The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1892-11-15
"THosR HoRRID POLITICS.

In d SuldLI Oh WOMEN 0dCu
had been specifying which kind of
newspaper reading she cared for most,
and which she skipped. Every one
disctaimed any interest in politics and
in public affairs generally Said Aunt
Phosie tO them in her Aunt Phosie
fashion:
Now, ladies, excuse me, but in
sighting politics it seems to me you
don't know what you are doing. Say,
now, what il politics?'
Then came definitions. Fraud and
corruption" What the men quarrel
about" Nothing that concerns wo
men" Carried on by corporations,
so my husband says"
lone of you," said Aunt PhOsie,
mentioned just now the coal combine
as something of no interest to women.
That M into politics, IN n way,
and is an uncommonly public affair.
You must have skipped over that In
reading the papers, so l will explain.
Of course combine mean to bring to-
gether. You combine a lot of strings
into a rope. This gives them strength
to pull. They all pull together and
pull the same way, and act as one.
Now, a number Of railroad corpora
tions in the coal country combine SO
as to bring their railroads under one
management, and to get control of the
coal mining and the coal carrying and
the coal market and the prices. When
it appears that coal enough mas been
mined to make it plenty enough and
cheap enough, SO that everybody, poor
folks ami all, can have an abundance
to keep them warm in winter, and for
cooking their vituals, then the mining
is stopped and miners by the hundreds
are thrown out of work and the coal is
held back. | read an account of great
numbers of cars full of coal standing
stock still on side tracks-for youknow
it will never do to let coal be too plenty.
This would bring down prices. Coal
could be carried at less cost If sent part
of the way by water, and there have
been sixty or seventy cOastlng vessels
at a time staying idle at Philadelphia
b. cause the combined people r deter
mined the coal shall go over their rail
roads so they shall get the pay.
"AIl this is for keeping up the prices,
or what they call keeping the market
firm You see that the object in COM
bining is not that the people may have
plenty of coal, but that the railroad
owners may have plenty of money. l
| have seen it stated that when the cor
porations combine each one is guaran
teed a certain yearly income and if the
roads do not earn enough to allow this,
why. what is lacking has to be put
onto the price Of coal and so taken out
of the people. l have read that some
of the M 4nagers get twenty-five thou
sand dollars a year apiece, and some
get more.
Q "You~ perceive that these coal com
bines, by having control OF n mines
and railroads, car put up prices higher
and higher, and they do. Such an easy
wav to make a great deal more money !
For the c~oal-carry is about twenty mil
| lion tons a year. Adding fifty cents
| a ton to the price would give them ten
millions of dollars more a year to divide
among themselves, and they can just
| 90 easily add another fifty cents later
IN This would be taking only twenty
millions out of the people, a sort of
private way of taxation. These high
nnrices would give a boost to the figures
On YOUR coal bills-thOugh of course
this is no concern of women.
"But there's more to it than this. A
GREAT part of all the factories are run
nv means of coal, and if coal goes up,
the prices of manufactured goods go
nm such as are used in the family.
Then the figures of more of your bills
90 I'D. and the common run of folks
will have to pinch and to do without
+hings-but of course this is no concern
Of wOmen-nor when the sugar com
hipn raises the price of snpaP high