The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1895-07-05
md establishing pence and good will among

who engage I'm the work of alleged public
instruction and the procurement of legis-
lation Is tho telegraph, and il il the social
labor theory that one of tho first steps To
be taken IL 10 annex the telegraph To the
postofiioe, rs is done I'm England. In this
0untry that experiment would he almost
as costly as war, but IL is not the cost
that radical craftsmanship counts. Asso-
ciated very closely with the telegraph Is
the press-the "capitalistic press, T" II you
please-and behind tho press are certain
monopolies of presses and of material and
machinery for paper making, and modern
transportation reaching all continents and
Islands has supplied to the latest appli-
ances vast amount and variety of woods
and grasses that are flbrous, and paper has
become through the combination and com
petition of monopolies excellent and cheap.
The result is the daily newspaper at "A very
low rate, and ii contains the news of the
world. One cent n day will place the work
inginan on an equality witl> the capitalist
In the current history of mankind. There
are no important secrets from the press
Rich and poor alike share in the universal
and simultaneous diffusion of the knowl-
edge that is justice and power, the new
material OF wealth and fame. This should
not be regarded as trivial or frivolous
matter because it is so common that it is
accepted like the health that is in whole
some air and water.
Labor and Railroads.
The crusades of labor, when it's organi-
cations become contentious, are usually di-
rected against the railroads. The great
strikes are aimed at lines of transportation.
The Coxey armies thought they had rights
or ought to have them To be rolled across
the continent when on political business
free. There has been strike to check the
production of coal, a strike to direct the
principles upon which cars should be con-
structed, strikes to prevent the transit of
food from the grainiields and cattle plains
and the gardens and orchards to the cities,
and the word railroad has for millions
become synonymous with monopoly and
with oppression. 1t is great part Of the
social labor doctrine that the roads for
steam locomotion should be the property
Of the people, that labor and not capital
should possess and occupy and operate the
railroads, state and interstate and trans
continental. The first reflection under this
head is that capital Is better able than la
Dor to bear the losses that have befallen
railroads within few years. The nation
would have been bankrupt if it had owned
the roads ten years ago. 1t is one of the
lines of policy laid down by populistic and
communistic publicists that the state
should build roads to prevent the exactions
of monopolies. There are four lines of rail
road connecting Kansas City and Denver
and but three between Liverpool and Lon
don. 1t is in Kansas, however the scene
of great portion of this excess, that there
has been the loudest and sharpest demand
for the duplication of roads. Next TO rail
road monopoly the most bitter and system
attic hostilities to combinations and aggre-
cations of capital are meant for land mon
Opolies, and we have all sorts OF remedial
righteousness placed at our service from
no tax at all on land To single exclusive
land tax, and we can take our choice, for
it Is all the same anyhow. 1t is Il dreadful
thing to own land-why, land should be
as free as air. we are told-no workingman
should DO allowed to toll enough hours
day TO become the proprietor of an acre,
for if he does he will become an oppressor
and tyrant TO gather and multiply the un-
earned incrcments. We may, however,
possibly ascertain something by putting
the railroad monopolies and land monop-
olies together in our meditations, as they
are in our experiences and see what their
relations become and how the popular in
terests are affected by the largest monopoly
developments.
The railroads across the continent have
brought to New York, ard that signifies
that they have introduced to the markets
of the world, the vast wheat areas of the
northwest and the cattle ranges of the
southwest, and other roads and steamer
lines have thrown the beef and cotton and
butter of Australia and the wheat of Ar
gentina into the London market to meet
all the farmers of this boundless continent
there, and therefore the resources of the
earth are this very year spread before the
working people who densely inhabit the
older countries as never before in all the
stories of the ages Are the workingmcn
opposed to cheap food? Could they have
done for themselves what monopoly has
done for them ia opening new wheatflelds
and cattle pasturess Is It nothing that
they have wheat and beef at rates that
they never could have been produced by
old England or New England? Are not
the farmers of Germany complaining that
their food products are SO low their land is
not worth what it was once, and do they
not call upon the emperor TO give his help
to land monopoly Are there not like out
cries heard in France, in England and in
the older states of the United States? Is
1t "a misfortune that the best food the earth
yields has been cheapened so that 1t goes
to the tables of the workingmen? Is there
no progress that the poor have wheat in
stead of rye To eat? Is 1t, counting the
human race by the ten millions and time
by ten year periods, calamitous that the
railroads have diffused the value of the
land of Germany England, New York,
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois
and bestowed that value upon Asia and
South America, Texas and Dakota Neva-
da and Nebraska? Has not the railroad
done far move for the amelioration of land
monopoly than all the philosophers and
professional reformers since the dawn of
civilization?
As the telegraph and the press, and the
paper maker, and the machinist have to-
gether given the poor man equality with
the rich man i'm the news of the day, Civ
ing him as the sun rises and sets the run
ming record Of the hemispheres in the ,Irac-
tical intelligence that possesses the broad
est utilities, even so the railroads have
sown broadcast to the ends of the earth the
old golden land monopolies, and the "long
haul transportation, that has been accused
as one of the most acute grievances of the
multitudes of men, has placed wheaton