The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??, 1891-12-18
FARMERS RIGHTS.
They Are Acting on Principle and Know
What They Arc About.

FARMERS RIGHTS.
They Are Acting on Principle and Know
What They Arc About.
Thinking that the farmers are too
busy, are too ignorant to concern
themselves about government our law
makers have not concerned themselves
very much about agricultural interests;
at least not in such a way as to pro-
tect or help the producer Indeed.
until recently the politician has not
regarded the farmer as a factor of any
Importance in the civil problems of
this country. The latter has been
looked upon as a voter simply, one
who should cast his vote without ques-
ton and according to the direction Of
some party leader.
! So tamely and SO long has this poll
cy been accepted. that it is probably
not very surprising that the politicians
should be indignant as they now are.
because the farmers are presuming to
claim some recognition in the discus
sions of government and TO express a
wish to share in its benefits,
Assumptions unquestioned soon be-
come rights in the eyes of those who
make them. and 'squatter sover-
eighty" has become as bold in politics
as ever it was IN the Western re-
serves. 1t is strange that it has peen
submitted to so long. No doubt many
party leaders have come really, to
think, that because farmers have not
asserted their rights that they have
| forfeited them by the law of limita-
tions.
This is serious mistake and the
sooner it is recognized the better.
We give below from the Western
Rural non bipartisan, fair and dis
passionate statement of some rights
which farmers may still claim.
Please read it in the same spirit of
equity.
There are certain rights which
calm, fair judgement will accord to
the farmer, even though it may be the
judgement of some one who is not
pleased with all that the farmer does.
The farmer has been drifting toward
independent political action more and
more, and naturally this does not
| please the partisan, who in his anger
may not stop to think that the pro-
ducers of the country have suffered
real wrongs and that these wrongs
ought to be redressed. The Rural is
not partisan paper and hence gives
no advice as to what the farmers
should do politically. Nor are we
politicians, but we believe that it is
good common sense to say that the
old parties can break up any in
dependent political movement in no
way so surely as they can by
making an honest inquiry into the
merits of the complaints of the farm
ing community and then set them
selves about the work of encouraging
reform where it is needed. It is all
folly for our great city partisan dailies
to keep harping about good crops. In
the first place it will require more than
one good crop to enable the farmer to
square himself after all his years of
misfortune. and hence those who think
that the farmers political creed be-
gins and ends with his pocket-book,
will find that even with bursting grain
bins and corn cribs the supposed mild
inspiration to the farmers remon-
STRANGE to things as they exist a slim
pocket bOok-will still remain after
paying his Indebtedness. At least that
will be true in a sufficient number of
cases to make a good sized army of
fault finders.
But the farmer is acting upon prin-
ciple He has been a student of the
tendencies Of the time He knows
that he has been overcharged by the
railroads and rings and trusts. He
knows that taxation is not equal and
that he is the main sufferer from the
inequality. He knows that while he
is producing the nations wealth to a
very large degree, he is not getting
his share of it; and everybody who
knows anything at all about it
knows that too. While farming
should be in the nature of the case
probable in this country, it is not; and
it is not probable because of preventa-
tive causes. Now, the>newspapers, as
rule are not in favor of robbing the
producer, but they become angry be-
cause the producer does not quietly
submit to partisan authority. Not only
justice, but the welfare of political
parties. demand honest, fair treatment
of the farmer. and that truth will vet
be recognized - Southern Alliance
Farmer.
| Women as Hod Carriers.
MIR. Wood says that he visited
Prague, in Austria, and went through
a'large pearl button factory employ
ing l, 200 men, women and children.
He found that the younger hands
earned 10 cents a day, and the men
and the older women 20 cents day.
During dinner time he and his friends
went among the work people who
made pearl buttons. Their dinner
was dark bread and soup made from
| potatoes and turnips Right opposite