The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1894-05-30

unanimously adopted at a meeting of
5000 of the unemployed citizens of the city
OF Minneapolis, Mimi, May % 1894.
We hold these truths to be self-evident;
that all men are created equal inheritors of
the bountiful gifts of nature.
That to insure to all men equal and lust
access to their inheritance, the spontaneous
creations of nature stored in Mother
Earth governments should be instituted
among men, deriving their powers from the
consent of all the governed; that man is so
constituted that he must have constant ac-
cess to natures storehouse or civilization
must cease and life become extinct; he
must have access to light that he may see
thereby being enabled to fashion the earth
to satisfy his necessary wants. He must
have access to natures various sources of
heat, furnished spontaneously to man, that
he may cook, control power and carry on
the necessary factors of civilization. To
the surface of the EARTH that he may
plough, SOW and reap the fruits of his in
dustry, many explore the hidden re-
sources of hill and valley in search of
mineral treasure necessary to provide him
with the instruments of industry; to water,
that he may drink, and the air, that he
may breathe.
That whenever any form of government
becomes destructive of these rights, it is
the privilege of the people to alter or
abolish it, and to institute a government;
recognizing the equality of man by his
birth, nature and necessities to be The
common inheritor of natures gifts, and
which are the basis of life liberty and the
possession of happiness; instituting a gov
eminent granting special privileges to none.
Prudence dictates that social regulations.
once established, should not be lightly nor
thoughtlessly disturbed; and the history OF
nations has shown us that people are dis
posed to bear injustice for long periods OF
time rather than overthrow existing insti-
tutions. But when a long and systematic
infiction of abuses and usurpatiOnS tend
continually to deprive the laborinS people
of their rights to the earth, their privilege
to benefit by improved means of transporta
ton and communicating intelligence, the
benefits arising from the administration of
a financial system founded on justice the
benefits of a speedy and just administration
of the laws of the land, and the people
discover that society is being degraded by
injustice into two classes; small minority
favored by class legislation absorbing the
entire wealth of the nation, and denying
the Industrious citizen the right to use the
gifts of nature to all men, except as tribu-
tary slaves to the minority, keeping all
that labor with their hands poor and those
that engage in mercantile pursuits ever on
the verge of bankruptcy, going far as
to deny some the right to step on the earth,
our common mother under pain of arrest
and imprisonment We believe it to be the
duty of all good citizens to arise in their
might and by the intelligent use of the
ballot to correct all such abuses of
sumed power.
Such an assumption and abuse of power
by the men who have controlled the ma
chinery of government in this, our country.
a once free nation, has existed for many
years.
They have despoiled the people of their
land and given it to American corporations
and foreign syndicates, ana when there
were settlers on the land, who by their
honest toll, had made themselves homes,
the infamy of courts have decided against
them, in defiance of the time hon0red GUS
tom of squatter sovereignty, a custom more
ancient than the Monroe doctrine.
They have made laws under the pretense
of encouraging home industry, for the bene-
fit of special manufactures; and when the
laboring people have demanded an equal
benefit, foreigners have been imported to
chea pen their labor.
They have loaned government funds to
private corporations, surrendered first
mortgages and taken second securities, and
by infamous chcanery on the part of con-
gress and the supreme court, have al
lowed the corporations to refuse to pay
interest until the expiration of the mort
gage.
They have introduced bills to extend the
time of payment and to reduce the rate OF
interest to railway corporations that have
defrauded the people out of hundreds of
millions of dollars, and passed laws for the
benefit and protection of chattel. mortgage
brokers that fatten like vampires the
miseries of the people.
The courts have taken railways under
their control for the benefit of the holders
of fraudulent stock and foreign bond
holders, and, by assumed power, enioined
the American workmen from striking
against reduction of wages made for the
purpose of paying interest on fraudulent
stock and securities
They have allowed the cOrnOra tiOnS to
maintain a paid lobby in state legislative
halls and in our national congress, and
grown wealthy off the corruption.
They have created and fastened on the
nation, state and municipality, a bonded
debt amounting to thousands of millions of
dollars.
They have parted with our coal lands to
the few rich, and miners are driven to the
extreme verge of restitution.