The workingman's advocate. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1864-1877, 1877-05-19

cert Oh uCllOH, We nave bulb uMyy anu
in this capital, beheld q browning |
Two years ago you decided to organ |
i1e and to bring your voting power to
bear upon the political affairs of your
State. Through the efforts of this and
kindred associative organizations, q
concert of action was secured between
the farmers, miners. and mechanics OF
the State. You nominated, voted for
and elected, four members OF the
national house Of representatives
more than five members OF the Illinois
State Senate and more than twenty
members Of the Illinois house Of repre-
sentatives; also the superintendent Of
public instruction in your State, and q
nudge of the Supreme Court Of Illinois,
AS we'll Ms numerous county and
municipal officers. And to-day your
representatives IN the general as
scmbly have. on JOINT ballot, broken
the states" Of both the "Democrasic"
and " Republican" politicians and
elected the man Of your selection
Senator Of tn United States
All this. "a II remembered, how
ever. is the result Of the organiza-
ton and effort of two years ago.
Since which YOU have almost wholly
abandoned your political organization,
and have for the most part been driven
into the ranks Of one or other Of the
political parties by their "whippers-
in" You, therefore, have
AN EXPERIMENTAL KNOWLEDGE
Of your power when organized, uni
ted, and active; and of your weak
ness, when unorganized, divided,
and inactive. You have power,
and if the spirit of this annual meet
ing of the Farmers Association meets
with sympathy and support, the farm
ers of Illinois will not permit the pow
er, which they evidently possess, to
remain latent and unused.
The use Of power to secure Office
e lin substance that the Law power Of the State
Governments regulate ferries common carriers hack
men, baSers merS- wharugers, inn keeper, etc, ap
plies % railroads and grain elevator and that has IN no
en diminish and restricted 10y the constitution q
the United and thar the state Legislature have the
right 10 decade by statue Il they pleas whAt sa-on
Abe Of transg-or tation.~
Thn called the Granger decision confirms tbs
Granger ami under farmers To he safe.
for ourselves or friends, for the
mere sake of official emoluments, is
not worth an effort. But persistent
labor for the advancement of true civ
ilzatlon and the full development Of
the manhood Of our people by the re-
moval Of those obstacles that have been
placed in the way by government, and
can therefore be removed by the &C
ton of a government, should COM
mand your v hole energy and activity.
Without undertaking. or overlook
ing the advantages of our present civil
zatlOn and our form of government, no
thoughtful person will deny that there
are great SECRETARY evils existing among
a. to-day, for which governments are
responsible and for which they are
providing no remedy. In the old
world these evils and dangers are of
THE MOST APPALLING NATURE,
and the evidence of the premature de-
cay of our own young civilization is
manifested by great numbers of tramps
in the country, and paupers and
those who are unwillingly idle in our
cities, and other signs indicate that
evils peculiar to old and decaying civ
llizations are growing upon us here.
In England, for example, we have
the monstrous paradox of a nation of
enormous and growing wealth, in
which a large and increasing portion
Of Its people are ground down under
the hardest poverty, to physical, in
tellectual, and moral deformity. We
behold nation which, during its con-
tinental wars, was able to raise easily
vast sums, annually, to support and
subsidize armies and navies, the great
majority Of whose people have nov
scarcely food to eat or clothes to wear;
nation where pauperism is rising
like swelling flood, encrOaching con-
tinually upon and engulhng classes
who thought themselves on safe ground,
being skilled, industrious, and frugal
a natioG whose labor-saving ma
chnery does the muscular work of
many millions of men, and yet whose
children, scarcely out of the cradle,
have to work day and night, kept
awake by the whip and crippled In
their tender limbs by unnatural toll.
SUCH FRIENDS OF HUMANITY
as Alex. Mcdonald, the Hand Workers
in parliament, are en-
deavOrlng, it IS true, to rescue them,
and, with some success, after many
years of agitation and effort, through
laws regulating the age and the hours
of work of operatives; and Arch is en-
gagged in the same work, with less frui-
ton, for the benefit Of the poor chill
dren and laborers Of the farm gangs !"
a nation overlooking with wealth, doing
the business Of the world, whose mer-
chants and trades all fail, at some
time In their career, almost without
exception; containing, also, many hun
dreds of thousands who would gladly
toll all day for food and a nights shell
ter, who can get no work to do. 1t is
a nation, to use Mr. Carlyle's striking
in which horse is sure
Of comfortable support for the work he
does, but man who Is willing to work
may etarve.
1t is not strange that Lord Macauley
declared government by a numerical
majority of such a people as impracti-
cable; and it is not strange that our
own people are becoming each year
more and more like the people of that
country in the.poverty and degradation
Of the majority, reduced by similar
causes, which must be removed il
representative government is to sue