Springfield globe-republic. (Springfield, Ohio) 1884-1887, 1885-04-28
TUESDAY EVENING, APRIL 2s.
THE PROBLEM OF THE PERIOD.

THE PROBLEM OF THE PERIOD.
The pending problem with the average
American has been as to how he can get
rich at the earliest possible moment. The
Almighty Dollar and how to get hold OF
it has been in the thoughts and dreams OF
the larger number of our people, from
time imme mortal" 1t has been discovered,
however, that everybody cannot get rich,
and it will be discovered, further, when
people become wiser, that that there is
something better than making money:
namely, the acquiring Of sense, Judgment,
character, the ability to properly utilize
the advantages within reach and to make
the best of circu instances, such as they
may prove to be.
But the problem OF the present period
relates not to methods of making money
or getting rich, but to methods of getting
bare subsistence. Great masses of the
American people are now engaged in a
struggle for bread and the outlook is not
at all inspiring. Neither does the prob
lem involved pertain merely to those many
thousands of people who are fighting the
wolf from the door. 1t pertains also to
those people who are well-to-do, for il
any member of society or the community
suffer the whole body suffers. If people
are hungry and starving-or even il they
do not know where the next day s food is
coming from, and are anxious and contin-
ually worrying, with good cause for the
future, it is not simply a source of trouble
TO them but it is a source of not annoyance
t. them alone, but of danger to the general
public When people are hungry their stom-
ac's not unirequently cry louder than their
consciences! We cannot rest conten'ed
with saying that there shall be no starva-
ton in the land-thtre must be no hunger
that cannot be met with food. But when
we have said this, and enforced it, there
has still been no solution of the pending
problem. Administering to the needs OF
suffering people must be continued, but
that is only temporary expedient. 1t
stays the stomach, but it does not relieve
anxiety. 1t gives no assurance for the
future. 1t contributes nothing to the
feeling of manliness and self-dependence
which are essentials to the personal hap
piness and dignity and contentment of the
citizen. The problem involved is for So.
ciety, for the community, for the State, to
take into consideration. Something must
be done in the direction Of putting our
hundreds of thousands of idle men in a
position to help themselves, not into ways
of getting rich, but into ways of earning
bread and shelter, and clothing. This
must not be done IN the way OF charitable
endeavor, or as a gratuity, but as some
thing to which these idle men are fairly
entitled. To large extent they are the
victims of circumstances to which they
have not contributed and for which they
are not to blame. II there have been
oyerproduction and cutthroat competition
as there have been-so that men are
thrown out of work and can find nothing
to do, the men who have run their
establishments recklessly and in a
manner sure, at some time, to result in
pressure, and panics, and commercial dis
aster, are the men who ought to bear the
blame. And they are the men who should
join with others in trying to invent methods
by which the honest idle classes--and all
who belong to them--csn be put in posi-
ton to earn their own bread, and to pad
die their own canoe" so that they can
themselves, feel that they are men, and so
that they shall be looked upon as men.
1t quite true that very many who are
now idle, and suffering, have been i'm proyi.
dent. Some Of them have squandered
good money for drink; others have wasted
their earnings in luxury and have made no
provision for the future but even these
must be provided for. Perhaps they will
be wiser hereafter. But very many have
been provdent and have tried to save;
some have bought ground and built and
cannot now meet their payments; others
have exhausted their little surplusses. All
these classes must receive the attention OF
the general public; now, at season OF the
year IN which men can work where EN-
ployment can be secured---where they
can plow, and plant and cultivate veseta-