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EDITORIAL RAGE The Atlanta Georgian THE ATLANTA GEORGIAN Published by THE GEORGIAN COMPANY At 20 Eai»t Alabama 8t. Atlanta, Oa. f «#»ror claim matter at pnat office At Atlanta, i^rleract of March S. II J - ■ I NDAT x M i ■ i: I' \v am THE ATLANTA GEORGIAN will -ubsrrlbera anywhere In < he l'nltcrl S'Htej, Ganada and Meiico, - ?! L 1 1 for $.60, three months for fl ?f>. chans* >A addr* H« made aa oflan aa dr>ired. Foreign subscription rates on application Let Us Have Progress Coupled With Prosperity President Wilson says There is but one cloud upon our horizon, ’ and describes that cloud as our trouble with Mexico. Mr. Wilson evidently is not an expert in political meteor ology. There is, perhaps, only one cloud on the distant horizon, but there are several very threatening clouds hanging immediately overhead, and casting a very heavy shadow upon the business interests of this country and upon the general prosperity of the producing classes. This heavy shadow, with a prospect even of i -erious storm, is due to the President's exceedingly obstinate .ttitude in regard to the modifications of the tariff. The President is one of those men to whom success gives hal lucinations. He has the Presbyterian belief in predestination. He is convinced that he is the direct representative of the Almighty on earth, and that, being in more immediate contact with mundane affairs, his knowledge of them is, perhaps, a little superior to that of the Almighty. This conviction is not uncommon among men whose sudden i-;e to power is as incomprehensible to them as it is to the rest ot the community. Not only politicians have this obsession, but business men also who attain unusual success or important posi tion too rapidly. A conspicuous example of this hallucination was given by George F. Baer, of the Reading Railroad, with his avowed inspi ration and his arrogant action by ‘ ‘ Divine right. ’ ’ Vanities of this kind would be harmless enough if they did not so often lead men to become inaccessible to facts and im pervious to reason, and if they did not so often persuade men that their own fallible opinions were direct inspirations from on High, not to be modified or aftneliorated by the opinions of other men or the actual conditions which confront them. The clouds which now hang menacingly overhead and threaten the prosperity of the nation could have beer dissipated if Mr. Wilson had taken a broader and more liberal view in his policies of tariff reduction. He should have realized that tariff reduction, however necessary for the benefit of the consumers, must fall more or less heavily and disastrously upon the producers of the country. He should have appreciated the necessity of compensating these American producers for the markets which they would lose here at home by opening to them markets which he could easily have secured for them abroad. The reduction of our tariff barrier allows our markets to be invaded by foreign products, and our producers to be deprived of a greater or less proportion of our American markets. If a policy of reciprocity had accompanied the policy of • iriff reduction the markets of foreign nations would have been reciprocally opened to the products of our American manufac turers and producers. The advantages gained in these foreign markets would have compensated our producers, and, perhaps, more than compensated, for the loss of part of their home markets. Mr. Wilson should realize that the word “producers ’ does not mean only the big business men who conduct manufactories, but the workingmen, who are the partners in this production, and the farmers, who are the most important producers of all. However desirable it might have been to benefit the consum ers, it was certainly as desirable, or even more desirable, to ben efit the producers in this country. THE GREATNESS OF THIS COUNTRY AND THE WEALTH OF THIS COUNTRY ARE DUE, NOT TO WHAT WE CONSUME, BUT TO WHAT WE PRODUCE. The increase in the creation of wealth depends in great meas ure upon proper encouragement to production, and the distribu tion of wealth in good prices to fanners and good wages to workingmen is obviously dependent in the first instance upon the creation of wealth through profitable production. Profits on production depend largely on the extent and ex cellence of available markets, and any sort of ordinary business intelligence or political intelligence ought to have observed the wisdom of increasing and improving the markets for American products. In fact, the only kind of mind that could not see the practical and sentimental, the material and human advantage of such a policy would be that type which believes itself to be the medium for the direct transmission of Divine instructions. It is certainly not incompatible with any moral obligations to consider the material welfare of a country and the financial prosperity of the individual citizens. The material prosperity of the people is a matter worthy of the uttention and consideration of any Administration, but par ticularly of a Democratic Administration, and Mr. Wilson's policies, no matter how inspired he may believe them, should be executed with due regard for the welfare of the nation and of the citizens. Indeed, it would be well if Mr Wilson could realize that no one man is doing God’s work on earth, but that all men are doing it. in the place and with the power that God has allotted to them; that vox populi vox Dei. that all men are entitled to be heard, and that the moral and material interests of all are right fully to be considered and conserved. WILLIAM RANDOLPH HEARST * THE CITY HORSES .* By WILLIAM F. KIRK. P ATIENT, plodding, bravely tolling. Slipping on the icy grade • Where the devil's pot Is boiling In the city that he made; Straining at the thoughtless urgdng Of grim men as dumb as they. Where the traffic's tide is surging. See them on their weary way. Sick and sore, but uncomplaining At their humble, dreary lot. Wet and cold when It Is raining. Diary when the sun is hot Over pavements hard and endless. See the city horses go Till removed, all still and friendless, lo the graves they welcoma »o. SOME DAY! Copyright, 1918, International News Service Mr. MeCay here shows one argument that will persuade our slumbering statesmen of the neces sity for an adequate navy. Let us hope that a majority of them will wake up before this day comes. <8 Is Most of Our Labor Joyless? 8> Selected by EDWIN MARKHAM I N “The l/se of Leisure,” a re markable book sent out by B. W. Huebsch, Mr. Temple Scott baa put some of hl» keen est work. From hie chapter "Wanted Leisure" I cull a pas sage: "Buried in foul basements and bereft of sunlight and air. hun dreds of thousands of young men end young women are dally occu pied in a deadly routine of em ployment at tasks that concern them only in so far as their ac complishment brings them a weekly wage "And they are doing; these tasks from early morn till dewy eve. Out in the streets and in the country the blue sky is effulgent in golden sunlight, and trees are blossoming, lirds singing, clouds sailing and gentle breez.es blow ing. But the toilers see nothing and feel nothing of what is going on without. They have not the time; they are too busy asserting their God-given rights to 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happi ness.' ‘Blessed are the homy hands of toil!’ "In stuffy little shops are thou sands of others husbands and wives and children—smirking, genuftexing. tricking, flattering, deceiving, cajoling customers into buying the wares they are offer ing for sale. From 7 or 8 o’clock in the morning until 7. 8. 9 and even 10 o’clock at night, they are engaged in this degrading labor. They have no time for anything else, for if they took the time their neighbor shopkeeper might take customers from them, More over. they must, at any cost, make good their inalienable rights to 'life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.’ So 'Toil on, ioll on. thou art In thy duty, be out of It who may.' "■Watch the farmer at his work and his family at their dally tasks. The pageant of landscape and of sky passe. 1 by the. unseen They are bowed and bent earth ward. For a brief moment they look up; but their eyes are blind. For a short space they plod homeward a weary way and leave the world to darkness and them selves to brutish sleep. He is his own taskmaster, with the whip of anxiety to spur him on to effort after effort. Yet they are also told that 'to labor is to pray.’ "See the employer at his office desk, tricking, cajoling, swin dling. haggling, directing, smirk ing. Juggling and doing the many- other worthy and unworthy acts that he calls business. He also is harnessed to the mortar- wheel. He is the blind leading the blind. He is the slave of hi9 enterprise, the creature of his success. Listen to him. in his hours of ease, at the restaurant, in the theater, or at his own din ing table, a,nd he is saying, 'Dol lar®, dollars, dollars!' If other words fall from his lips, they have reference to dollars; If he PUTTY: He Gets the Pup in Bad ln=Shoots talks of art, it is in terms of dol lars; if he d scants of pleasure, it is in the language of the mar ket place; if he speaks of love, it is with synonyms for money. “He knows no god but the Gold en Calf and no joy but the fever of desire. And he Is oppressed with worry and depressed by anxiety. If he makes thousands in a day, he loses them in a night. He is the gambler offspring of competition and the millitariat system. He is Time’s slave; he is the chained driver of the com petition car. doomed for life to cross and recross the Bridge of Sighs. And in his wake follow the groans of the hungry and the moans of the stricken. Yet he can not help them because he Is himself stricken; he is the slave of the system which com pels him to do what he does." Good morning; have you pick ed your all-America team yet? * * * Man asked that his electrocu tion be put off until he had fin ished reading a joke book. Dis counting his doom. Suffragettes will march seven times around the White House. Hope it’s better built than Jeri cho was. * * * President Wilson has a cold. Not stated whether he is taking a cough cure or pursuing a policy of watchful waiting. * * * the more money he sells another cas tle. The plain citizen has to slap on another mortgage. * * * Man loses claim of $1,000,000 from Government * for inventing wax-nige stamp books. In other words, he was stuck. THE HOME RARER Georgia Soil Produces a Crop of Three Hundred Mil lions of Dollars! Three hundred millions of dollars—a dollar sign, a 3 and eight ciphers—represents the value of the products of Georgia s broad acres this season. This is a sum almost inconceivable. It would be easy to compute how 300,000,000 silver dollars laid side by side would reach from Atlanta to England, or something of the sort. Thai isn’t necessary. It is enough to realize that wealth beyond hu man conception comes from Georgia soil every year, and that this year Providence has so tempered the elements that the State, with Atlanta as its commercial and financial center, is in the midst of unbounded prosperity. It is more interesting to explain how conservative is the estimate, which is for the most part not an estimate, after all, but sober fact. There were ginned in Georgia, up to December 1, 2,064,792 bales of Sea Island ginned to the same date, it is certain that the happy contrast to the sorry grades from the western and central belts. The price has ruled well above 13 cents. Including 34,000 bales of Sea Island ginned to the same date, it is certain that the average has been 13*4 cents. This makes the amount ginned worth $139,373,480—the figures which, published in The Georgian Monday, took away the city’s breath. Some experts think the total crop will be 2,500,000 bales. Others say not. Put it at 2,250,000 bales, to give plenty of lee way, the total crop, then, will bring $151,875,000. A crop of 2,250,000 bales will yield 1,125,000 tons of seed. About three-fourths of this will be crushed, statistics show. At $20 a ton, the seed will net $16,875,000. Then turn to the corn crop. Corn is $1 a bushel. If the Georgian had to feed his mules this winter on corn grown in Kan sas and Illinois, 13y 2 -cent cotton would not help much. But he doesn’t. He raised his own corn this year—72,000,000 bushels of it, which leaves him $72,000,000 in pocket. Now, add cotton, cotton seed and corn—the total is $240. 750,000. Where is the rest of the $300,000,000? Why, in peaches, which Georgia sends to all the nation; in syrup, which goes pretty nearly everywhere the peaches go; in oats, of which Georgia raised the largest crop it ever knew; in pecans, in truck, in yams, in swine, in cattle, in mules, in apples— indeed, $300,000,000, were statistics for all these crops available, would be found a figure pitifully short of the mark! The Act of Habeas Corpus By REV. THOMAS B. GREGORY. T WO hundred and thirty-four years ago the English Par liament passed the famous Habeas Corpus Act, thus crown ing the Great Charter which, 464 years before, had been wrenched from King John at Ruhnymede. Magna Charter had for a long time been practically ignored by “those in authority.” Time and again the venerable document had been flouted by the Kings and their henchmen, and the descend ants of the men who won the great victory over the King at Runnymede were treated not as freemen, but as slaves. The business leached an alarm ing stage under Charles the First, and came to a climax in the reign of the “Merry Monarch," who came to the throne after the fiasco of the second protectorate. The despotic and unscrupulous Clar endon brought things to the pass where the representatives of the people were obliged to act, and the result was the immortal bill which forever put an end to all trifling with the liberties of Eng lishmen. Despite the provisions of Magna Charta to the contrary, Claren don threw men into prison right and left, and kept them as long as he liked; but by the Habeas Corpus Act of 1679 the qld prac tice of the law was freed from all difficulties and exceptions. Every prisoner committed to jail was declared entitled to his writ, even in the vacation of the courts, and heavy penalties were enforced on Judges and jailers who refused the prisoner his rights. The Judge who delayed granting the habeas corpus forfeited 500 pounds to the party aggrieved, while a violation of the provision that no Englishman should be carried beyond seas for trial car ried with it the same heavy pen alty. At last Magna Charta was a living realty, not a mere theory For four centuries and a half Englishmen had endured the vio lation of the sacred charter, but at last the age-long evil w r as over, and the personal freedom of Englishmen was assured for all time. Oglethorpe University (From The Griffin News.) npHE move to establish Ogle- j thorpe University in At lanta affects the South as a section and is the most impor tant educational enterprise ever attempted in the Southern States. That Georgia and Atlanta should be the home of this great insti tution is not remarkable—Geor gia is one of he best States in the Union and Atlanta has never yet failed in an undertaking. Oglethorpe will in many re spects be as extensive and com plete in its work as Harvard and Yale and the people of the South are loyal enough to support It from the beginning. Age and prestige are valuable assets for any university, but that they are not indispensable to operation has been convinc ingly illustrated by the Univer sity of Chicago, which is attain ing results that compare favor ably with any of the older insti tutions of learning. What has been done in Chicago can be done in Atlanta, and Oglethorpe will be a lasting monument to the en terprise and liberality of Geor gia and place it in the education al history of the future. Atlanta has undertaken to raise $250,000 of the required amount and it is pleasing to note that Griffin is co-operating hand somely in this work of construc tion. All the eminent educators are not employed by the older uni versities, nor is it impossible for the South to succeed where oth er sections have made good. Backed by the unlimited capi tal that will eventually material ize, Oglethorpe will prove a glory to the South and a credit to the nation. Stars and Stripes Life ig just one divorce after another—in some society circles. • * * Dewey wants 48 battleships! That s the right sort of peace talk. • * * No money bill, no holiday for the President. Can’t have a Christmas without bills. • • * Aviator’s motor stopped as he looped the loop. Hospital report shows the airship went on. * * • Wall Street brokers complain their only active accounts now are those relating to expenses.