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THE Weekly .1 effersonian. Vol. 11. - ' '■ WE THE OFFICIALS OF > ' ' THE ROAD.F/NO THE V- „ x - \ ENGINEER RESPONSIBLE /W I - ' - ■ v-nr - # y nP -/nW ' r / Zflonw' n>'W/ i ai nfe> < n> s' n • <b x\ J? i K x■ 1 /Wn. ? ' w^ali^ , vn' \\ » >-nXIMMBI. Xz>X/ wtw' \\ K - 1 A '', J? vwtr |\\ I \ \ -<■ u\ Up i|i a|»? 23F ®/ ;i ®a«wwß At A WsbXw wJf • AwTlllf ■fß WW f# Sir - OM||Mlll|P x W L:-< ' \\ a Jolly JUSTICE IS ‘BLIND. The Directors Are Never Guilty: It is Always Their Salaried Employes Who Commit the Killing—But Can the Engineer Be Held Responsible for Rotten Ties, Broken Down Bridges, Light Rails and Neglected Roadbeds? Mr. Watson’s Great Farmers’ Union Speech. Tuesday was a memorable day in the history of the Farmers’ Educa tional and Co-operative Union. For weeks the districts have been holding meetings and choosing dele gates to the conference called by President Charles S. Barrett, and o i Tuesday morning they began arriving in full force. The - leading officials are here and many subjects of vital interest to the order, which will be discussed in these columns more at length next week, were brought up for consideration: The most notable feature of the conference was the speech by Hon. Thos. E. Watson, be fore the National convention, on Tuesday night, an extensive synop sis of which we give in this issue. Mr. Watson does not write his speeches, and as he has specially pre pared this synopsis for the benefit of the Farmers’ Union readers of The A r \elvspaper Demoted to the Advocacy of the Jeffersonian Theory of Government. Atlanta, Ga., Thursday, January 24, 1907. Weekly Jeffersonian, it is the only authorized and absolutely reliable summary of his speech to be had. He said: * Synopsis of Mr. Watson’s Speech to the Farmers’ National Convention on the Night of January 22, 1907. The Farmers’ Union as an organi zation should, by all means, steer clear of politics. As an organization, it should take no part in any political campaign. It should avoid all entang ling political alliances. But if the individuals composing the Farmers’ Union do not go into politics waist-deep, shoulder-deep, chin-deep, to get what their intelligence tells them is necessary for their material welfare, they will continue to be what they have been ever since the Civil war —the mere drudges, pack horses, “hewers of wood and drawers of water’’ for other classes who do go into politics, as individuals, to get what they want.. In other words, if special privileges have been granted to other classes, which are bearing with harsh ness and injustice upon the agricul- tural class, how is this adverse legis lation to be repealed unless the farm ers make themselves felt as a politi cal power? Let us study the national situation as pictured by Uncle Sam himself in his census reports. We will not take anything from any political text-book, any political pamphlet, any speech or essay written by reformers, by Popu list, by Bryanite, by Hearstite, by So cialist. For the purpose of my speech tonight, I am going to confine myself strictly to the government reports, as shown from year to year, in the well known volume called, “Statistical Ab stract of the United States.’’ The vol ume from which every statement of a statistical character that I make to night is known as “The Statistical Abstract for 1905.’’ This was issued, of course, last year. Now, let us see just what Uncle Sam says is the con dition of the various members of his family—agriculturist, banker, railroad er, and manufacturer. These are the leading members of Uncle Sam’s household —big boys of the family. Let us see how they are getting along, and how the progress of the one com pares with that of the other. We find that in 1850, the amount of capital invested in agriculture, or in other words, the entire value of the agricultural estate in the Union, was $4,000,000,000. At that time we were living under what is called the Walker tariff, which levied a contribution of 20 per cent upon the farmer in order that his brother, the manufacturer, might be protected from foreign com petition over on the other side of the big water, thousands of miles away. This, of course, was a burden to the farmer, but because he loved his brother, the manufacturer, he bore the burden cheerfully and went forward with it for ten years—with a slight re duction in 1857. In 1860, we again take an inventory of the estate of the farmer. We find it to amount to SB,- 000,000,000. In spite of the fact that he has been contributing a bonus of twenty cents out of every dollar to protect goods which he purchases for his use, which bonus went to his brother, the manufacturer, the farmer has doubled his estate within these ten years. Then came four years of war, a loss of nearly a million men from the army (Continued on page 4.) No. 1.