Kansas agitator. [volume] (Garnett, Kan.) 1890-1905, 1897-09-03
THE PoPULIsT VIEW.

The Common Cause, OF C1nclnnati,
Ohio, and advocate of more money,
says
What makes a falling market and
stagnant business? The dollar that
buys more today than 1t would buy
last year
I'm the very next item it gives the
lie to the above as follows:
"'Idle labor lowers prices Of COM
modities. The man out Of work con-
sumes as little as possible Of anything,
and none at all of many things he
would buy if at work. Less consump-
ton, less demand. less price
"Could a man be more muddled than
one who could set these two paragraphs
together as an expression OF his opin-
ion?"
On the contrary, 1t is the New Char
ter that is muddled 1t is surely self
evident that dollar which always
buys more goods than 1t could the year
before, will cause falling market and
stagnant business; and besides, every
political economist confirms that truth.
Then, do not hard times throw men out
of work, and does not the throwing OF
men out of work make times harder
and harder. for just the reasons given
by the Common Cause? There is no
contradiction in the two paragraphs
from the Common Cause. Read to-
gether they simply state well known
and lamentable fact. Scarce and dear
money starts an endless chain of disas-
ter, each result becoming in its turn
the cause Of more suffering.
Frank l.. Stanton. the Jim Riley Of
Georgia, has opinions on the money
question. as he often shows in such
verses as the following:
School time, gentlemen! Now, take
hold:
There is dollar, and its name is gold:
That you shall worship, and that
alone;
It's bright and shiny, and it's Wall
streets own! sETf
'Taint circulatin', an it's hard to get,
It'll land this country into trouble yet;
But this is the lesson you must learn
and hold:
There's but one dollar, and its name
is gold.
School time. gentlemen. and hard
times, tool
Let that dollar be a god to you;
It's heavy burden and grinding tax,
But man made burdens and God made
backs!
Heavy-heavy! but don't you fear,
For the poor are patient, and the poor
must bear! ...ts
We've loosed a tiger where the toilers
roam: f'a
Schools out, gentlemen-now run
home"
The state of Kansas seems to have
Federal Judge Williams scared. Plu-
tocracy is coward when confronted
with a powerful adversary such as a
Populist state government, backed by
the people.
And Populism is rampant in the Am
erican Association for the Advance
ment of Science. In an address to
that body DR.. William H. Hale said:
There are many obvious advantages
in having a responsible government
control and operate all franchises
which use public highways and sup
ply public necessities. 1t is we'll that
the comfort and convenience of the
people who are supplied by these mo-
nopolies be made the paramount con-
sideration. Strikes and boycots, the
bane. of the street railway systems,
would thus be averted or minimized.
believe this country is on the eve
of vast extension of municipal own
ership and control of systems to sup
ply. light, heat, transportation, etc.
Perhaps there is danger Of too sudden
and explosive a movement in this d.,
rection. Work of this kind requires
careful selection Of men. The system
of reformed civil service which aims to
secure, and to large extent succeeds
in securing, the best men for the per-
Torrance of public duties, affords the
only economical, and, therefore, the
only practical solution of the problem
of governmental administration of
these natural monopolies for the pub
lie good"
assN,t
In an interview in the New York
World, Jerome O'Neill, New York
labor leader, says:
Fifty per cent of the labor repre-
sented in the Central Labor Union is
idle. We know from our books that
the situation grows worse instead Of
better, and we know it from all reports
Of the many branches Of this union.
II this is the prosperity that was prom
sed, want the reverse. 1 would rath-
er have fifty-cent dollar that you can
get than a gold dollar that you cannot
get. 1t takes too long to get to such
and we are obliged to chip
in and pay for the prosperity that su-
gar affords to senator's and stock
brokers'. There is the close combina-
ion that controls and enjoys the only
that we have heard anything
about" rht iAl4