Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1885-02-05
ADVERTISING RATES.
NJ. tAeuf On t.fele
THURsDAY......FE FEBRUARY S. 1885.
The Power.

nents Of the BLAIR bill that Congress
has no power under the Federal Con-
stitution to pass that bill.
In view of facts krcwn to everybody,
such a contention slSsns to be ludicrous.
Congress has power to forbid to-
bacco-plantor from selling the tobacco
grown upon his own land, and tended
by his own hands, to anybody except
dealers in tobacco authorized by the
same Congress to purchase tobacco, but
Congress has no power to appropriate
the money it collects from tobacco
manufacturers and others in aid of the
public-school systems of the several
States.
Congress has power to forbid the
people to convert their apples or their
peaches into brandy without permits
sion from an agent of the Federal Gov
eminent; power to compel everybody
10 pay tax for the privilege Of making
brandy; but no power to assist in ed
ucating the children of those taxpayers.
Congress has power to forbid any
man from making whiskcy out of his
own grain, grown on his own land,
unless he first obtains permission to do
SO from some agent appointed under a
law passed by the same Congress, and
power TO collect a tax Of nearly dollar
per gallon on all whiskey manufactured
under that permit but no power to use
any Of the many millions of dollars
thus collected from the products Of
grain in educating the children of the
men who raise all that grain and pay all
that money into the Federal Treasury.
Congress has power to appropriate
money to supply the physical wants Of
persons whose farms are overflowed by
river, but not to appropriate money
to supply the educational wants Of the
same persons.
Congress has power to pass law
under which tobacco-manufacturer is
compelled keep books of prescribed
kind and show those books to Govern
ment agents whenever requested so to
do, but no power to appropriate a dol
lar to be used in purchasing school
books.
What is it that Congress cannot do
except pass the BLAIR bill: 1t can
tax your income, and make you tell
what that income was last year. 1t can
send an agent to your drugstore to ex-
anime all the bottles and boxes and
walls and packages therein shelved in
order to ascertain whether or not any
of them are proprietary medicines upon
which the tax has not been paid. 1t
can give public lands to railroad
companies, and to the several States,
and to individuals. Ii can give
you good title to tract Of the public
land if you will live upon it five years.
II has been doing this for years and
years. And therefore we may add that
il could just as well give you the land
unconditionally-out of hand, so TO
speak. The power is the same. 1t can
compel you to go hundreds Of miles to
dance attendance upon an UNDER
WOOD. 1t can impovcrish you with
taxes. 1t can annoy you to death
with internal-revenue spies. informers,
and detectives. 1t can appoint
your postmasters, carry your letters,
send newspapers or anything else it
chooses so to send free through the mails.
1t can educate your children at Govern
ment expense il you viii send them to
West Point, OF to Annapolis, or to any
other Government school, but not if you
keep them at home "Paternal Peda-
gogy" is all right when it undertakes
to educate the children of men rich
enough and influential enough to get
their children into Government schools.
but all wrong when it presumes to cdu-
cate the children Of the rest Of the COM
munity.
II all these things be true, is not ours
monster Of government powerful
for evil, powerless for good? We can
not admit that It is such government;
and so we advocate the BLAIR bill.