Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1896-09-05
What's the Matter With Kansas?

L.
There were about 10000 babies born
In Kansas, and yet so many people
have left the State that the natural in
crease is cut down to less than 1000
net. This has been going on for eight
years. If there had been a high brick
wall around the State eight years ago,
and not soul had been admitted or
permitted to leave, Kansas would be
half million souls better off than she
is to-day. Not only has she lost pop
ulatlon, but she has lost wealth.
Every moneyed man IN the State who
could get out without great loss has
gone. Money is being drained out all
the time.
What's the matter with Kansas +?
Missouri has gained nearly two mil
lions, while Kansas has been losing
half million. Nebraska has gained
in wealth and population, while Kan
sas has gone down-hill. Colorado has
gained in every way, while Kansas
has lost in every way since 1888.
What is the matter with Kansas !?
There is no substantial city in the
State. Take up the Government Blue
Book and you will see that Kansas is
virtually off the map. Two or three
little scabby consular places in yellow
fever stricken communities that do not
aggregate $4,000 a year is all the
recognition Kansas has. Nebraska
draws about 500, 900 little old North
Dakota draws $4,000: Oklahoma
doubles Kansas; Missouri leaves her a
thousand miles behind; Colorado is
almost seven times greater than Kan
sas. The newspaper columns and
magazine pages, once devoted to
praise OF the State, to boastful facts
and startling figures concerning her
resources, now are filled with cartoons,
glbes and Pefferian speeches. Kan
sas just naturally isn't in the civilized
world. She has traded places with
Arkansas and Timbuctoo.
What's the matter with Kansas !?
We all know, yet here we are at it
again. We have an old mossback
JackSonlan who snorts and bowls be-
cause there is a bathtub in the State
House; we are running that old Jaw
for Governor. We have another
shabby, wild-eyed, rattle-bralned fam
attic who said openly in d dozen
speeches that the rights of the user
are paramount to the rights of the
owner; we are running him for Chief
Justice. so that capital will come
tumbling over itself to get into the
State. We have raked the ash-heap
of human failures in the State and
have found an old hoop-skirt of man
who has failed as business man, who
has failed as an editor, who has failed
as preacher, and we are going TO
run him FOR Congressman at large.
He will help the looks of the Kansas
delegation in Washington. Then we
have discovered kid without law
practice, and have decided to vote for
him as Attorney-General. Then, for
fear some hint that the State had be-
come respectable might percolate
through the civilized portions of the
nation, we have decided to send three
or four harpies out lecturing, telling
the people that Kansas is raising hell
and letting corn go to weeds.
What's the matter with Kansas ?
We need more men who are posted.
who can below about the CRIME of '73,
who hate posterity and who think that
because a man believes in national
honor he is tool Of Wall street. We
have had few of them-some l50, 900
but we want more. We need several
thousand gibbering idiots to scream
about the great red dragon of Lom-
bard street. We do not need popula-
ton, we don't need wealth, we don't
need we'll dressed men on the streets,
we don't need standing in the nation,
we don't need cities on these fertile
plalns-you bet we don't. What we
are after Is the money power. Be-
cause we have become poorer and
meaner than a spawned, distempered
mule, we, the people of Kansas, pro-
pose to kick. We don't care to build
up; we wish to tear down.
That's the stuff. Give the pros
porous man the dickens. Legislate
the thriftless into ease whack the
stutfing out of the creditors, and tell
the debtors who borrowed money five
years ago, when the money in circula-
ton was more general than it is now,
that the contraction of the currency
gives him a right to repudiate.
Whoop it up for the ragged trousers !;
put the lazy, greazy fizzle who will not
pay his debts, on an altar and bow
down and worship him. Let the State
ideal be high. What we need is not
the respect of our fellow-men, but u
chance to get something for nothing.
What's the matter with Kansas !?
Nothing under the shining sun, She
is losing wealth, population and stand
ing. She has got her statesmen and
the money power is afraid of her.
Kansas is all right. She has started
in to raise hell, as Mrs. Lease advised,
and she seems to have suffered from
over-production.- Gazette.