The workingman's advocate. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1864-1877, 1875-08-14
FROM new YORK.
To the Editor Of the WoRKNeMAS's ADVOCATE.
New YORK, July %, 1875.

THE BITTEREsT FOES TO PRODUCERS.
The most positive concentI alton of OPP
position to all those beneficial movements,
which came under the head of grangerism
is naturally found in the purely CONNER
cial or middleman papers of this great
centre Of traficers. II is for this reason
that follow these papers so sharply in
my letters, and quote in order to refute
their sophistry. 1t is some satisfaction to
see that these sheets are beginning to find
out that the people are waking up. The
N. Y. Commercial Bulletin had its snarl,
of course, at the cotton buyers. After
some trouble about communism it said
The agricultural class of the West and
the South are also forcing INTO politics en-
tirely new and dangerous class of questions
In order to carry out the cooperative idea in
a modified form, they have organized for war
fare against all the agencies which have here
tofore been subservient to their interests
against the railroads which carry their pro-
ducts the banks which afford them credits,
and the middlemen who market their com
modities Knowing the lmpossibility of pro-
theories into practice, they would make the
general government tool for doing the ser
vices that have hitherto been rendered BY
corporations. The government, indeed, is to
be the great moving power Of commerce and
finance, owning and controlling the railroads
and the telegraphs, furnishing or regulating
insurance, outstanding the savings Of the peo-
pie, and alone furnishing the circulating me-
dunn"
That's 1t exactly, q very fair statement
for once, only that some improper Ian
guage was used. If that is communism,
grangers and workingmen are certainly
ready to back it up with work and notes
The sapient editor then goes on to say,
that the chief Importance of all these
movements he is criticising lies, in the fact
that they are backed by clesses that are
more numerous than the wise and good
who oppose them. These are no indi-
viduals Of any account, for instance,
among the grangers. Perhaps not; we
will see.
WHY PEOPLE HATE FARM LIFE.
How's this | thought agricultural
colleges we're going to be such an attrac
ton, that all the young counter-jumpers
would throw away their yard-sticks and
rush for the scientific farm. The N. Y.
Express says:
"One of the most saddening facts con-
nected with farming is that so few persons
either understand it or enjoy it. At Cornell
University, for example, there is an expert
mental farm. with every possible advantage
in botany, chemistry, and horticulture, drain
age, engineering, ETC., and the best practical
leaders, and yet, in the year just closed, only
single student graduated possessing the
knowledge required to make a complete
farmer"
find that. strange to say that noted
conservative, DR.. J. G. Holland, editor of
Scribner's Monthly, has found out the true
cause and cure of this evil. He says
''The isolation Of American farm life is
the great curse of that life, and it falls
upon tho women with hardship that the
men cannot appreciate, and drives the
educated young people away" This looks
as if even the old fogies are getting ready
for my favorite scheme Of complete CO
operation" of "birds Of feather hocking
together" into associations to work to-
gether like shakers. Holland thinks that
it will be enough for farmers to live in
villages and have concerts, lectures and
libraries. He lays down the excellent prin-
ciple, that sit is better to 60 a mile to
ones daily labor, than to place ones self
mile away from neighbor." | 60 furth-
err, and demand the uniting home and
farm, workshop" &c.
CAUSES OF TRAPPING.
The N. Y. Times is worrying again
about ''tramps," especially those of New
England. 1t says that the old style Of
Yankee would die rather then turn stroll
ling beggars. 1t finds the cause Of this
evil in the introduction of manufacturers
and foreign population, and says
" 1t may be doubted whether, on the whole,
the masses Of real New ERglanders- ver-
table Yankees-have protited by the change,
and whether their fathers, although poorer in
money than they are and not quite so finely
dressed, were not happier in every way. But,
however that may be, this is certain-that
the mere existence of tramps in New Eng
land, in such large numbers as to be a cause
OF serious con Germ, shows a radical change in
the character of the population Except in
q few old towns, and in some OF the remotest
rural districts yet unthreaded by railways,
New England has ceased to be the land Of
the Yankees"
Well keep on dresses table editors,
sound fnanciers, and supply and demand
economists" keep on with your honest
currency, vested rights, class legislation
and monopoly, subsidies, absinteeism, &C.,
and the heart will soon be so eaten out Of
the whole people that the poor will be lit
tie better than ''bummers."
MIRACLE WANTED.
David A. Wells, who has gathered
good deal Of information, uses this language
in an argument intended to support free
trade
Having regard to the nominal rise in
wages reckoned in q deprecated currency,
and to the nominal rise Of prices, the real |
of the American labOrer in all |
the leading departments Of industry, had dur |
ing the nine years ending 1858, positively |
fallen in . proportion not leas than 20 per |
cent. on his previous earnings"