The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1893-10-24
CONGRE SIS SCORED.
Wealth Struts Amid Squalor-- Gould and
AmeS,


in a manner that has sown the seeds of
revolution in thousands of men hither-
to little moved by politics
A description Of the last Congress is
typical of the average session. Listen:
At time near the conclusion of the
session of the late Congress the House
of Representatives appropriated $24,
600, 600 in one bill after an hour of de-
bate. No opportunity was allowed to
offer amendments to this bill There
was no time for discussion or amend
ments
Congress had been in session three
months, but at the last moment the
money of the people had to be bestowed
for various objects, which may or may
not have been entirely worthy, at the
rate of $4OO, 900 minute, for want of
time for longer consideration.
Our solemn Senate is just now busy
digging the grave of it's traditional
pride and courtesy" by demonstrate
ing it's exhaustless capacity to do moth
ing in the hour of a nations peril.
How long the people in their silent
suffering millions will stand the tom
foolery of tradition ridden govern
ments in Europe and America who can
tell9
And strangest of all is the fatuity
with which the present rulers pursue
the even tenor Of their way.
Second-We observe it in the hearts
and methods of the very rich of our
day. 1t is day of lavish expenditure
and vulgar display.
In the midst of hunger and cold, and
even starvation among thousands, the
rich are busy amusing themselves.
There has been no time since the days
of the Emperor Nero when wealth
strutted amid squalor with greater con-
tempt for it's surroundings and with
vainer display of all its vulgar trap
pings of gold and silver. The palaces
of the rich in the days that preceded
the fall of Rome we're pigpens com.
pared with the marvellous piles of
architecture and decorative art with
which our modern cities are full. The
banquets given by the great gluttons
of Nero's day are not to be compared
in cost or display to the elaborate
affairs of the year of our Lord 1898, at
time when 100000 of the human
race are in q starving condition.
Tailors are busy inventing costumes
for dogs, while children freeze for
want of clothing.
Servants are busy airing the poodIes
Of fashionable women who refuse to
have children, preferring the affection
of dogs and the gay rounds of a decay
ing social order. While thousands toll,
half fed and overworked, and fight for
the half pay and overwork, the rich
are busy preparing divorce papers and
soliciting new partners as the results
of half drunken social debauches at
their palaces. The men who give
largely to the com munity of their great
wealth are fewer and fewer compared
to the number of very rich.
Mr.. Gould not only did not leave the
community a dollar of the wealth it
created, but gave it parting kick as
he did by creating perpetual trust
for 5he Gould millions.
Mr.. Ames, the richest man in Boston,
died the other day and left not single
dollar to the community that created
his fortune. And note this-that while
such men as Gould and Ames die every
day and clutch their millions with spas
mOdic grasp in the hour of death, the
seeming Inconsistencies of the fact
that they live among men whose lives
are bound up with theirs the restless
millions about them curse with deeper
emphasis the grave Of every man who
thus proves traitor to his social trust.
1t used to be common to say only good
thing about the dead.
The rich man who dies the death of
a hog to day is rOundly cursed by
every body without fear or favor. Will
the rich take note of this fact? The
rapacity of the great freebooters of
modern commerce seems rather to in
crease in proportion to the discomfort
and opposition among the masses.
With threatened labor uprisings in
many nations, the money kings of the
world have just precipitated one Of the
greatest panics Of the nineteenth CEN
tury. They have made billions of dol
lars But few more such victories
and they are lost. Are they all fools,
or are they born idiots when confronted
with the problem of selfish gain on the
one hand, justice on The other?
When a fruit grower is determined
to raise grass in his orchard he should
put sheep in it to keep down the growth
of grass and furnish manure for the
| trees Sheen are also eyneIlnnt for de-