Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1893-02-08


ers could be better exercised by the
separate states. and reaches the result
OF separate sovereignty as better form
of government than that of the United
States.
"Shhall we find, then, any justifca-
ton, when great combinations Of corpo-
rate power shall seek to gather enor-
nous wealth for themselves by regu-
lating and also by the controlling of
foreign and Interstate commerce of all
the people of the states so that the por-
ton OF every mans labor which he
shall receive for himself and Lis family
shall be dlminis he'd and the larger part
taken as the share of the persons en-
gagged in these corporate combinations,
so that great wealth and luxury and
power shall result to few and great
poverty and want shall come to the
many, to the great body of the people
shall we find justification for refusing
to exercise the power of regulating this
commerce in all the products of labor
between the states by prohibiting such
combinations and the methods by
which this result shall be reached?
Can our institutions of free govern
ment coexiSt with the existence and ex-
ercise of power either of individuals
or of corporations to make fictitious
prices for the great staples of commerce
undertaking them when in the
hands of the producer and increasing
their price when in the hands of the
purchaser?
what Is the evil complained of?
The vast productions of sixty-five mil
lions of people, constituting their means
OF subsistence and procuring the COM
forts and enjoYments of life, require ex-
change with the people of the states
and with the foreign countries. This
exchange is commerce, and can not be
confined within the limits of a state.
nor country, nor bounded by state
lines or national boundaries.
1T of necessity finds its convenient
places of distribution, and become
properly laden with the just and neces-
sary and reasonable charges of it's
transportation and of compensation to
the persons whose services are required
for its exchange.
"HOw large share of it is taken
from the producer is shown in the lux
ury and lavish waste and vast buildings
and enormous wealth in the great cities
Of the world in all previous time, and
in the poverty and suffering and hum
BILE fortunes of the great mass of the
people of every country, our own in
cluded.
IF the extremes of great wealth in
the few, and great poverty and suffer
ing in the many. do not meet in the
country as they do in the great cities,
we still behold the producers III the
country in the main of humble means
and with but scanty share even of the
things which their own labor produces
Super added on this great structure of
commerce and exchange, where ~-condi-
lions have been made so onerous and
oppressive to the great body of produc-
ers, our times have found a new device.
device not needful to commerce or
exchange, not just to the producer, nor
promotive Of permanent productionor
of increasing commerce.
WHO is interested in fixing the price
of the great staples in the hands of the
producers at the lowest price possible?
1t is not the producer, but must be any
one who shall handle these staples or
use them. All persons except the pro-
Queer of an article are interested in
getting these great staples out of the
hands of the producer at the lowest pos
sible rate