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8 THE Weekly Jeffersonian A Newspaper Devoted to the Advocacy of the Jeffersonian Theory of Government. PUBLISHED BY THOS. E. WATSON and J. D. WATSON Editors and Proprietors Austell Building, Atlanta, Ga. SUBSCRIPTION PRICE - . Si oo PER TEAR. Advertising Rates Furnished on Application. Affiliation made for entry as second class mail matterat Atlanta, Ga., Postoffice. ATLANTA, GA., THURSDAY, JANUARY 17, 1907 The Pirates Strike the Flag. The New York “Watson’s Magazine” has .gone down. The two pirate captains, Mann & DeFrance, have struck their colors. Let them go. Nobody will miss the New York fake maga zine. Anybody could have told that precious pair that they could not possibly win out in that little game. Now, Friends and Comrades, put your shoulders to the wheel and help me get forward with THE WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN and the JEFFERSONIAN MAGAZINE. 'Fhe Presidential Campaign of 1908 is even now on —as, indeed, it has been ever since Mr. Ffyan made that Government Ownership speech in Madison Square Garden. The two JEFFERSONIANS want to be at the front, in the thick of the fight, in 1908, to smite yovir oppressors —The Trusts —hip and thigh. HELP ME BRING THE BATTERY INTO POSITION. I’ll do the rest. Not a cent of your money do I ask. You are asked simply to say a Good Word for the two periodicals. Tell everybody you meet what they are and what you think of them. Try to create among your friends AN IN TEREST IN THE WORK THE JEFFER SONIANS ARE DOING. Once interested, the people will read. And when they read, they will wake up. And when they wake up, the cause of Re form will have on its side an overwhelming Public Sentiment that will change conditons for the better. num In Chains, If one be the right sort of man, mere fet ters that shackle his limbs never make him a slave. The soul escapes the chains; the mind de fies the dungeon walls. Regulus—fettered by his Carthagcnian cap tor —died in hi§ prison rather than bend his Roman spirit to the service of the enemy of his country. Giordano Bruno —caught in the toils of the Church —went to the stake with undaunted soul and perished in the flames rather than prostitute his genius to monkish ignorance and superstition, THE WEEKLY. JEFFERSONIAN. Cervantes was a prisoner, but he was no body’s slave. A portion of his immortal Don Quixote was written while the author was be hind the bars. Epictetus was, in law, a slave; his Roman owner could force him to any physical task; but the slave mind remained free, and his phil osophy is even now a text-book of thinkers. Henry Laurens, captured and thrown into the Tower of London, was offered freedom if he would advise the rebellious American colonies to make peace. He proudly refused, and chose to remain free in soul though lan guishing tedious years in prison. On the other hand,-one may be physically free and yet a mental slave. If one fears to express one’s real opinions; if one takes orders from another; if one dares not think, speak and act according to the dictates of his own conscience and intelli gence, he is not a free man. No matter how much he knows, or owns, or pretends—he is a slave. How is it with you, Brother? Are you in slavery, or do you claim to be free? Look at that powerful cartoon of'Mr. Gor don Nye, on the first page. Are you chained, as that man is? Do you vote because of a party name, with out due study of the Principles? Do you vote as the party boss says you must, or do you vote as your reason says you ought? Does your body and soul shrink in terror at the crack of the party lash? Do you submit without a murmur when a party convention hands you out a platform that you secretly loathe and condemn? Do you shout, “Hip, hip, Hoorah!” when your convention nominates a black sheep and tells you that the nomination makes the black sheep as white as snow? Do you let some one-hoss corporation edi tor do all your thinking for you; and are you afraid to investigate public questions for your self? Are you afraid that you will lose your job by voting your own convictions? Does any other kind of sea—social, finan cial, political or religious—prevent your vot ing just as you please? If so, your condition is that of the poor fel low pictured in Mr. Nye’s cartoon. Brother, rise up and shatter those chains. You can and you must —if you would be free. MM* Railroad "Butcheries—An Appeal to Congress. There isn't a fair-minded, intelligent citizen of this country who does not know that the butcheries which occur upon our railroads are caused by the fact that not enough money is spent upon the roads themselves. Burdened by the necessity of earning divi dends upon seven million dollars of watered stock, the managers of the property have sim ply been unable to do that, and, at the same time, properly equip the roads so as to save human life. Because they knew it would cost much money to equip train? with automatic car- couplers, the railroads refused to adopt that life-saving appliance. Year in and year out, trainmen had to risk their lives coupling cars by hand. At last, in 1891, some of us young fellows took up the matter in the 52d Congress and went to work to 'pass' a bill compelling the corporations to adopt the au tomatic car-coupler. The railroads fought the measure, tooth and toe-nail. Maj. Stahlman, President of the Louisville & Nashville R. R., came on to Washington and acted as commander-in-chief of the lobby. After a long, hard fight, we whipped the Major and passed the bill. By the terms of the act, the railroads were given five years within which to equip their trains with automatic couplers. Would you believe it? —the corporations went before the Inter-state Commerce Com mision and actually got that most comical concern to suspend the law, by allowing the roads a certain additional number of years within which they could go on mangling and maiming human car-couplers! It may be that some of the lines are not sufficiently equipped even now; for.it was only year before last that Sam Spencer’s road was prosecuted because of its failure to com ply with the law. Now, if Congress could force the railroads to adopt the automatic car-coupler, why should it not compel them ta adopt the automatic block system? If that system were in operation in this country, as it is in Switzerland, in the subway of New York, and upon certain New England roads, the greater part of this horrible butch ery of the people would be stopped. It would cost S7OO per mile to put this au tomatic block system into operation, and hence the corporations refuse to adopt it. They would rather have dividends at the expense of ninety thousand human victims ev ery year, than to have no dividends and no victims. If the managers of the corporations were not compelled to earn dividends upon $7,- 000,000,000 of watered stock they could easily expend the S7OO per mile to make the roads safe. If the burden of management consisted merely of earning reasonable dividends upon actual investment, the automatic block sys tem could be put on at once. But the managers are helpless; their Wall Street masters —monsters of greed that they are!—demand more than $300,000,000 in divi dends every year upon fictitious and fraudu lent valuations, even though the money be gory with the blood of human sacrifice. Why does not Congress come to the rescue of the people and the managers? Is there no member of Congress who has pluck enough to introduce and lead the fight for a bill mak ing it compulsory upon the railroads to equip the lines with the automatic block system? Give them five years within which to make the change, but compel them to make it. The situation is so appalling that it abso lutely exhausts indignation. Surely Congress will not adjourn without having made some effort to check Railroad Butcheries,