Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-01-20

va of more far-reaching
W importance than al
first appears, and in
dictate that we are
slowly, but none the less surely, drifting to
that point outlined by the poet where he
says of Lo! the poor Indian:
We, the rightful lords of yore
Are the rightful lords no more.
And what is true of Lo! the red man will
soon be equally true of Lo! his ''pale-faced
| brother"
1 have no sympathy whatever for what is
commonly preached as communism, and our
| Anglo-Saxon thrones of claw and order"
compel US to gracefully accept legal de-
| cisions which we feel are strained or errone-
ous Yet it is impossible not to feel that
such decisions as those handed down during
the week will in the future not only breed
what Carlyle calls claw defers," but that
| they are giving legal effect and force to
! principles which the vast mass of orderly
and intelligent citizens feel to be mon
| strous wrong.
The average citizen cares nothing for the
tax collectors "pugs" involved in this de-
cision. Very little more for the mere "tare
and net as such, so far as it effects the
city's exchequer, but it is surely curious
spectacle to find the Court of last resort in
Pennsylvania closing the English lam
guage into corner to get adjectives vigor-
GUS enough to uphold corporate against
popular right.
REMEDIES FOR LITIGANTs.
Chief Justice Church used to say in New
York that litigant when beaten in the
lower court had two remedies-one to ap-
peal, the other to swear at the court. Here
we have no Court of Appeals such as they
have in New York, and peradventure our
only popular remedy in sight is to ''swear
at the courts" and certes the public are swear
ing hard at these later decisions of the Big
Wigs. And why not?
Take very simple proposition, which
everyone can understand without petit
Jogging:
A stranger visits the city-has no inter
orders cab. He is charged an excessive
rate, and he finds remedy-a tariff oil rates
ordained by the municipality for the pro-
lection of "all and sundry" persons within
our gates. He pays neither tithes nor taxes
gives no equivalent for the police, magis-
terial and legal protection afforded. He
gets all these without any sort of return or
equivalent. am talking now to common
people, such as lett their bloody footprints
at Valley Forge, and supposed they were es-
tablishing a government of "we, the peo-
pie" but knew nothing of the quadlibets
and quidiebits of modern law.
Now look at the reverse of this picture
and tell me il the drift is not toward a ''de-
cline and fall" Here is a corporation
drawing its powers from the people, and
given valuable franchises without any
sort of equivalent, permitted to use the
highways, tear up and obstruct streets,
make mud holes out of leading thorough
fares, cause citizens loss and ANNOYANCE
without any redress, asserting rights not
claimed by any citizen, and assuming to
charge the public, which has been granted
all these tavors, any rate it pleases for its
product, and when the public attempts to
resist these extortionate claims, it is told
by the highest court in the State that it can
have no redress, and the creature is above
the creator. Pray where do "we, the peo-
pie, come in under such doctrine?
HISTORY MAY REPEAT ITSELF.
IF such decisions must stand, the Huns
and Vandals which Lord Macaulay pre-
dicted would overthrow the "Great Re-
be recruited very largely from the sons of
the "law abiding" citizens of the nine
teenth century.
Take the other case, and
Tell me, implore,
Quoth the raven evermore.
Is this sort of INEQUALITY in a land of
equal laws" to continue?
A poor man erects a homestead of brick
and mortar, and the assessor comes along
and assesses the homestead at what is face
tiously elmed its actual cash valuation.
There is no escape for him. Taxation follows
assessment, and lien and costs follow delin-
ttohl II ~ A., lol1 Al
night. No courts or retinue of LAWYERS in
tervene in his behalf. Whether it be robbery
under the form of law, or the other kind, he
must stand it, nolens, volens. But 10
here is corporation, which uses-not
private ground paid for by individual
effort, but public ground paid for by the
common veal. 1t digs up the highways
obstructs travel and traffic, and laws pipes
which are as much the product of human
labor, and, therefore, as property taxable as
brisk or mortar, and the company resists
taxation on this franchise, and this property
the big wigs and silk gowns in the highest
judgment seat in the State afirms the
corporate claim as against the individual.
Injustice cannot permanently thrive under
our Anglo-Sa1on civilization, and 'ere the
child of to-day is voter such decisions and
their authors will be as forgotten or as exc
cradle as Jeffries. 1t was such outrages as
these against popular right" that COM
PEELED the Barons to combine against King
John and have made Magma Charta and
Runnymede immortal.
As Charles O'Connor said in the Tweed
appeal suits, "When law ceases to be an
embodiment of justice, it becomes thing of
contempt. JAMES W. BREEN.
Ross TOWNSHIP, January 10.
Electrical Diagnosis of the Brain.