The advocate and Topeka tribune., 1893-12-20

Il "4AA0NA
own is diminishing. Tenancy ia increas-
ing. Prisons are growing, insane asylums
are filling up, charitable organize.
tions are rising, even in our newest
cities. And this during time Of un-
prsCedented growth. During this CEN
tury We have had what no succeeding
century can giVe-G vast continent to
overrun. Now, nothing but the remnants
OF our vast public domain remain. AL
ready the tramp hBs reached the Pacific,
and men looking for work move from the
setting toward the rising sun.
This change in social conditions means
corresponding change in political Condi-
tions. There is some sense in the Idea
which requires property qusli6cationfor
vote. Democratic institutions worthy
of the name can only exist where the
masses Of the people are personally inde'
dependent, have some stake in the coun-
try" A true republic cannot exist where
there is on the one side the hundred fold
millionaire, and on the other the tramp.
No matter what be the forms, no matter
what be the political parties, under such
social conditions the strong and un-
scrupulous must rule, and under what
ever name tyrsnnies and despotisms must
arise. Wealth and political power can
not long be separated. Wealth is power.
And in any country where men become
unnBturslly divided into the rich and the
poor, the rich must ultimately rule the
poor. Labor movements, populRrist
parties, may arise and vanish without
accomplishing anything, until the cause
that steadily differentiRtes men into the
unduly rich and the uRdeservedly poor
is seen and grasped and destroyed.
That there is deep wrong in existing
social adjustments is everywhere felt by
the masses. This is shown by the farm
ers' movements Of the west, by the labor
combinations Of the east, by strikes in
Great Britain, by the growth of socialism
and anarchlsm on the continent, by the
disquiet and unrest everywhere. But
the difficulty is that the great majority
of those who feel that there is something
wrong do not see what the wrong is.
The great question is, what is the
wrong that not in one country alone, but
all over the civilized world is making
the working class" the poor class, is
robbing producers of the fruits OF their
toll, and piling up the wealth born OF
social advances in the hands OF a com
paratively fewP There may be many
thiAgs thRG have that tendency. But the
questisn is, what is the bottom cause,
the universal csuseP It cannot be found
in anything merely local or national. 1t
cannot be successfully sought In the
money question, or the railroad ques
tion, or the tariff question, or in the
want OF any Of the pslhRtiVes or restric-
Cions or class measures 30 commonly ad-
vocated. There must be some great,
broad, common cause as deep and as
wide spread as our civilization itself
And the only place we can lind cause
deep enough, wide enough, adequate
enough to account for all these wide
spread phenomena is in the most tunds-
mental of all social adjustments; that
which fixes the relations Of men to the
planet which they inhabit-that which
settles the terms upon which labor can
obtain access to land!
There are two great ways in which
those who wish to live without doing
any labor may, no matter what be the
other social adjustments, enjoy wealth
at the expense Of those who produce it.
The first and most primitive OF these
ways is that Of making property OF the
lRborers. This is chRttel slavery-R way
as old as human injustice.
But chRttel slavery is only coarse,
rude form Of taking from q man the
produce Of his labor. It only grows up,
and is only maintained where pOpula-
tion is sparse and land is plenty. Where
population is at all dense there is an
easier way of obtaining wealth at the ex-
pense Of those who produce it, and that
Is, not by making property OF lsborerS,
but by making property of land. For to