The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1886-10-29

brood OF giant corporations, endowed
with life, privilege and power by this
Commonwealth, and bring them under
obedience to the XVIIth article :
They are but public agencies created
for a public purpose. They were de-
signed to fetch and carry for the peo-
pie. But what do we see2 They
take the produce of the West to mar
ket through the heart of this Common
wealth, using the grants made by us
to do so, at rates ruinous to our own
production, impoverishing our farmer,
and causing shrinkage in the aggre
gate value of our lands beyond calcula-
ton. They make one rate to one
man aud different rate to another.
They make one rate to one community
aud different rate to another. They
build up here they destroy there.
They follow but one rule that seems to
be fixed-and that is steady, constant,
cruel discrimination against the local
trade of the State to the full extent of
the rule of taking all the traffic will
bear | believe that the direct tax
upon our domestic industries, and upon
the necessarics of life, arising out of
these unjust and unlqwful discrimiua-
tions against our people amount in
the grand total to more than all our
other taxes, local, State and national,
put together. And what is the remedy?
What is that strange revolutionary de-
mand which the sovereign people who,
originally, granted small portion of
their power to these corporations,
make? 1t is no great matter. They
only ask that after dozen years of
notice and Of preparation, that article
of the constitution which solemnly for
bids these wrongs shall be put in OPP
Grafton. But when venerable citizen
went up to Harrisburg at the regular
session ard argued the case of the
people against the corporations, he
found himself nearly as solitary as
Brothers Rbone and Piollet when they
were down about the tax revision. No
body could answer him. The cons,i
tuition, the la and the truth were with
him. But when he retired came a
great procession Of railroad presidents,
directors, attorneys and other skilled
and trained servants, confusing com
mittees with the legerdemain of fig
ures and other railroad mysteries, show.
ing how our fundamental law was a
failure and folly, impracticable and
worthless and how five millions of
fieemen, having created set of ire
sponsible corporate monsters must con-
time forever 10 writhe under their
hoofs
MONOPOLY WILL NOT LAST.
But this will not last. These great
corporations, by which public interests
are in large degree committed to
private control, are comparatively new;
but both abroad and at home inquiry
and experience are gradually settling
the true principles upon which they
are to be managed. The railroad man
ager will not always battle the states
man. When the people of Pennsyiya.
MIA come to realize that the tremeu-
dous power Of taxation has long been
and is now practically exercised by iu-
terested boards of directors, RESPONSE
be to nobody but those interested like
themselves, and that that power is used
irregularly, lawlessly aud caprlciously,
they will find the way to reduce their
common carriers to the government of
liked law, Your present governor has
not minced these matters. His mes
sages have gone straight to the heart
of the subject. But assemblymen,
with their wallets stuffed with passes,
were utterly shocked by the radicalism
of his startling recommendation that
the Constitution should be enforced by
"appropriate legislation" Would we
cripple railroads =? Not at all. The
real interests of the owners of railroad
property correspond with those of the
State and people. The local traffic
within our borders contributes eleven
twelfths of their profits and taxing il
to death to maintain their destructive
"forelgu wars" is ruinous to them as i,
is to us. They We're created to do oul
business and they must do it accord
ing to law; that is the proposition now
and in a few years will be the fact
Would the farmers, would the work
ingmen, would the many citizens o.
Pennsylvania, engaged in small indus
tries, who complain of the capricoui
tyranny of the transporters, infringe ;
contract or disturb vested rightl W,
know too well that upon the sacred
maintenance of the rights of proper
ty depends the whole fabric of society
including the title to our lands, and lc
the enjoyment OF our earnings whei
they are least. 1t is the small accumu
lations which are eaten up by the larg
ones, when the restraints of law ar,
relaxed, and this is precisely the pro
cess which is going on under the pre-
vailing disregard of fundamental prin
cjples by the corporations, 1t is eve
the few who break over the limits o
the contract which organized socet
makes with all its members, in orde
that they may gather and devour tn
earnings of the many. We stand fo
law; it is our only shield. They a,
sail it; 1t is their only restraint.
1t is true that the wealth of thi
country is almost too great to be con
passed by human imagination, as ha
, reoently been exhi' tied by very cur
, ming and most dazzling array Of fiG
r ures, But who possesses it 2 Thos
! whose labor primarily created it ? Tt
) ten, twenty and hundred milionair
5 corporated monopolists, or the man
2 thousands of workmen, cast at IL
I same moment ont of employment an
, out of home? We hare vast accur
S ulations of wealth in a few places an
r in a few hands, aud this is the sad +
q suit of tho artificial arrangements
' class legislation. We are rich but n
prosperous. Nature and justice, wi
laws, insuriug to every man that viii,
he earns or that which he produce
y excepting the small portion requir,
n for the public service, would nev
: have permitted this extraordinary d
. tributiou of the common produce
q the great hive of North American
"a dustry.
n LAND AND LABOR MUST ORGANIZE.
~ Until land and labor oroaniza