New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1876-06-03
THE SAGACI0Us MECHANICS.

If we compare the daily life Of White
League politician who whiles away the
tedious hours that intervene between cleo
tons by rising at late hour, and devot-
ing the day to the enjoyment of eating,
drinking, lunching and lounging, with
that of the mechanic who must report at
six or seven o'clock at the workshop with
his dinner pail, and give his daily labor
for Lis daily bread, we will find social
difference of the most radical character.
The man who does nothing but agitate
subsists on the labor of the man who does
nothing but work. 1t is natural, then,
that the professional politician, who has
no subsistence except the official salary Of
himself or others, should continue to
exhort the blacksmith or the shoemaker
to work on, to work harder, and to put
up more and more of the pecuniary or
political support upon which the political
loafer depends.
The mechanics of New Orleans, for
want Of the capital elsewhere devoted to
the organization of machine manufac-
lures, from the high price of taxed food,
taxed labor, taxed light, taxed trade and
a rate Of rents increased by an addition OF
the landlord, merchant, lawyer and ply
stefan tax, in part to their own taxes, have
turned to see for themselves the cause of
their poverty and privations. "Why do
you ask for the cause?' exclaims the po-
litical baron or the political hummer.
"Do you not perceive it is Grant who denies
you work and wages? Is it not plain to
your visions that Kellogg is the bane of
all industry and the sole cause of our de-
cline? Can you for moment doubt that
if you Stay the Republican leaders, run
the negroes from the polls and intrust the
government Of the State to the Democracy
that prosperity will return and remain
permanently among us?" We do not SO
well know how the mechanic may reply.
Other States and cities are badly gov
erned. Their debt and taxation is as
heavy as our own. They have suffered
from robbers of the revenue and fraudu-
lent officials, yet we find the prosperity Of
Chicago, St. Louis and New York has not
been impaired as that Of New Orleans.
You tell us the government of the United
States has been in the hands of reckless
and corrupt party. We know that the
whole Union was involved in destructive
war, yet We find the United States richer
and more populous in spite of this al
legged misrule. We can not, then,
understand why causes which you
say are common to other cities and to the
whole Union should have caused par
ticular destruction in this city alone.
Suppose you allow the mechanic to speak
occasionally in his own affairs, instead of
appearing eternally by political attorney.
We find it an undisputed fact that during
the period of her greatest prosperity the
city Of New Orleans was the only port Of
export Or import for all the country be-
tween the Rocky mountains and the Ale
ghanies. We learn that all the cotton,
sugar, Western tobacco and provisions
produced upon the Mississippi and its
20, 600 miles of navigable tributaries must
pass to market by way of New Orleans.
We learn that I'LL the foreign or domestic
roor,fo nfrroc concumad in tho sauna IN
terror must have passed by way Of New
Orleans to their destination. We are
satisfied from facts in our possession that
New Orleans has lost its geographical
monopoly. That the railroads and
canals which conduct the trade between
California and New York, and between st.
Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati and the whole
West and the Eastern Atlantic States,
now take twenty-four twenty-fifths Of the
Western and Eastern freights, with .