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WATSON’S EDITORIALS
Food For Thought.
The pack is in full cry after the railroads.
So be it. The railroads deserve every jolt
they get. Their management has been high
headed, arrogant, arbitrary, tyrannical,
scornful of public opinion, contemptuous
of private censure, disregardful of indi
vidual and public rights.
They have squandered their money fighting
the laws which they ought to havo- obeyed.
They- have wasted on lobbyists, newspapers,
and “special counsel,” the money which ought
to have been spent in the improvement of the
service. To earn dividends on watered stock,
they have shed blood like water*
Such management deserves to be made “to
smell hell”—and from the looks of their noses,
they are getting a few whiffs.
But this railroad question has a good many
Other questions coupled up with it; and we
must study these, also, as we go along.
Why is it that the Chambers of Commerce
and the Freight Bureaux and the Labor Unions
refuse to help the people secure a flat two
cent passenger rate?
Here is food for thought, my son. You.don’t
need to be told that when a railroad is made
to lower its passenger rate, everybody gets the
benefit. Rich and poor, , black and white,
country and town, they all “share, and
share alike.” Whosoevevr rides on a rail
road, pays less. The manufacturer,
the merchant, the laborer, the farmer—each
saves one cent a mile when passenger fares
drop from three cents to two cents per mile.
That’s a plain proposition, isn’t it, son?
To be sure.
Well, then, why should the Chambers of
Commerce and the Freight Bureaus of the
cities be indifferent to the reduction; and why
should the Labor Unions oppose it?
Chew on this, my son.
Listen: With all of its shortcomings our
Railroad Commission has reduced freight rates
about $2,000,000 during the last few years.
Consequently, the consumers of manufactured
goods ought to be able to buy those goods at
least as cheaply as they did a few years ago.
But can they do so? Not at all. In spite
of freight rate reductions, the farmers and oth
er consumers are paying more than ever.
How is that?
Why, the manufacturer and the city jobber
have simply pocketed the $2,000,000! And
more besides.
Just as soon as our Supreme Court decided
that the order of the Railroad Commission, re
ducing the freight on stoves, must be obeyed,
the price of stoves immediately advanced.
The stove which was costing you $lO in
1905, was costing you sl3 in May, 1907. Then
came the Supreme Court Decision in favor
of the lower freight rate.
And the jobbers of the cities at once put a
five per cent increase to the price of the stove
—making the sl3 stove of May, 1907, cost
you $13.65, in June, 1907.
These are facts, my son. Chew on them.
In 1905 freight rates from New York and
Boston to Atlanta were reduced 9 cents per
100 pounds, or $27 per car-load of 30,000
pounds, on hats, men’s clothing, blankets, dry
goods, etc. On iron ware, flour, bedsteads,
WATSON’S WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN
A Newspaper Devoted to the Advocacy of the Jeffersonian Theory of Government.
published by SUBSCRIPTION PRICE: SI.OO PER TEAR
THOS. E. WATSON and J. D. WATSON, Advertising Rates Furnished on Application.
Editors and Proprietors
rr. Ent, nd at Ptntfict, Atlanta, Ga., January 11, iqoj, at tttand
Temple Court Building, Atlanta, Ga. dan mail mattar.
ATLANTA, GEORGIA, THURSDAY, AUGUST 8, 1907.
and many other articles, material reductions in
freight were made.
Yet what farmer, or laborer, or other con
sumer, can buy a hat cheaper than before the
freight reductions of 1905? Who can buy a
suit of clothes cheaper; ot a calico dress or a
pair of shoes or a pair of blankets; or a plow,
ax, set of harness, bedstead, chair, or barrel
of flour?
The manufacturers and jobbers made the
railroads reduce freights on these goods to the
amount of two million dollars*
How much of this saving did the farmers
and other consumers get?
Not a red cent!
Think it ovef, my son.
Shoes are classed among “the necessaries
of life.” The manufacturer of shoes has always
been a governmental pet. Special Privilege
extended its protecting care to the shoe-mak
ers of Lynn, .Mass., before it did to anybody
else*
For more than a hundred years, this indus
try has been built up at the expense of others.
Foreign competition has been made practi
cally impossible. Therefore, the trust was
easily organized. In 1905 the freight on shoes
coming into Georgia was reduced SB7 per car
load. _ \
The manufacturers and jobbers advanced
the price $3,375 per car!
Hence, the people who buy shoes not only
failed to get one cent’s benefit from the reduc
tion in freight, but are having to pay nearly
three thousand dollars per car-load more for
boots and shoes.
Tough on the shoe-buyers—isn’t it, son?
Similar showings can be made as to other
“necessaries of life.”
Farmers are congratulating themselves up
on having forced the spinners to pay a higher
price for raw cotton. Don’t crow too soon,
dear friends.
Watch the price of all the manufactured ar
ticles which you are necessarily compelled to
buy. Study the price list of cotton goods!
WHAT THE SPINNERS ARE GIVING
YOU WICH ONE HAND, THEY ARE
TAKING AWAY WITH THE OTHER.
All of this is food for thought, my son.
The leaders of the great Farmers’ Union
will see to it that we have a reduction in pas
senger rates which benefits all classes alike;
and will see to it, also, that the purchasers of
manufactured goods get a fair share in the
millions of dollars saved in freight rates.
In this great national fight for just trans
portation charges, we would be silly, indeed,
to do nothing more than to rake chestnuts out
of the fire for the manufacturers and jobbers.
hmm
Thanks, "Brother Ducklvorth !
In the course of his fine address to the recent
State Convention of the Farmers’ Union of
Georgia, President R. F. Duckworth was gen
erous enough to say:
“We have been greatly assisted in the last
few months by other publications, some of
them running Farmers’ Union departments.
We appreciate all such assistance. It would
not be out of place here to make special men
tion of the assistance rendered us by Hon.
Thomas E. Watson through his publications,
which is greatly appreciated by the members
throughout the state.”
H R
Clark HolvelTs Editorial.
In Sunday’s Constitution, the leading edi
torial, “The Late Georgia Democracy,” is an
epoch mark.
In frank recognition of actual facts, in broad
ness of view, in magnanimity of temper, this
editorial does honor to the head and the heart
of Clark Howell.
For his generous allusions to myself, I sin
cerely thank him.
There is just one thought that I would sug
gest to him. His head-line should have been:
“Sham Democracy dead in Georgia, and real
Democracy triumphant.”
I have never made war upon organized Dem
ocracy because it was Democratic. Oh, no.
My fight was against those who took the grand
old historic name, and used it as a branding
iron for policies and principles which were the
reverse of Democratic.
In other words, my long fight has been made
for Democracy—not against it. Always I have
claimed to be a Jeffersonian Democrat.
I am nothing else, now.
And I am ready now, as I have ever been, to
march side by side, and fight shoulder to shoul
der with those who think more of the true prin
ciples of Democracy than they do of party
names.
Let all of us quit bothering ourselves about
the tag, and the brand, and the label. Let us
concern ourselves with the genuineness of the
goods. Let all of us cease to worry over party
names and party success. Let us study public
questions on their merits, AND VOTE, AS
REASON DICTATES, FOR THE BEST IN
TERESTS OF OUR COUNTRY.
Heretofore, the great question with the aver-
' age organized Democrat has been,
Have we got the right branding iron?
Hereafter, let us take some pains to have the
right cow.
The branding iron may be yours, all right
enough, but if you’ve gone and corralled the
other fellow’s cow—look out for trouble.
THE LATE GEORGIA DEMOCRACY!
There are few things so strange that they may not
be surpassed in strangeness. Accustomed to this
character of events these days, or inured to them by
their slow processes of evolution, we almost cease to
wonder until hauled up short by some simple refer
ence or incident and brought face to face with bald,
protruding truth. Ten years ago the wreck of or
ganized Democracy would have been viewed with
horror in Georgia. Today It is accomplished without
a ripple of excitement. Not that any one has ground
of complaint; on the contrary, only the people are
concerned and it is the popular will that makes it so.
The people are the supreme arbiters of their tem
poral destiny, and their demands must find con
cordant expression from the various governmental
departments which they have created.
But it is not so many years ago that the call of
Democracy or of the Democratic party was superior
Mi*