Kansas agitator. [volume] (Garnett, Kan.) 1890-1905, 1894-12-06
THE STRUGGLE FOR LIFE.

York city reports that 10 per cent. of the popu-
1ation live in tenements, and that the density OF
the population below Harlem river is the high
est of any city in the world The number OF
people without homes is 1,332,773. 1t may
reasonably be assumed that the one-and-a-halt
million own but very little wealth, since they
do not own their homes, and that the poverty OF
part of the population must be something
awful, since they are more closely packed than
In the old-world cities. 1t may also be assumed
that, of the one-and-a-half million, large
humber are sober, intelligent and industrious.
MANY of them are skilled mechanics, teachers,
clerks, book-keepers and other employments
that call for brains. They are not all foreign
ets, and all foreigners are not vicious ignorant
or shiftless.
Now, what is wrong that causes so vast
humber of people to herd together like rats,
and some of them in as filthy surroundings?
New York city has no lack of wealth. In
fact, there is mole wealth garnered In that city
than in any other city in the United States; and
every power of which men are capable-inen-
tai or physical-has been exerted by the major
1ty TO gain q COmpStSuSS, "hu ~ p N~S' --N>'~
failed In that vast beehive of industrial pursuits
Think you that the 80 per cent. have all the
thrift, economy, industry and temperance! or
think you that the 80 per cent alone nave
earned the wealth, and that the 10 per cent.
have notl Possibly, if the 10 per cent. were
weighed in the scales of righteousness,
larger per cent. in proportion would be found to
have deserved better of society than the 80
per cent.
We are hot specializing, but we state cold,
incontruvertible fact that the worthy men and
women of the world are too benevolent and
honest to cope with the cunning and avaricious,
and that often the most worthy are the poorest.
Remedies, it would seem, would be the all
absorbing topic in the minds OF Christians and
benevolent persons; but, instead, we witness an
litter beartlessness on the part of the more for
tunately situated that is, to say the least, dis
couraping. If there is enough and to spare
fand there certainly is), what enjoyment-what
GOOD thing-can come to the opulent in refusing
70 change conditions so as to make tolerable the
lives of so many worthy fellow beings?
thousand years ago has not arrived in New York
r;tv. nor vet in Kansas. Many of us have not
eve,, viewed the earthly land of promise from
distant Mount Nebo but, as a whole, we wor-
shin at the shrine of Maininon, and sacrifice to
devils of the most fendish type.
We are very careful to admit that God de-
stoned that men should labor for their existence,
hit in that labor, if wisely used there was a
blessing in disguise. As it is to-day, the more
wealth the laboring classes produce, the fewer
the blessings simply because wealth is cornered
bv the few, and the power that wealth conters
l. ,.ed to make the life of the laborer who falls
nader that power less tolerable. We might
suggest that if all the members of society should
cooperate instead of competing, and that II
all men should be rewarded according to service,
the reward being no greater than the service, 1t
would largely afford remedy for such condi-
tons. bit if we did, we would be hooted at for
being anarchists
plutocracy is Americas god, and great the
th;ro is. even in the eyes Of some of the poor
,rortals who lie PROSTATE at its footstool.
How long these things are to last, God only
troxys. We know that it is alleged by promi-
neut politicians, and few worthy divines, that
since such things have always been, they always
will be, and since they are, they are therefore
-;obt. We cannot subscribe to any such satanic
doctrine. Whatever is wrong is unalterably
wrong. but the fact that wrong exists is no
reason why it should exist, or that it cannot be
changed to right. 1t was the Devil who
,,,-o,,obt the change that forced man out of the