The Bennington banner. [volume] (Bennington, Vt.) 1858-1894, 1888-08-09
"COMPLAINT OF THE POOR,

The poor | wish to speak for are the
self sustaining poor. Especially do |
wish to speak for the poor farmer and of
his class | am one. The entire yearly in
come of the average farmer is not near
ly $400 By this do not mean that farm
ers who own several farms and employ
the labor of Others cannot got $400 year
but mean that the small farmer lin this
section at leasD who owns and tills with
his own hands his farm of so or 100 acres
cannot, after paying his taxes and re
pairing his buildings. give himself sal
airy of $400 year And observe include
in that salary all produce consumed at
home by his family.
Now what is the complaint of such
farmer Does he complain that the esti
mate of society as whole on the Sc,
vices of for instGnce) Joseph Cook, is
that Joseph Cooks services for two or
three nights are worth more than his
own are for a year Such is not his com
plant. Or is it against the man who
earns $50, 900 year? No. If there be a
railroad superintendent or any other
useful man who can by superior efficien.
cy do work worth $50, 900 a year, let him
have it, The complaint of the poor is
not that superior talent gets higher
wages, but their complaint is precisely
the reverse of this; it is that income is
not guaged by talent.
Our complaint is against the power Of
money to command and control. not only
money, but men. The rich who make
no pretensIons to superior skill of hand
or talent of brain, except 1t be the ability
to fOretell the state of the markets and
so are able to buy cheap and sell dear to
their own advantage, these are they Of
whom we complain. Their talent is not
one whit more useful to society than was
the talent of Jesse James. Their incomes
are not the result of services to society.
The younger Vanderbilts in maintaining
their immense fortune, may have Incl
dentally served society to some extent {;
but to say that their income is wages re
ceIved from society for services is non.
sense. Or take the above mentioned in
dividual who is supposed to earn $50, 900
year. we have no complaint to make
against him. but we do complain of the
fact that with his money he can and
often does eudow his inefficient and IN
capable son with such an amount in
seven percent mortgages on improved
Kansas farms that he can command in
interest, without the use of any talent at
all, the entire surplus earnings OF fifty
small farmers, any one of whom is more
talented more efficient, more useful than
himself; so that he can send his daugh-
tors flirting 70 tho watering places, " hlle
the daughters of his debtors grow coarse
and unwomanly with endless drudgery
Our complaint, then, is not that eff
cheney makes money, but that money
makes money. When we see a man in
the possession of wealth we do not con-
clude that he has been more than other
men useful IN serving society; but we
conclude that either he inherited good
start or that he has embraced salvation
by meanness,' or salvation by rascalty.
The master evil Of the present age is the
power of mere money to accumulate
money. Usury GnteIes) was forbidden
to the Jew by the law of Moses. II il
could be forbidden now, money would
cease to win money, and skill brain, eff
cheney would have fair chance in the
race and would always win.
1t has been demonstrated that the
mortgaged Indebtedness of the farming
class is constantly increasing. These
mortgages are surely and not very slow
" sinking the class of independent
small farm owners out of sight. This
class, conservative, moral, reliable, is
doomed to perish through the workings
of the power of usury,- James Martin,
Bloomington, Ind, in Independent.