
a growing dirposition to meet it
with a smile. Disaster, sickness,
sorrow, disappointment, and death
itself, tire all met more bravely
than a few generations ago
We have become wiser, and that
means that we have become more
cheerful.
Do we stoop?” It is not to find
a thorn, but a posx
Ito we stand and sta r’ It Is
not to . sign ~f a storm, but to
note the blue that is left in the sky.
A SUMMER DREAM
iv BEATRTCE FA 11? FA N.
We are becoming a nation of op
timists, and I claim that this is
largely due to the growing influ
ence of woman. Always the one to
And the bright side in her home,
her Influence has spread beyond
her four walls. She is the one
who finds when there is a financial
wreck that there is enough of the
debris for a new beginning.
Women Have Acquired
An Optimistic Feeling.
She is the one who, when her
husband comes home with a brok
en limb. Is grateful that it Isn't
his neck She is always looking
for the posies when she stoops,
and for the blue in the sky when
she stands and stares.
This optimism was not always
natural lo her. She acquired it
when confronted with the task of
cheering up father, husband and
son.
It Is a good habit. It is a good
habit to get early.
No days tire ns dark as youth
paints them. With the despera
tion of youth much is sometimes
done rashly that would not have
come to pass had the girl been a
w oman.
-Cowper gives .lust two linos I
want younger girls to remember:
"Beware of desperate steps; the
darkest day
Lived till tomorrow will hate
passed away."
Commit these lines to memory
and act upon them. No one dare
tell a girl whose trouble is great
that she has no trouble, or that it
Is not as great as she thinks
Time, and time alone, has the
right to toll her that. If can
prove that if a trouble is "lived
MONDAY, JULY 8. 1912.
Bv HAL COFFMAN.
till tomorrow" It will have passed
away.
That is all. Don't act rashly to
day. Wait till tomorrow, and with
tomorrow alw'ays comes wisdom.
If not, then wait till another to
morrow.
There once lived a woman who
had a great sorrow. The day be
fore that set for her wedding day
her lover was killed.
How did she live through it?
"I always said every morning,”
she once told a friend, "that my
friends had troubles which T must
consider before my own. 'T will
go to them and help them.' I would
say. 'and when tomorrow comes I
will give way to my own grief.'"
And so she lived her days till
they became weeks and months
tnd years, always devoting TO
DAY to the sorrows of others, and
putting off the giving way to her
own sorrow till TOMORROW.
Tomorrow never came! And her
life was spent in a devotion to
others that was far better than a
devotion to grief.
Not a bad idea, was it? It Is
the only kind of procrastination of
which the gods approve: A pro
crastination of tears.
It is a procrastination the whole
world is acquiring. I'or the smile
Is a newer, finer, nobler, braver
fashion.
1 want my girls whose troubles
seem great Io try this new fash
ion. x
Urges Downcast Ones
To Put Off Tears.
Look for the posies when you
stoop, and for blue when you stand
and stare.
There may be tnueh to weep
about, but let's put off the tears
till tomorrow.
THE HOME PAPER
The Strongest Man on
Earth
Like Socrates, Luther, Wesley, Lincoln and
Other Great Men in History, It Is He Who
Has the Courage to Stand Alone
HOW often it goes unexplained
why it was that Athens kilt
ed Socrates.
It really is no wonder why they
killed him: that flat-nosed, awk
ward. barefooted inquisitor, forever
poking his flat nose into other peo
ple’s affairs, showing them that the
wisdom they claimed to have was
but foolishness.
Yet a Socrates is indispensable
to every community—a man who
will force you to understand your
self, to examine your own thought,
and see that your wisdom is fool
ishness. We think that we are
thinking, but eVen a Socrates is
needed to show us where we stand.
We have today a Socrates with
us. The dramatist Henrik Ibsen
is a direct descendant of Socrates,
and has inherited his right to make
us think of the foundations of our
knowledge.
Ibsen never claimed to be more than
an interrogation point; he has no
philosophy or views of his own to
systematize. His work is to make
you think of the truth or falsity of
your own thoughts. And of all his
plays, the one of which he him
self is the hero is the’most strong,
simple and direct, the drama “An
Enemy of the People.”
The Secret
Os Strength.
The hero, Doctor Stockmann, the
man who has been so ready to tell
the people of his town wherein they
are wrong, when defeated in his
purposes, boycotted, and even be
sieged in his home, comes at last
to the declaration that he made to
his wife, “I have discovered that I
am the strongest man on the earth
the man who stands most alone.”
“Trust thyself.” says Emerson,
“every heart vibrates to that iron
String.” So then, that is the se
cret of the foundation of strength.
The great men of the ages who
have stood most alone are the men
of whom we are now the most
proud. Luther stands for the geat
institution of Protestantism. Fox
for Quakerism. Wesley for Method
ism, and Lincoln for the great na
tion which he saved.
In the case of Lincoln, in par
ticular, It is impossible to. account
for his greatness unless we remem
ber that he did stand alone. After
he had reached the age of 49 he
had absolutely nothing in his life
that had been successful, but he
stood; so that when he was called
to the highest office that the peo
ple could give he was ready to take
it and make that power which was
given to him the power that should
save the nation.
Courage and Faith are the foun
dations of the victory. The hedge
hog sees a. movement an inch from
A Valuable Possession
By EDWARD LUCIEN LARKIN.
TAKE a bar of hard steel, mag
netize it. and the adjacent
space will be in a very pe
culiar state; and this space is called
a magnetic field of force; for short,
magnetic field. And the energy is
supposed to exist in lines, or flow
in lines from the north pole of the
magnet backward through the
neutral line, the equator, to the
south pole, and thus complete the
circuit. The flow of energy is sup
posed to be very rapid.
To magnetize the bar, it must be
touched by another magnet—or by
lodestone, the magnet made by na
ture.
We imagine that gold and dia
monds are valuable, but a mag
netic field is at present the most
valuable possession of man. Thus
three great standard fundamentals
—heat, light and power—can be,
and are, incessantly taken out of it.
And several billion dollars are now
Invested in one little apparently
trivial act. namely, that of mov
ing masses of metal in this most
wonderful field. No moving metal
must touch another, the motion is
In space without contact; the mov
ing molecules of metal must cut or
pass through the invisible lines of
force.
Lay a straight bar magnet on a
table with end projecting over.
Take a wire, hold it at right an
gles to the end of the bar. you have
two places of metal apparently
useless. Move the wire, and one
of the most extraordinary events
/within the entire range of human
Bv Dr. C. F. Aked.
the end of his nose and cries that
the world is coming to an end.
There are these hedgehogs tn ev
ery line of life.
The Man Who
Stands Alone.
Lord Acton, when asked what the
greatest single event of the century
was, answered that it was the sink
ing of the trial steamer of Fulton in
the Seine, for its perfection under
the government of Napoleon would
have changed the history of the
world. And the hedgehog people
In Netv York stood on the deck and
declared “it will never go,” but It
did go, and Fulton’s stand alone
was gloriously justified.
In the church, the charge is made
that evangelicalism is dead. It is
not even dying. It can never die,
for it is founded on the living faith
The world is waiting for a new
incarnation, a religion that shall be
as good for the polling place as
for the prayer meeting; as good
for swapping horses as for saying
prayers; as good for the primaries
as for the presbytery. The gospel
of today is a gospel of service. We
-may be thankful for the promise of
mansions on high, but what w»
need is more decent homes on earth
and more decent people in them.
Religion is not a thing of the stars,
it is a thing of the streets.
In the drama referred to the hero
declares that in a democracy the
majority rule; that the majority of
the people are fools; therefore, the
•democracy is ruled by fools.
How far can we go in this?
Where is the fallacy?
In this: The majority does not
rule; it never did and never will.
The minority rules; ideas govern.
It is your strong men who stand
alone whose strength is in brain
and heart. These sit on the thrones
of the ages, and sway the majori
ties to their will.
It is your Wesleys, your Luthers,
your Cromwells and your Lincolns
who make and mold the mighty
forces with which empires have had
to deal.
Then, the majority Is not so
given to foolishness after all. In
the long run you can trust the in
nate sanity of human nature. De
mos is not a child of Chaos, It is
a child of God and the outgrowth of
the Christian spirit. Democracy Is
the expression of the highest of the
teaching of Christ.
What is the manifest destiny of
the American people in the growth
of this democracy? America has
years of glory behind her; she Is
young and daring. What is her mis
sion ?
It is this; To bulid up life on
truer, juster foundations that the
Old World ever laid; to evolve a
nobler manhood and womanhood.
This is the destiny of America.
experience will occur—electricity
will appear in the wire. The lines
of magnetism being cut by th'
atoms of the metal generate elec
tricity.
Move the wire up and down fast
er, it will begin to develop warmth.
faster still, it will become red hot.
white hot and melt.
Instead of allowing the wire to be
destroyed, connect the ends by
means of another wire; then a net'
event appears—a flow of electricity
is set up within. Move the wire up
and the electricity will flow in one
direction; move down, the flow will
stop during a minute Instant of
time and at once flow in the oppo
site direction. The name of the ap
paratus is magneto.
Look closely into tills matter, we
have a straight bar of steel whose
atoms are saturated or endowed
with magnetism, totally unknown
to us. A short piece of thick wire,
whose ends are connected by a third
wire to complete a path or circuit
for electricity; motion, and a series
of rapid changes in direction of
motion.
An additional name may now nr
added—“alternating current mag
neto.” On the face of this mattei
the word alternating is superfluous
because all magnetos set up or gen
erate alternating currents, or mo
mentary impulses succeeding each
other. To secure direct current’
all flowing in the same direction,
external devices called commuta
tors must be added.
