The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1893-10-26


liberty is at stake. They believe that
they are in slavery and their children
being borne in slavery--a slavery they
maintain that is worse that chattel slav
cry, because the master is not held re
sponsible even for food and clothes and
shelter. Is this true2 Il is said thai
during the winter months of recent
year in three judicial districts in New
York city over 81 600 men, women and
children were evicted for nonpayment
Of rent, and in the course of the 23,SO5
families comprising not less than 10000
persons were evicted in like manner.
A young man who attends my church
services and who is clerk in one of the
firms which does this work told me the
other day that hardly day passed over
his head that his soul was not made sick
at what he saw. He says that the pow
erty and suffering of these poor families
are so intense that after he has executed
his orders and turned them out he fire.
quently takes q dollar out of his own
small earnings, gives the mother to buy
something TO eat for at least day or
two for herself and her children. He
told me that the world would be amazed
to know how many big tenement build
ings with imposing fronts and apparent
ly prosperous tenants hide freless, emp.
ty rooms, with one old, broken chair, a
mattress or a pile Of rags as the only
furniture.
THE VERY PooR CANNOT BE FREE.
1t is useless to tell these people they
are free. Liberty is to them faraway
poets dream. Il is not in their world.
The trouble is that this mass Of despair
ing manhood and womanhood fall easy
victims in such hours to the spell of
criminal madness called anarchy. An
archy is nsanity--criminal insanity. 1t
had its birth in the prison vomit of the
last century. This stream Of deadliest
poisons has been pouring unheeded into
our social order for the past hundred
years. The progeny Of crime are pris-
oners for life. The hope of liberty be-
comes O madness. 1t is q madness that
is contagious when brought into con-
tact with hopeless, if respectable, pow
erty. Here lies the danger of the threat
of anarchy. Here is the danger point Of
the future. The poor rankle under the
fancied or real sense Of injustice. Out
of work and the victim of despair, he
may go mad. Will we have the love
broad and deep enough to meet this is
sue for him in seeing that q sane life is
at least made possible?
A writer in the Hartford Courant tells
us how Lord Lytton of England behaved
when such an appeal was made to him.
A laborer ON the estate Of the elder Bull
wer did certain hard job. The bailiff
refused TO pay what he demanded for the
work. The man insisted. The bailiff
discharged him and prosecuted him, un-
til finally he drove him almost pauper
from the estate and from the neighbor-
hood. He kept telling his friends that
some day he would get what was due
him from the Bulwer-Lytton estate.
When Owen Meredith came to the title
and was home on leave of absence as
English ambassador to France, this
laborer met him on the road one day.
"You are Lord Lytton, 1 believe" he
said respectfully.
eyes"
"Then, if you please, should like you
to pay an account which has been due
me for long time"
Lord Lytton looked at the account, and
at his request the man told the whole
story. The poet was very much affected
and disturbed. Then he said:
"Well, will do what l can to make il
up to you"
He was as good as his word. He built
house at the gates Of the park, put the
man and his family into it and gave it tc
them, rent free, with other perquisites
so that he was entirely comfortable fol
the remainder of his days.
DUTY OF THE RICH.
| If our powerful classes of today would
| only meet the suffering and despair OF
the present with something like this spir.
| it, there could be but one end Of every
issue-peace and fraternal helpfulness.
| Third-The issue for which the larger
number struggle and the one fraught
with more serious possibilities than any
other is the right to tolerable existence
for the masses of the people. 1t is @
| question of debate as to whether the con
dition of the working masses is abso
lutely better or worse than in the past
generation. Some affirm that the work
ing people have the best Of the advanct
of the civilization of this period.
But so high an authority as e. Benja
min Andrews, president of Brown uni
versity, declares that Sin many respects
the toiling masses are no whit better of
today than in England four centuries
ago." and that "the passing of this age
of industrial advance and Of worldwide
land utilizations, with so slight gain IL
the ordinary comforts of life on the par
Of the laboring man, goes far to preclude
all hope of great Improvement for hin
under present economic conditions.
While it is q question for debate as t,
whether he has actually improved hi
condition, it is no question for debat
whether the life Of the rest of mankinC
has advanced.
| Under these circumstances the condi
ton of the workingman Of today is be
coming for him more and more an intol
erable one. He has learned to read an
to think. He has hundred wants an
aspirations now where he had one hun
dred years ago. What his father wa
content with he will not accept. Fl
lives in a bigger world. Forty years ag
the postoffice Of Great Britain carrie
86,000,000 newspapers. Now it carrie
$50, 900, 900 annually. The total numbe
Of papers issued in America is estimate
at 8,86S, 900, 900 annually, or "a copies fo
every inhabitant. The masses Of tn
people now read, and this for the frs