The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1873-08-15
SOME PLAIN TALK TO PACKERS
BY JOSIAH coPLEr.
[FrOm the Kansas Farms.l

e puUIISlcd AIOCcS4iHSS VI Il IA 4uNA :
e Leagues, and mere general Con
r ventions. 1 have taken no part il
: them, for / can hardly claim to b
e farmer, although I reside Oh
= what would make a good farm
were ! young enough. to take hol'
of it; but I believe in the yenera
BILE distich-
: He who by the pillow would thrive,
Himself must either hold or drive, =
: and 1 arp too old to do either. Stil
: less am i q merchant, trader, Q
: speculator, apolitician or n law
, yer; butt have led busy life, anG
: have enjoyed admirable opporta
mites for observation. Having nc
personal ends to seek, either pc
cuniary or political, beg you viii
. suffer me to give my views upon
: the state of things in Kansas.
7 The main trouble is, that mar.
? kets adequate to the absorption
of the surplus agricultural pro-
J ducts of our teeming soil are too
far away to be reached by us with
out wasting, in the cost of trans
portation and handling, more than
half their value. The railroad
men may not be doing just what
they ought to do. I am not their
advocate or apologist; but this
much / will say, because I know
lit to be true, that it is not in their
power to transport the crude pro-
ducts of the soil 1,200 to 1900
miles at rates which will leave
farmers living profit. Laws too
high, too strong for men to Crap
pie with, come in here. Neither
Congress nor State Legislatures
are able to afford the relief that is
needed, although some legislation
to do away with arbitrary and ca
PRECIOUS rates OF freights would
be wholesome; still no legislation
can relieve this far interior region.
| We must multiply our Industries
and thus create market at home.
A thousand miles or more, and q
chain of keen, grasping specula-
tors must not lie between the pro-
Queer and the consumer of food.
The farmer ought to be able TO
reach the people who make his
cloth, his leather, his garments,
his boots and shoes, his wagons,
plows, &C., without the interven-
ton of anybody. We ought to
rear sheep here by the million and
have wooden goods to sell, instead
Of sending off to New or Old Eng
land for such things, as we are
now doing. We ought to have
cotton mills here, and have cotton
goods to sell to our still moro
Western people. We can grow
hemp and fax here with great sue
cess; but to make these things
conducive to our prosperity they
must be worked up into cordage,
woven fabrics and oil, here among
ourselves; and SO of a thousand
other things. People who have
nothing to sell but crude products
and who are obliged to pay for the
carrying of all they sell and of all
they buy hundreds and hundreds
of miles, must expect to be poor;
for the mere cost of this carrying
is waste which renders prosper
ity impossible, even though the
railroad men should put rates
down to the lowest grades they
could afford.
But railroad men are like all
others, farmers and stock. raisers
included; they take all they can
get; and to rail or scold about 1t
will not mend the matter, or add
anything to the prosperity of
farmers. There is no money in
that kind of work to them, al
though noisy politicians and dem
agogues may acquire a little pop
ularity and work themselves into
offices by indulgence in such pon-
sense. This thing of cutting our
people up into separate and hostile
classes-as though in the matter
of prosperity and adversely we did
not all fall and rise together-is
one of the grand mistakes of the
age. Can a merchant or mechanic
prosper when the agricultural COM
munity, upon whom he is mainly
dependent, is depressed? OF course
not. We are all, whatever we may
be doing, whether selling goods or
shooting horses, or teaching school,
or even preaching the Gospel, in
the same boat, and must sink or
swim together; and he is q foolish
or a wicked man who tries tn TO-
ment jealousies and create divis-
ions and hostile feelings among
the crew. The war now raging
between labor and capital is
fraught with incalculable evil; and
is doing more to retard the gen
eral well-being than any other one
thing. Every man of common
sense knows that labor and CAPT
tai ale mutually dependent one
upon the other. To both, separa-
ton is death; for labor without
, capital would cease to be labor,
and becomes idleness; while cap
ital without labor would be utter
ly powerless. Together they can
produce and have produced mar
q. velous results. just so it is with
: the producers and consumers of
: food. They are mutually depend
emit; together they make up a
healthy and prosperous commune
ty, and the more intimately they
are intermingled, and the more
; harmonious they are with one an
: other, the better for both.
l should be glad to convince the
farmers of Kansas that they. are
, too far removed from the Atlantic
border ever to hope for any profit
able participation in the great
markets of Europe. Away out
: here, in the geographical center o.
the continent, the people must be
come more self-sustaining. They
must make themselves independ
emit of railroad companies End
mIddlemen by putting themselves
in such u position that they viii
, need so much of their services
That is the way to bring them tt
terms, and there is no other way
Acts of Congress can't do it; fal
less can demagogical spouting al
Farmers Conventions; and least
of all can empty and pompou:
resolutions, which are not wortl
the paper upon which they are
written. All these things ar
mere squirmings, and can affort
nothing towards setting us for
ward on the path of prosperit.
:, and progress.
i Let us have no more class Iii
visions, for there is already to-
! much of that; but let us labor t.
h diversity our own Industries. !
- thousand things can be made her
d which VIC now have to bring froT