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did it without the knowledge and consent of
the owners—and, ordinarily, the act would be
larcenous.
But Perkins was actuated by a good motive
—hence Perkins is not guilty.
Suppose Perkins had given the money of
the Republican policy-holders to the Demo
cratic Campaign Committee—would his mo
tive have cleared his skirts?
Certainly. Why not? By the reasoning of
the court, if he meant well he is innocent.
Suppose he had given the money to the So
cialists—would the larceny have been merito
rious?
Os course. Why not? If he meant well,
his larceny was commendable.
So, by the reasoning of this eminent New
York Court, you can steal as much as you
like, provided you mean well.
Particularly is it all right if you steal trust
funds and give them to the Republican Par
ty?
Think how many poor devils who had no
“pull,” and no millionaire partners, have
been railroaded to jails, chain-gangs and pen
itentiaries, for stealing trifles, since the sum
mer of 1904, when Perkins stole $47,000 from
the widow and orphan fund of the New York
Life Insurance Company!
Men, starvelings that they were, have been
chained up for stealing bread to eat. Poor
old hags, pilfering a handful of coal, have been
harshly punished because their honesty could
not withstand the temptation to take the coal
and thus save themselves from the freezing
night.
Little children, for the most pitiful pickings
and stealings, have been fed ruthlessly to the
cruel mills of the criminal law.
Against the poor, the weak, the submissive,
the friendless the majesty of the law can as
sert itself. To these, it can come in thunder
claps, as though Sinai were as fearful as of
old. •
But against the Swifts and Armours, who
poison food; the Standard Oil band, who vio
late all kinds of law; the Railroad murderers,
like J. P. Morgan, and sleight-of-hand rascals,
like E. H. Harriman; traction-merger plun
derers like Ryan and Belmont; Insurance
• company thieves, like Geo. W. Perkins—
What can the law do?
NOTHING.
The criminal acts of millionaires are not
crimes. Commoners, in Great Britain, could
not sit in judgment upon Dukes, Marquises
and Earls.
The lordly law-breaker might have defied
God and man, revelled in evil, reddened his
hand in the blood of his fellow man. Common
juries, common judges, common tribunals
could not reach him.
He was above the common herd, above the
common thief or murderer, above the com
mon law.
Only the Duke and* the Marquis and the
Earl could adjudge and condemn the Duke
and the Marquis and the Earl-
God I how the old foes of human liberty are
crowding back upon the stage!
Our millionaire Dukes and Marquises and
Earls—FOUL SPAWN OF OUR VICIOUS
AND VILLAINOUS CLASS LEGISLA
TION—have taken the place and claim the
privileges of Aristocracy.
We common men have no power over them.
Our common courts and our common judges
disclaim jurisdiction.
Standard Oil magnates are wanted for Per
jury, in Texas, but can not be arrested.
Beef Trust criminals are wanted for fla
grant, insolent and repeated violation of law
—they can not be reached, because the Judge
ruled that they were immune. Railroad kings,
sacrificing everything to dividends, have been
guilty of the murder of thousands of passen
gers whose lives were demanded by mere
sordid, criminal greed—but they can not even
be indicted.
Nor, after indictment, can the millionaire be
THE WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN.
convicted on a plain case of larceny. When
nothing else will save the criminal, the Prose
cuting Attorney throws all his help to the de
fense, doctors the record to suit the accused,
and.actually succeeds in having a high eourt
of appeals decide that a good motive, actuat
ing the thief, makes it an innocent act for him
to steal your money.
•t n n
An Object Lesson to "Farmers.
Senator La Follette of Wisconsin has for
many years been waging in his state a fight
for the people against grasping, lawless, pred
atory corporations.
The plain people supported him just as
they will always support the honest reformer
Who wins their confidence.
Elected to the Senate of the United States,
the corporation doodles and dummies who fill
that august body declared their purpose to
snub La Follette, give him cold shoulder,
freeze him with their disdain.
They tried it on —good and hard—but it
didn’t work worth a cent. La Follette cared
nothing for the supercilious aloofness of the
corporation doodles and dummies.
Steadfast in his purpose, he introduced his
reform measures. True to its purpose, the
Senate mangled these measures.
Then La Follette went on the Chautauqua
lecture platform, exposed the conduct of the
corporation dummies, gave the names of va
rious senatorial doodles, showed how these
corporation hirelings had mangled good mea
sures, and thus, in effect, appealed to the
country against the United States Senate. The
result was encouraging to the reformers. Pub
lic opinion declared itself so unmistakably in
favor of La Follette that various corporation
Senators began to hedge. Their knees weak
ened. They began to treat La Follette and
his measures with more consideration. But
still they hated him and hated his measures.-
Not daring to vote against him openly, they
determined to emasculate his propositions
with amendments which looked innocent but
which were, in fact, full of poison.
This was particularly the case with his bill
which forbade railroad corporations to work
their employes more than sixteen consecu
tive hours.
Corporation Senators got this measure in
“Conference,” and were joyously proceeding
to jab its life out with treacherous amend
ments.
La Follette, however, did not lie down and
go to sleep. He is just about as keen as they
make ’em.
La Follette sent the word along the line of
organized railway telegraph operators, telling
these over-worked and underpaid men what
the corporation doodles were doing.
Then there was a kettle of fish! Twenty
thousand telegraph operators got on to the
wires and made them hot with indignant mes
sages.
Basketsful of telegrams began to rain on
the House and Senate. The whole country
seemed to be in a state of insurrection.
The cowardly and corrupt Senate backed
down and passed La Follette’s bill!
Now if 20,000 telegraph operators can dic
tate terms to Congress, why can not the
million members of the Farmers’ Union get
what they want in the way of righteous leg
islation ?
They can do it!
Farmers! Organize, educate, agitate, co
operate, and you can rule the Republic!
HMM
Members of Congress, a short time ago, in
creased their own wages by 50 per cent, yet
they work no better than before.
The honest men of the House had a major
ity over the Ship Subsidy thieves, but these
honest men could not be kept in their seats.
Consequently the Ship Subsidy thieves
pushed their steal through the House.
Editorial Notes.
Senator Tillman’s friends can not “point
with pride” to his record during the short ses
sion of the 59th Congress.
Tillman’s senatorial energies seemed to be
devoted exclusively to the petty task of an
noying Roosevelt.
The Ship Subsidy thieves were led with
such artful boldness in the House that they
knocked dovfrn John Sharp Williams and his
virtuous majority.
Oh, what a leader is John Sharp! He can
not win even when he has the majority on
his side.
It is reported that Senator Spooner of Wis
consin has resigned. Thank the Lord!
With the exception of Senator Aldrich of
Rhode Island, our corporation Feudalism had
no senatorial vassal so able, so efficient and
so blindly servile as Senator Spooner. Good
riddance!
The Ship Subsidy contest demonstrated the
unfitness of'John Sharp Williams for the
Democratic leadership. He had a clear, de
cisive majority of the votes, yet he allowed
the minority to whip him. ,
The name for such leadership is imbecility.
If a leader can not win when the majority
are on his side, when can he win?
Hereafter, you can lawfully write on the
left half of the face of a Postal Card.
Put the address on the right half of the
card, then write what you want to say on
back, and then say whatever else pops into
your mind on the left-hand half of the face of
the card.
In that way you’ll get your money’s worth,
and increase the happiness of your correspond
ents.
Always use a pencil, if you want the joy to
become contagious.
•t
Another railroad king, E. H. Harriman,
“reorganized” the Chicago & Alton Railroad
and pocketed $24,000,000 of the loot—he and
his personal gang.
He also mortgaged and bonded a railroad
that was never built.
When modem finance permits a swindler
to mortgage something that does not exist,
and when the law of the land is powerless to
punish such a rascal, simply because he is
such a big rascal, it would seem that our sys
tem has become like the nest of a certain spe
cies of fish-hawk—useless because of its layer
after layer of accumulated dead-weight.
The fish hawk’s nest is all right at first—
answers the purpose for which it was built.
But, year after year, the fish-hawk lays other
branches and twigs and sticks upon the nest,
until finally it falls of its own weight—goes
crashing to the ground.
Then the silly hawk begins it all over again.
We human creatures are equally foolish. We
have so over-laid our system with accumu
lated statutes, rules, decisions, exemptions,
exceptions, judge-made law and miscellaneous
rubbish that the whole thing is too cumber
some to be serviceable.
The system no longer answers the purpose
for which it was built.
According to the press reports, Jim Griggs
of Georgia was one of the men who got lost
at the critical moment {and thus contributed
to the victory of the Ship Subsidy thieves.
Where are you, James?
A Congressman who can not be kept at
the post of duty while such a fight as that was
going on, ought to be left at home.
He isn't fit to attend to public business.
Instead of being worth $7,500 per year, he
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