Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1885-06-05
MUNlSM
Why Bill Nye Refuses to Whack Up With
a Communist.

Whv Bill Nye Refuses to whack Up with
Communist.
DEAR SIR: Your courteous letter OF
| the first instant, in which you cordially
consent to share my wealth and dwell
together with me in fraternal sunshine,
is duly received. While I dislike to
appear cold and distant to one who
seems so yearnful and so clinging, and
while l do not wish to be regarded as
purse-proud or arrogant, 1 must de-
cline your kind offer to whack up.
You had not heard, very likely, that
! I am not now a Communist / used to
be, 1 admit, and the society no doubt
| neglected to strike my name off the
roll of active members. For a number
| of years | was quite active as a Com
munlst. I would have been more ac-
| tive, but 1 had conscientious %scruples
against being active in anything then.
While you may be perfectly sincere
in your belief that the great capitalists
like Mr.. Gould and Mr.. Vanderbilt
| should divide with you. you will have.
great difficulty in making it perfectly
clear to them. They will probably
demur, and delay, and hem, and haw,
and procrastinate, until finally they
| will get out of it in some way. Still I
do not wish to throw cold water on
your enterprise. If the other capital
lists look favorably on the plan, l will
cheerfully cooperate with them. You
go and see what you a do with MI.
| Vanderbilt, and then come to me.
You go on at some length to tell me
how the most of the wealth is in the
hands of flew men, and then you attack
these men and refer to them in q way
that makes my blood run cold. You
tell the millionaires of America to be-
ware, for the hot breath of a bloody
handed Nemesis is already in the air.
You may say to Nemesis, if you
| please. that have adouble-barrel shot
gun standing at the head of my bed
every night, and that l am in the Mem
esis business. You also refer to the
| fact that the sleuth-hounds of eternal
justice are camped on the trail of the
pampercd millionaire, and you ask us
sleuth-hounds of your society within a
week or two, l wish you would say to
them that at a regular meeting of
the millionaires of this country, after
the minutes of the previous meeting
had been read and approved, we voted
almost unanimously to discourage any
sleuth-hound that we found camped on
our trail after ten o'clock p. m. Slcuth-
hounds who want to ramble over our
trails during Office hours may do so
with the utmost impuMty, but after
ten o'clock we want to use our trails
for other purposes. No man wants to
go to the great expense of maintaining
a trail winter and summer, and then
leave it out nights for other people to
use it and return it when they get
ready.
I do not ccnsure you, however. If
you could convince every one of the
utility of Communism, it would GER
tainly be a great boon to you. To
those who are now engaged in feeding
themselves with flat beer out of a to-
mato can, such a change as you sug-
gest would fall like a ray of sunshine
in a rat hole; but, alas! it may never
be. l tried it awhile, but my efforts
were futile. The effect of nv great
struggle seemed to be that mems hearts
grew more and more stony, and my
pantaloons got thinner and thinner on
the seat till it seemed to me that the
world never was so cold. Then I made
some experiments in manual labor. As
| began to work harder and sit down
less, l found that the world was not so
cold. 1t was only when I sat down a
long time that l felt how cold and
rough the world really was.
Perhaps it is SO with you. Sedentary
habits and stale beer are apt to make
us morbid. Sitting on the stone door
stills of Railways and public buildings
during cold weather is apt to give you
an impression of life.
OF course, 1 am willing to put nv
money into a common fund if 1 can be
convinced that it is best. I was an
inside passenger on a Leadville coach
some years ago, when a few of your
friends suggested that we all put our
money INTO a common fund, and | was
almost the first one t see that they
were right. They went away into the
mountains to apportion the money
they got from u party, but 1 never
got my dividend. Probably they lost
my post-ofice address.-BM Nve, IN
| NJ y Mercn,>u 4.