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VOL. VII. LABOR AND INDUSTRY 60ME ITEMS OF INTEREST TO UNION WORKMEN. Proposed Legislation in Interest of German Producers—Plan by Which the People Can Control the Trusts That Are Now Absorbing Other People's Wealth. Aspirations. I waste no more In idle dreams My life, my soul away; I wake to know my better self— 1 wake to watch and pray. Thought, feeling, time, on Idols vain, I've lavished all too long; Henceforth to holler purposes I pledge myself, my song! Oh! still within the Inner veil. Upon the spirit's shrine. Still unprofar.ed by evil, burns The one pure spark divine. Which God has kindled In us all. And be it mine to tend Henceforth, with vestal thought anct care. The Jlght that lamp may lend. I shut mine eyes In grief and shame Upon the dreary past— My heart, my soul poured recklessly On dreams that could not last; My bark was drifted down the stream. At will of wind or wave— An Idle, light, and fragile thing. That few had cared to save. Henceforth the tiller Truth shall hold, And steer as Conscience tells. And 1 will brave the storms of Fate, Though wild the ocean swells. 1 know my soul Is strong and high. If once I give It sway; I feel a glorious power within, Though light 1 seem and gay. Oh, laggard Soul! unclose thin® eyes— No more In luxury soft Of Joy Ideal waste thyself; Awake, and soar aloft! Unfurl this hour those falcon wings Which thou dost fold too long; Raise to the skies thy lighting gaze, And sing thy loftiest song! Let the People Control Trusts. In a message to the legislature of Missouri requesting enactments pro¬ hibiting trusts Gov. Stevens of that state makes this statement: The closing decades of this century will go into history as the trust pe¬ riod. * * * The massing of capital and of business organization^ has cre¬ ated a revolution in the buslr.ess of the country. • • * One of the effects of this change is a large increase in the productiveness of capital thus em¬ ployed. These assertions are true. And be¬ cause they are true, and especially be¬ cause of the truth expressed In the third sentence, which is the milk of the cocoanut, it seems to me that ef¬ forts to smash trusts must taevitabSy and dismally fall In the long ran. What we all want is two things: The great¬ est productiveness of capita!, he that capital money or muscle; and second, just distribution of the enhanced quan¬ tity of products. Trusts—not wild-cat paper operations for speculative or Seecing purposes, but solid trusts, like the Standard Oil, the Carnegie Steel and Iron and Coal, the copper, etc., accomplish the first named end. They Increase the productiveness of capital. They make a given amount of money and given amount of labor go further than Is otherwise possible. But they don’t fairly distribute the additional product. In the town where I live cop¬ per costs 28 cents a pound, against 14 cents a year ago. Yet the copper trust has not doubled wages. It has ad¬ vanced them 10 to 15 per cent, prob¬ ably 10 per cent on an average. I cite this instance, not because I think that the price of copper is at all due to pro¬ ductiveness of capital invested in the copper trust, but simply because it forcibly illustrates the principle of the private trust, which is to run almost all the increased profit into a few pockets. What we want is, not the destruction of trusts, hut an industrial and eco¬ nomic system that will equitably dis¬ tribute the increased results. If the present system of employer and em¬ ploye, and private ownership of inter¬ ests affecting the welfare of the peo¬ ple at large, will permit of such amend¬ ment, well and good. If not, it will have to give place to some other, sys¬ tem that will. But it is impossible to cast aside a labor-saving machine, and the trust is the greatest labor-saving machine ever, devised. Don’t try to smash the other man’s bike because he rides while you walk, but figure how to make a tandem out of it, with your¬ self in one of the seats. Proposed Labor Legislation. A cablegram rrom Germany today states that a workhouse bill designed to punish strikers’ excesses and to pro¬ tect employers and non-union work¬ men against lahor union terrorism was laid before the relchstag by the govern¬ ment today. It is predicted that the bill will create a bitter parliamentary struggle when it is brought to vote at the next regular winter session. It is a more radical measure than that which was defeated in the reichstag in 1890. It raises the maximum penalty of the present law from three months’ to five years’ imprisonment on the proven charge of lawless actions to bring about strikes or lockouts that endanger public safety or life or affect the empire’s defenses. It is regarded as a reactionary measure which wil! command the attention of all countries, for the labor problem now exists every- THE RECORD DEVOTED TO THE INTEREST OF JOHNSON COUNTY AND MIDDLE GEORGIA. WEIGHTSVILLE. GA.. THURSDAY, JUNE 29, 1899. where. Some of the infractions of the law to be punished are enumerated !n the bill as attempts by threats, com¬ pulsion, insults, opprobrious epithets to compel workmen or employes to en¬ ter or refrain from enterting associa¬ tions or agreements affecting labor conditions or wages. It is mentioned that mitigating circumstances will change the penalty of five years’ im¬ prisonment to a fine of 1,000 marks. The same penalties apply to attempts to compel workmen to strike or em¬ ployers to yield to workmen’s de¬ mands. Heavier penalties are provid¬ ed in all cases for the walking dele¬ gates patroling workshops, streets, railway depots. Following workmen or employers is classed as threatening ac¬ tions. The significance of this bill will be apparent to all labor leaders and Its parallel to attempts at legislation in America will be recognized. Antiquity of tlie Saw. Saws were used by the ancient Egyptians. One that was discovered, with several other carpenters’ tools in a private tomb at Thebes, is now pre¬ served iij the British Museum. The blade, which appears to be of brass, is ten and a half inches long, and an Inch and a quarter broad at the widest part. The teeth are irregular, and appear to have been formed by striking a blunt edged Instrument against the edge of the plate, the bur, or rough shoulder, thus produced not being removed. A painting copied ih Rosellini’s work on Egyptian antiquities represents a man using a similar saw, the piece of wood that he is cutting being held be¬ tween two upright posts. In other rep¬ resentations the timber is bound with ropes to a single post, and in one, also copied by Rosellini, the workman Is engaged in tightening the rope, having left the saw sticking in the cut. In an engraving given in the third volume of Wilkinson’s “Manners and Customs of Ancient Egyptians,” a saw is represented of much larger dimen¬ sions, its length being, by comparison with the man, not less than three or four feet. It does not appear that the Egyptians used taws worked by two men. The inventions of saws was variously attributed by the Greeks to two or three individuals, who are supposed to have taken the Idea from the jawbone of a snake or the backbone of a fish. There is a very curious picture among the remains discovered in the ruiua of Herculaneum, representing the inte¬ rior of a carpenter’s workshop, with two genii cutting a piece of wood with a frame-saw, and on an altar pre¬ served In the Capltoline Museum at Rome there is a perfect representa¬ tion of a bow-saw, exactly resembling, in the form of a frame and the twisted cord for tightening it, those used by modern carpenters. From these re¬ mains It is evident that these forms of the Instruments were known to the an¬ cients.—London Architect. I.abor Notes. The oil well workers are agitating the formation of a national organiza¬ tion. During the first week of May over 2,000 new members were added to the Tobacco Workers’ National union. One union tobacco firm in Brooklyn, N. Y„ used 2,000,000 blue labels In April. Mr. J. R. Sovereign, ex-grand work¬ man of the Knights of Labor, now pub¬ lishing a paper in Idaho, was refused a seat as delegate from a “working men’s union” of Gem, Ida., at the ses¬ sion of the Western Federation of La¬ bor at Salt Lake City. A correspondent of the Winnipeg (Canada) Voice writes: “There is a great deal of kicking over the impor¬ tation of Chinese labor into the coun¬ try, but the average workman appears to be blind to the fact that out of his own home goes forth his worst enemy. If women and children can do the work of men they should be paid the same wages as men. Under the present sys¬ tem women and children are paid apologies for wages, and consequently the husbands and fathers suffer. These latter are either entirely replaced by women, or, if employed at all, have to accept such wages that they can barely keep themselves alive." Story of Lewis Carroll. The Rev. C. L. Dodgson, better known by readers of “Alice in Wonder¬ land" as Lewis Carroll, was a lovable man, who delighted to do good in a quiet way. In his "Life and Letters” the following story is told by one of his child-friends: “My sister and I were spending a day of delightful sightsee¬ ing in town with him. We were both children, and were much interested when he took us into and American shop where the cakes for sale were cooked by a v.ery rapid process before your eyes, and handed to you straight from the cook’s hands. As the prepa¬ ration of them could easily be seen from outside the window, a small crowd of ragamuffins naturally assem¬ bled there, and I well remember Mr. Dodgson’s piling up seven of the cakes on one arm, taking them out and dol¬ ing them round to the seven hungry little youngsters. The simple kindness of the act impressed its charm on his child-friends inside the shop as much as on his little stranger friends out¬ side. T? D ATAT tji \rm 1 T»y D1 ATT ■ NO LONGER FAVORED BY THE WEALTHY CLASS. The Goldbugg and Monopolists Would Put Us in the Same Boat with the Filipinos, Which is Why They Want s Large Army. The present Wall street national ad¬ ministration is committed in favor of a standing army of 100,000 men as i starter. No previous Wall street ad¬ ministration recommended any in¬ crease of the standing army. Here is a change in Wall street policy that is worth noting. The conquest of the Philippines furnishes no good excuse for quadrupling the standing army, unless the war there is expected to be perpetuated. The huge standing armj asked for by President McKinley must hp intended for use at home. The young giant republic of..the western hemisphere has oustrlpped all pre-existing governments, not only in the loftiness of its Ideals and tile ex¬ tent of their realization, but in its material progress as well. Until very recently the word “destiny” when as sociated with the government and peo¬ ple of the United States made no sug¬ gestion of empire, armies or serfs, but illumined the Imagination with a pic¬ ture of millions of happy homes spread from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from the lakes to the gulf, says the National Watchman. The imagination, as it peered into the future, counted a population of hundreds of millions, and viewed a domestic commerce un¬ known and undreamed of before and possible only to the great American nation. The changed attitude of the execu¬ tive head of the nation, who is now cowardly skulking behind the de¬ mands of the commercial press and trimming to avoid the avowal of a policy, while the toils and snares of imperialism are inviting the nation to its ruin, is making all intelligent Americans sick at heart. What power paralyzes the tongue of President Mc¬ Kinley, who in a message to congress Jess than one year ago spoki in plain American dialect: "I speak not of forcing annexation, for that cannot be thought of. That, by our code of mor¬ ality, would be criminal aggression.” . With imprisoned conscience aad sealed lips the silence of the president is ominous, while the men who are known to control his action are de¬ manding the subjugation of t 1 "? Fili¬ pinos and the consigning to vassalage of millions who were eagerly sought as allies and who loyally co-operated with Dewey and Merritt a few short months ago. What is behind thrs strange con duct? What does it mean? There can be but one interpretation. Free insti¬ tutions and popular government no longer find favor among the wealthy and powerful classes, who through the gold standard, trusts and monopolies are forging fetters for the limbs of American freemen. These classes seem determined to utilize the passions of the people, engendered by war, to cause them to blindly do that, which if done, will prove the undoing of the republic. These classes realize that they must undo the republic or pop¬ ular government will sooner or later restore the reins of government to the people and right the wrongs of the toilers, producers and taxpayers of the nation. Hence, under the heat and ex¬ citement of war, they are demanding that we enter upon the unrighteous and Ignoble conquest and vassalage of millions of human beings who aspire to the realization and enjoyment of freedom and national life—the highest attributes of collective man that the Creator has implanted in the human breast. To compass this end the first thing necessary is to rear a large military establishment. Men of America—farm¬ ers, mechanics, laborers, merchants, all who are producers of wealth, you men whose brain and brawn produce all that give incomes to the rich and revenues to the government—wherein do your interests demand the subju¬ gation of the Filipino? In what way will a large military establishment contribute to your peace, comfort, se¬ curity and future happiness? You are the victims of the gold standard and monopolies. They are not demanding a large military estab¬ lishment to secure your release from their own relentless grasp. No, It Is not to advance your welfare that the Filipino is to be subjugated and the army increased. You have political power. This the monopolies dread. Do you think they will continue in¬ definitely to spend their millions to corrupt the ballot box In order to de¬ feat your will, as they did In 1896, after they have sufficiently strength¬ ened the military arm of the govern¬ ment and are able to control it to defy the popular will? In the strict ad¬ herence to the traditions of the fathers lie your safety and the safety of the republic. Those who would speud millions to corrupt the ballot box will, as soon as they possess the power to do so, use the army to set aside the popular will. Aside from a war of conquest being an evil in itself, a na¬ tional sin that would merit the wrath of heaven, in this case it' is hut the pretext to secure an army which the money kings, trusts and monopolies believe to be necessary to have for the successful prosecution of their designs, which if carried out means at no dis¬ tant day the overthrow of the re¬ public. WILL OUR GOLD LEAVE US? Sterling Exchange Is at the Gold Ex¬ porting Point. We are told that our foreign trade has increased enormously during the past three years; that our exports are worth millions and millions of dollars more than our imports, and that in all directions the goose honks high. As this information has also been con¬ veyed to Wall street in various shapes and forms, it is no wonder that the gentlemanly speculators and button pressers are shaken with surprise when they discover, as they did yes¬ terday, that the “conditions of trade” seem to demand a renewal of gold ex¬ ports. Though the market reports stated that the price of sterling exchange was “nearly” at the gold-exporting point, it had, in fact, quite reached that point, which is anywhere between $4.88% and $4.90. The par of sterling exchange is $4.86 and a fraction. The recent rise in price has been gradual, hut Wall street has gone on gambling without giving the matter a thought, until now there is danger that our gold will go where It came from. This has given a severe twist to what is called the market, and In order to explain it satisfactorily the case of yellow fever at New Orleans is men¬ tioned. At this rate, ten yellow-fever cases would precipitate another panic. Seriously, the drift toward gold ex¬ ports cannot be satisfactorily ex¬ plained except on the theory that our debt abroad has accumulated at such a rapid rate that it has wiped out our balance of trade and still calls for cash in settlement. The fact that more gold has not been Imported as the result of our enormous balance Of trade has been explained by the statement that much of this balance has been loaned abroad. This explanation is either pure surmise or a plain invention, or the figures of our exports have been foully dealt with. We are glad to see, however, that Wall street has taken the figures seri¬ ously, and that Its astonishment at the threatened export of gold Is real. The truth of the matter is that, In the face of the statements made by the trade agencies and the figures given out by the government, the present situation is as unexpected as a clap of thunder in a clear sky. The one fact that stands out is that sterling exchange is at the gold-ex porting point, and that fact gives the lie to whole columns of figures about the debts due us from abroad. Reed In New York. A law firm which the ordinary citi¬ zen never heard of can afford to pay Tom Reed $50,000 a year to come here and help twist the law for prosperous clients. It is more profitable to juggle with the law obscurely than to fight for the making of good laws conspicuously. It is saddening to think of Reed’s downfall. He has great power, and years of his life have been given to the gaining of a high standing in a great party. In Minneapolis, where he hoped and strove for a presidential nomina¬ tion, he made a great speech of un¬ usual power. His close deprecated the great importance attached here to financial success. “Prosperity,” said he, “is important, but human liberty is magnificent." Human liberty is magnificent, and now he hires out as a tame lawyer to fight for corporations and defeat the laws that he has helped to frame. Human liberty is magnificent—but $50,000 a year is more magnificent. Poor Tom Reed! With your big brain, big body, fine mind—you prove for the 10,000,000th time in history that abil¬ ity without principle leads nowhither. Bourke Cockran and Cockran the pal of Reed. Both are in New York, accepting a little money, a foolish so¬ cial success among social nothings. Each, with principle added to his power, might have been something be¬ sides a swollen, well-fed hoptoad in the world’s history—New York Journal. What It Is For. “If I could only say my darling died for his country! If I could only say that, I would he content. But he died trying to take a country from its own people. Oh, what 1 b it for?’’ That is what Mrs. Poor of Nebraska pathetically said when she heard of her son’s death. We can answer the mother’s question, “Oh, what is it for?” It is to enrich the worst millionaires in this country by despoiling another country, through land grabs and fran¬ chises.—San Francisco Star, ALL OP ONE VOICE. DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COM¬ MITTEE FOR 16 TO I. Republican Effort to Substitute Another Issue a Failure—The Platform of 1890 Is the Only Proper Remedy for Trusts and Imperialism. Democratic national committeemen all over the country are nearly unani¬ mous for making 16 to 1 the chief shiD boleth in next year’s campaign. Here are copies of a few letters sent out from the Press Bureau of the Demo¬ cratic national committee: Secretary Walsh Positive. C. A. Walsh (Iowa)—In the cam¬ paign of 1900, as In the campaigns of 1892 and 1896, the issues of free silver and “down with the trusts” should go hand in hand. The Democratic party, in its national utterances, has always stood for bimetallism and against trusts, and the Chicago platform of 1896 should be reaffirmed In all its parts in 1900, its pronouncements against trusts made strong and explicit and a remedy for their prevention offered. The Republican party is today endeav¬ oring to treat the trust issue as a new question, and undoubtedly Republican leaders in the next convention of that party will try to deceive people by in¬ serting a plank in their platform de¬ nouncing trusts. Their denunciation will mean no more on that question than did their planks prior to 1896 fa¬ voring bimetallism mean for free sil¬ ver. The Democratic party in 1892 in its national platform said: “We recognize in the trusts and combinations which are designed to enable capital to secure more than its share of the joint prod¬ uct of capital and labor, a natural con¬ sequence of the prohibitive tax*;s prevent the free competition which the life of honest trade.” And In platform of 1896, after against the "national hank” trust In the matter of the issuing of money, it said: “We denounce as turbing to business the threat to restore the McKinley * .* * which, enacted under , false plea of protection to home try, proved a prolific breeder of and monopolies.” The party, always for bimetallism, for free coinage at the existing and always against monopolistic and combinations, will occupy its toric position on these questions 1900 without a backward step without relinquishing a single ple of the Chicago platform of And these positions, taken long ago a party that has always said what meant, always been true to its ciples, and has stricken down its leaders when they betrayed their on these questions, will mean thing, while the people will put faith in similar utterances by party whose protective legislation been the “prolific breeder of trusts monopolies.” The history of the paign of 1896, when every great poration, combination and trust turning loose all Us forces to Bryan and to elect McKinley, is fresh in the memory of the people make it of doubtful choice in whom confide. The trust-made and making Republican party can get a vote of confidence of the on these issues. Acting; Chairman Johnson. J. G. Johnson (Kansas)—Nothing has occurred since 1896 to shake the faith of Democrats in the principles announced in the Chicago platform. The financial question is still the domi¬ nant issue, and all other economic .questions are but collateral to it. If the present program of the Republican party—gold standard, retirement of greenbacks, control of paper money Issue and volume by the national banks —had been honestly announced, or even hinted at, in their platform of 1896, Mr. Bryan would have had a mil¬ lion plurality. By next year they will bo fully committed, in their national platform, to the program of the banks and money lords, and as the Chicago platform of 1896 presents the political antithesis of that program, the Demo¬ crats will without doubt reaffirm that declaration, thus presenting the finan¬ cial issue of 1900 far more concretely than it was In 1896. The trust question has since 1896 become an issue of the first magnitude. Democrats have al¬ ways contended It is the logical growth of the protective tariff system. The tariff protects from foreign competi¬ tion. the trust destroys domestic com¬ petition, and the beneficiary of these Republican theories becomes a monop¬ oly. The people have a right to con¬ trol or destroy monopolies or combi¬ nations in restraint of competitive trade. The Democratic states of Mis¬ souri, Arkansas and Texas have this year adopted drastic laws against suen combinations. The Democratic na¬ tional convention of 1900 will emphat¬ ically and specifically deal with this question. Their tariff protection must be canceled. Possibly the national taxing process which destroyed state banks of issue must be resorted to. The reported control of 40,000 miles of railroad north of the Ohio river by the Chicago & Alton syndicate pushes to NO. 16 . the front the theory of federal control or government ownership and opera¬ tion in dealing with a railroad trust. Whether the Filipinos are “benevo¬ lently assimilated” (with the soil) or subjugated during the next year or not, the Democratic platform of 1900 will declare emphatically against the Mc¬ Kinley program of colonization, impe¬ rialism and British alliance. If Mr. Bryan had been elected in 1896 and had pursued McKinley’s policy of the last two years the Republican press and congress, instead of lauding him as a statesman, would most likely be now impeaching him for exceeding his con¬ stitutional rights and plotting the over¬ throw of our system of government. The Denjocrats will not stand for elthqr a borrowed English money sys¬ tem, a borrowed English colonial sys¬ tem, or an agreement to take part in English quarrels with other nations. There may be other matters declared upon, but in my judgment the above outlines the salient features of the coming Democratic platform and the storm centers of the campaign of 1900. Editor Daniels Arraigns Money Trust Josephus Daniels (North Carolina)— The shibboleth of the campaign the Democrats will wage in 1900 will be “Down with the trusts—from the gold and national bank trust down to the peanut trust.” The Chicago platform will be reaffirmed, Bryan will be re¬ nominated, and all men who are op posed to trusts of all sorts and to militarism will be invited to join in a struggle to restore equal opportunity, which the trusts deny, and to crush the attempt to saddle old world mili¬ tarism upon this country. The con¬ test is largely for a country for the currency as well as a currency for the country. In view of the policy of "criminal aggression”' and militarism adopted by the administration, the struggle to rescue the republic from destruction as a republic looms up as a matter of the highest importance. If militarism and colonialism are to stay, the republic founded by the fathers has been destroyed. The Democratic party favors returning to the old prin¬ ciple that “All governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.” The real issue in 1900 is manhood against money, no matter what special phase seems paramount. Represented by the control of cur¬ rency, by the organization of trusts, by th? policy of iniperialifsin and mil¬ itarism—they are one and inseparable —money will seek to re-elect McKin¬ ley. He is the agent through whom the government lavishes favors and special privileges upon the trusts and syndicates which gave Hanna enough money to buy the election in 1896. They will raise another corruption fund in the same way in 1900, and will demand greater bounties and subsi¬ dies in return for their contributions. The trusts are behind the demand for imperialism and a big standing army. They wish to put the soldier over the civilian so as to crush labor if it pro¬ tests against oppression. Republican platform declarations against trusts will not avail against the fact that more trusts have been organized since McKinley was elected than in 100 years previous. In Ohio the Republican, plat¬ form contained a declaration against trusts. The same convention refused to Attorney-General Monnett a renom inatlon. He is the only living Repub¬ lican officeholder who tries to enforce laws against trusts. The trusts de¬ manded of Mark Hanna his head on a charger. They got it. This incident shows that Republican denunciation of trusts is a sham. Plain Talk from the Coast* William H. White (Washington)— In 1900 the Chicago platform of 1896 will be reaffirmed In its entirety. Free silver will not be abandoned, but the fight will be against the money trust and Industrial trusts as well. The na¬ tional bank syndicate and the effort made by it to substitute national bank currency for the greenback currency will be vigorously denounced. If the Democratic party opposes the reten¬ tion of Porto Rico and the Philippines under control of the United States, the party will be defeated at the polls. In my opinion no fault can or should be found with the administration of Pres¬ ident McKinley In dealing with the Philippines as he has. Atkinson, Hoar and Cleveland should not be permitted to frame the policy of the Democratic party with reference to the Philip¬ pines. This state gave W. J. Bryan nearly 15,000 majority in 1896, but If the party adopts a platform against the retention of the Philippine islands, and McKinley is nominated for presi¬ dent by the Republicans, McKinley will carry this state by a greater ma¬ jority than Bryan carried it. From Bryan's State. W. H. Thompson (Nebraska)—The battle cry of the Democracy In 1900 should be the financial question, as by it declared in 1896, and anti-trusts, an¬ ti-militarism, anti-Anglo-American al¬ liance. These issues should have precedence in the discussions in the order named. However, each writer and speaker will undoubtedly be gov¬ erned by his own personal views and his immediate surroundings.