People's party paper. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1891-1898, 1896-10-09

OF the United States is exempt from
taxation, therefore, the men not ex-
empted must pay the taxes. (Applause)
What else? You take the great land
owners, the aristocrats, the great Eng
fish estates the great land lords, they
own ten billions worth. There you
have nearly an entire one fourth. You
can see there are three tourths of the
wealth of the nation exempted from
taxation. We fight that system because
it is wrong. The burden ought to be
laid upon every man according to his
strength to bear it. This is a sound
principle, and the Peoples party says
we are going to have that principle.
(Applause,)
The Transportation System Wrong.
Want else do we say is wrong? We
say the transportation system is wrong.
In the state of Georgia we had what
we called 1.-THE Georgia Central Rail
way" 1t was one that was priced by
the people of the state. and because OF
that we exempted it from taxation. we
gave it special privileges, gave it right
of way and advantages in nearly every
county; it was capitalized at $4,000, 900
and increased to S7,5O0,0o0. 1t became
one of the standard securities of Geor-
gia, rated along side of Georgia state
bonds. 1t became so good and the peo-
pie had so much confidence in it that
many business man, retired from bust
ness was glad to invest his life long
savings in the railroad. Many a guar
dian invested the funds of orphan chill
dren of that state; many widow put
into the Georgia railroad her last cent;
everybody considered 1t perfectly safe.
One day railway syndicate took hold
of it; they sent Calvin Brice down south
and he bought up a control of stock in
the Central Railway, They worked
one of those reorganization schemes;
they put on mortgage and in little
while the mortgage was foreclosed on
the property and the property was sold,
| and in the flash of an eye every orphan
| child who had dollar in it lost it,;
every widow in Georgia who had dol
lar in that road lost it; every retired
merchant and farmer and every kind of
business man that put his fortune in
that road lost it, and bankruptcy reign.
ed throughout Georgia; the only differ
ence being that man who steals a hog
| 1,,- 10 In nj n1 4 a
these fellows stole railroad and came
in palace car and went
out the same way. ZAP
plause) Now after they worked
that scheme with that mortgage on
this southern railway system, Morgan
of Wall street got hold of the railroad
and re-organized it again and this time
it was reorganizcd to the tune OF fifty
odd million dollars. Now then every
laborer on that road is made to do duty
at half pay, and every man that travels
or ships freight over the Central has 10
do what? He has to pay a freight and
passenger rate to enable them to de-
| Glars 3 tsiyEc14o44<1 Sle sFtT-tlHaa million
dollars when the original investment
was only seven and half million dol
lars. Therefore we see the railroad
system of today enables the shrewd,
INSCRIPTIONS manipulation to swindle
in that way, and the present system
allows the railroad to build up one city
at the expense of another, and build
up one industry at the expense of an
other, and build up Que section at the
expense of another; kill off competition
and express labor all along the line
and dictate how they shall vote in a
presidential campaign. Great APP
plause)
Railroad Power to Tax.
We say further that the present sys
tenn is wrong because it exercises a
q i +l,,4 Sc l., i