The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1894-07-11
WHERE THE PROFITS GO.
Why Farmers Are Poor.

WHY al IOOls
The last number of that reliable pa
per, Farm, Stock & Home, edited by
Mr.. S. NJ. Owen, says:
"Information that is unQuestion-
ably reliable, but obtained only under
promise that its source would not be
disclosed, reveals the fact that one
stockholder in one of the line eleva-
tors in the Northwest, drew dividends
for the year 1893, to the amount of
$l25000, and that lines net earnings
for the year were a. per cent on capital
invested. The informant in this case
is lone of the elect" and has the
means Of knowing what he is talking
about. According to their own pro-
feSSiOns elevator lines are "making no
to conclude that all of them are trav-
cling the same road to worm-eaten
poverty that the one in question is.
1t would be interesting to know just
how much of the huge profit of the
elevator combines is due to the stand
ing and oft-repeated suggestion of the
manager of each elevator that the one
who most successfully makes his house
''hold OUT, in the final ''clean up, is
the one who will stand highest in the
favor Of his employers
One stockholder, in 1893, d,e,c SIP, 900
ont Of the farmers pockets, and the earn
ings of the line were nearly one half
the capital invested Think of that!
Is it any wonder that the farms are
covered with mortgages and the peo-
pie in poverty?
Surely the farmers have nc votes, or,
being in majority, they would have
stopped this villainy long ago. They
must be Russian serfs and have no
ballot boxes and no schools. Poor
wretches! They are therefore utterly
helpless. II they were free men. in
free governmental they were them
selves the government,-wi power
to make and alter the laws, they could
cure all this between now and next
May.
Let us agitate to make them free.
Let us establish free schools for
universal education; let us provide for
Legislature, aud courts and ballot
boxes; let us build penitentaries for
the imprisonment Of gigantic thieves
who steal $l25,00O year; let us re-
move all obstacles that prevent them
from thinking for themselves and pro-
tecting themselves. AS it is, they are
simply great assemblages of helpless
lunatics, who utter strange, unreason-
able cries, like the discordant cries of
wild animals, about "the grand old
party" and Thomas Jefferson" and
"the tariff" and "honest money" and
lot more such senseless clamors;
while the thieves are emptying their
granaries by the wagon load: to the
tune of $l25,0OO year, or Al per cent
profit on capital invested
Poor people! Poor lunatics. Poor
slaves! Is it possible to make them
free and equip them with the ballot?
If Grover Cleveland was forced to
take his wife and children to the field
and hoe cotton, and raise the stuff at
six cents to settle off store accounts
for his family, he would no doubt en-
tertain different views upon the finan-
cial question.-People's Tribunt.
''You can't legislate money into
mans pocket" is the cry made by DO
litical boodlefs. What deal Of owlish
wisdom this is in the face Of the open
admission on all sides that the sugar
schedule in the Wilson bill will Dut
forty or fifty million dollars year
into the pockets Of the men controll-
ing the truSt.-Pilot