The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1896-09-19

What wonder that our land Is full OF
discomfort? Where are the poor and the
unfortunate OF this city before the law?
Their highest court is the justice-shop.
the creature of dirty politics; The officials
they meet are OF the worst. They hear
nothing but the b!ackest side OF govern
ment and are usually its saddest victims.
They know that they suffer; they know
that they are wronged. They listen TO
the voice of the demagogue, who has
learned the story OF their sorrow. and ac-
cept the quack remedy which he holds
out to them. And the farmer, the man
We sometimes call rcpudiationist-ln
what school has he been educated?
railroad has recently been built without
ton from San Francisco to Fresno. up The
San Joaquin Valley. Despite the eco
nomic waste OF parallel railways, 1t can
make per cent. by charging just half
what the Southern Pacific railway has
charged and the farmers have paid all
these years. Having contributed by tax
alton his share of government expense
and having paid IN addition extortIonate
rates to a merciless monopoly. can one
wonder that he now asks who Is in pos
session of the fruits of his toll or that
favors a sort of retaliation. unable to see
that the form taken by retaliation would
jury lie seeks to remedy? Too many Van
derbilts have damned the public. too many
rich men have been kept out of jail by en-
pensive lawyers. There have been, too
u
many Union loops. Were there nothing
but unreaso oning anarchy behind the DEM
onstration of class hostility, 1t would be
founded upon the whirlWind and blow
away, for the game OF politics is nothing
but a blur ana bubble. Upon the very
real danger Of an alien. irreconcilable
population Dennis kearney founded the
sand lot party; upon the abuses of rail-
ways the Populists have their footing.
Our governor, the inconsistent and contra
dictory. finds in the real evils that beset
the poor throughout the oppression of the
well to do, whether directly or through
the officers of the law a fertile field in
which to SOW the seeds of anarchy.
The worst politician in the midst of his
self-seeking does more for the commune
i,y than the citizen who is too fine to take
up the dirty business of practical politics.
] have seen in my short public life the
most shameless corruption that can be
conceived. ] have heard it made Il jest
by men who should wear prison stripes
for selling their constituents. | have
heard 1t lightly discussed by men of capi-
tai who should adorn the stocks and
whipping post if the prison is good enough
for the commodity they have purchased.
1t Is argued that the vote that
controls our local politics comes from the
saloon. that 1t Is drunken, sodden and
ignorant. What an admission. DO the
drunken. the sodden. the ignorant manage
the private business of this community?
Public control must come from some
source. 1t might come from the count.
ing-room and the pulpit. The neglect of
the intelligent and honest Is the oppor-
tunlty of the demagogue.
Pulpit and reform platforms ring with
vituperat.on of the saloon and the saloon
power In politics. Is selnshness the pecu-
liar property of the saloon? The saloon
may be the poor mans club 1t may be the
poor mans gambing-house; it may be a
leading cause of his poverty and the suf-
fe nf family /