The Forrest City times., 1892-09-09
WHERE WILL IT END?
What the Peoples Party Demand Ft
 Government Control May Lead To.


 What the Peoples Party Demand For Government Control May Lead To.
 Correspondent Courier-Journal.
 WARRIOR, ALA. Aug-When the national council of the Farmers Al liance and Industrial Union assembled at Ocala, Fla, and framed the Ocala demands, they probably never drean,ed of the extent to which the demand for government ownership would be car ried. They demanded that the govern ment control and supervise the rail roads, to prevent their making exorbi- tant charges upon the people; but if a road eyade this, then ownership of that road was demanded. Then came the Omaha platform, demanding abso- | lute ownership of railroads by the gov ernment. And now comes the latest and most absurd thing of the kind, in 1 the form of a demand from the People s party in Ohio that the government
 manufacture and sell intoxicating liduors. At that rate of increase. where will it be by the next campaign They will soon be demanding that the gov ernment establish bakeries in every | family, on the pretext that the govern ment can do our baking cheaper than | we can.
 Government supervision and control of railroads, or in other words, regu- l lation by statute, so as to allow only a reasonable per cent on the capital in- vested, is just, and 1 might say, neces- sary. Most of our states. believe, have such regulations, but here in Ala cama, We need a more rigid regulation. There is law prohibiting the declar- .,,r. of a lsxv,Ion1 nf cent. If we had law prohibiting the watering of stock. we would have that all right. And with such regulation we would not want government own ership. And this regulation would not be unjust to the railroads. A railroad is chartered for the general good of all and granted ril to pass over the peoples land. 6ftsn spelling large tracts of fine land by dividing it. They would not be granted this privilege if they were not benefit. Therefore, they should be thus regulated to re- main benefit.
 But the Peoples party demands ab- solute ownership of all roads by the government. The first thing to con- sider in this line is. how will the gov ernment get them? Win they buy our 40 OO0 odd miles of railroad? If so. figure up little and see if it would not be rather an expensive luxury to the taxpayer. It is more probable, how ever, that they would conliscate them. Then follows the effect of government ownership. The first and most obvi- ous effect would result from the ex- ample thus set. It would furnish an excuse for other demands, just as the demand itself has furnished an excuse for the recent demand of the Peoples party in Ohio. And it might go on down to even the water-mill that grinds our corn. The water-mill is built more for the pnblic benefit than for private gain. It gets a charter from the state, to enable it to pond the water Up over the rich bottom lands above. A rate of toll is fixed by law for it's charges. But if we are not satisfied with simi- lar conditions for the railroad. why are we satisfied with our mill system Another thing should be taken into consideration. With onr present pos tai system, most of the employees are dismissed at each change of adminis- tration. And what assurance have we that it would not be the same way with the railwaysp It most probably would be. And it would cause an un- told amount of misery and suffering for all the employees of the different rail- ways of the United States-or even half of them-to be thrown out of em- ployment at once.
 Nor would governmental ownership of our transportation systems materi- ally reduce freight charges. We would have repetition of the pension job bery on a larger scale. Politicians would see the opportunity to catch the railroad vote by offering higher wages, and they would gladly take it up and put it into excution, and all the profits would be eaten up in this way, or paid to pet contractors.
 that all these men would have if they were under the control of the govern ment. Their power and influence would be sufficient to perpetuate a party in power for all time to come
 The Courier-Journal once said that government ownership of railroads would end free institutions The hordes of office-holders would have the power to perpetnate themselues in power. And if we put all of our busi- ness into the hands of the government the official class, it would be--our as- pirations would be stunned, and we would move backward in the march of enlightenment; would grow careless, leaving all our business interets in the hands of the official class, until we would not care what kind of gov ernment we would have. It would be
 worse than the republican election bill for that takes from us the power to have a say in the government, while this paternal system would take from us the will to say.
 All this might not result directly from government ownership of rail roads, but that one step would pave the way to a system of paternalism that would inevitably lead to this state | of things.
 {, In my last I expressed an opinion . that the whole People's party move