The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1894-07-31
PRESIDENT BUTLER IN BLADRN.
Twelve Hundred People Hear Him Dis
cuss the Great Issues.

Cor. of the Progressive Farmer.
The Hon. Marion Butler, in response
to an invitation from the County ALI
c of Bladen, was at EIizabethtown
on Thursday, July 18th, it being the
regular quarterly meeting OF the
County Alliance. This was Bro. But
ler's first visit to Bladen, and his many
admirers determined to make it an &C.
casion to be remembered. Notwlth-
standing the hot weather and busy
season fully twelve hundred people as
sembled at the county seat to shake
their young leader by the hand and
listen to his presentation of the reform
movement and the part the Farmers
Alliance is taking in the great struggle
for a better government.
Prior to the arrival of Bro. Butler the
citizens held a public meeting IN the
court house at which it was decided
that the speaker be escorted to the
grove on the banks of the Cape Fear
river to deliver ibis address, the court
house being too small to hold the
crowd. Mr.. s.. M. King, President of
the County Alliance, was chosen as
chief marshal, with the following aids
one from each township in the county:
D. J.. Allen, 1. F. Hilburn, L. r.
Thompson, A. M. johnson, A. S. Kemp,
A. B. Rocks, Robt. Bryant, G. P. SUIT
ton, W. B. McGill, Mitchell Johnson,
j. B. Young, John Bell, E. N. Robson.
On the arrival of Bro. Butler he was
given an informal reception, when the
crowd formed in line and escorted him
to the speakers stand erected for the
occasion. Here in a few remarks he
was introduced by Bro. King, and for
three hours held the undivided atten-
tion of his large audience. Bro. Butler
started out by saying that they were
here gathered together On the v of a
great struggle between contending in
terests, and while every one knew and
felt the depression and abuses under
which they were living, it was his pur-
pose to try and present a system which
he believed would give us a better gov
eminent. There were those present
perhaps who would be bitterly opposed
to what he said, but believing it to be
the truth and right, he offered any n
a chance to show the justice of their
opposition and hoped they would make
better use of their chance than a GER
tain party who only wanted a chance
two years ago. Had he made a speech
two or three years ago on a like occa-
sion he would have made a very diff
ferent one. Why's Have the condi
tions changed7 Because then he should
have pictured the country as it was;
would have shown the burdens under
which the agricultural classes were
suffering and discussed the demands of
the Farmers Alliance one by one in his
effort to prove that their edoption
would have corrected the evils under
which the people we're living. But to-
day there was not a town or hamlet in
the entire country in which the ALI
ance demands had not been discussed
and where there is a single man unfa-
miliar with those demands. He wished
now to go further and with govern
ment records show that while the pro
ducing States we're creating wealth
someone else absorbed the fruits of
their labor. The speaker then took UP
the census reports for 1890 and select
ing the State of Massachusetts he COM
pared it on the one hand with the nine
great agricultural States of North Car
DINA, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi,
Alabama, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois and
Indiana and showed that while the lat
ter contained So times as much land,
seven times as much labor and twice
as much capital as Massachusetts,
all eight hundred and twelve times the
natural advantages-yet Massachusetts,
in the past ten years had accumulated
ten millions of dollars more money
than the above nine States put to-
gether. The reports show that you
have created but somebody else has it.
Now what you want to know is what
has taken it up there. It was done by
stealing-legalized stealing. There are
one hundred laws on the statutes under
which this bleeding has been done, but
of them all he had but time to name
three of the biggest:
LIST. That system of legislation by
which the taxing power has been taken
out of the hands Of the people.
I'd. That system which has placed
the highways of the country in the
hands of a greedy monopoly.
Sd. That system by which the none
of the country is regulated by corpora