The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1891-04-14

Grated, laws are prostituted, justice
becomes a by-word. the trial by jury a
farce, andpublic officials are corrupted,
while rumor of bribery r rampant
on every side.
again, history is replete with evil
dences that wherever gambling in any
form is tolerated in any community,
bribery and corruption protectit, while
the right of law-abiding citizens are
subverted, industrious habits are de-
strOyed, common honesty undermined,
and honest business enterprises are
honey-combed though employees rem
dered dishonest by these glittering
allurements to crime. Murders, sui
cides, embellishments, breaches of trust,
follow in the wake of these seductive
foes, while the homes Of the poor are
besieged with squalor and want"
1t is claimed by the gamblers them
selves that they spent $40, 600 recently
in bribing the members of the leglsla-
ture of New Jersey to pass a law grant
ing them a field to ravage the State
and the metropolis with their gangs OF
freeboOters. They struck men Of their
kind, who pocketed the money and
lodged the vote. They failed. They
are now at work with a corruption
fund at Albany.
The Western Union Telegraph Com
pany is said to be one of the most
deeply interested parties in this contest
of tie thugs and thieves against
decency, order and the life of society.
point:
1.-THE reason they think that they
are safe now from interference rests on
what some people might consider
pretty good foundation. Tammany
and the police have a most potent mo-
tive for standing by them. The Dis
trict Attorneys Office has pigeon-holed
the indictments of cases that were
worked up in good faith and with law
yerlike methods. But behind these bar
riers stands another, in the Western
Union Telegraph Company, which has
warded off the law before, and whose
interest it is to stand by it's friends
now. It's services may not be needed
in this city, which is we'll protected
otherwise, but in keeping the legisla-
ture silent it may prove an effective
ally;
Union pays so we'll as it's racing de-
partment. The price per pool room for
service from the New Jersey tracks is
at least $50 per day. If there are sixty
rooms in full blast the income Is So, 600
per day or $18, 600 per week"
More and more do we see, that it is
fast becoming an absolute necessity for
the United States Government to take
charge of the telegraph business. AS
it took the postOffice from private
hands, and through this throttles the
Louisiana State Lottery-so it must
sooner or later for reasons of public
safety, take charge of the telegraph
which is the post of the dawning
twentieth century.
Let the Christian world speak
out on this question. Let us
give the men who are helping,
through the press, to damn our
that no paper can make a speciality of
Religion and Home, and be at the same
time an organ of the vilest and dead
lest species of gambling of the age.
Let us give our time, our money and
our influence to all the agencies being
used for the crushing of these abomina-
tions. Let is stand by Anthony Com
stock in his efforts to suppress this
curse. Hear these incidents from his
daily record:
q knew of one case where a man
took $500 of trust funds and spent it
in a single night at a banking game
run in Monmouth county, by one of
those so-called improve-the-breed-of
hOrse-gamblers."
But a few weeks ago, a young man
having a wife and three children, called
at our Office, and almost the first words
he uttered were: eff you do not close"
(naming the place. SO that I cannot go
into it, I shall commit suicide. I can
not stand it to see my wife and children
suffer; but I am so completely under
the influence of this gambling craze,
that if I have a dollar of money I am
bound to stake it.
ct is not a great while ago that in
MOntclair, n. j., a man holding a high
position of trust under the government
of the United States committed suicide,
having been discovered to bea defaulter
to a large amount of money. This man
employed boot-blacks and others to
place his money, thus stolen, in the
hands of the city sharpers who were
engaged in the commission business of
thus improving the breed of horses"
Can we remain Indifferent while our
fellow-men are thus destroyed, and the
very foundations of business, society
and the Church of Christ undermined?
If we love our fellow-men, let us show
it. Let us speak. Let us act.
PROGRESS.