The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1897-09-01

others. This paper, inspired, as we be-
of Minneapolis, who had large supply
of wheat on hand, and were anxious
that the farmers should not sell their
wheat until they had a chance to first
dispose Of theirs, placed, it was said,
$40, 900 in the hands of the editor of this
paper, called "The State" and he en-
ployed lot of assistants and flooded
Minnesota and the Northwest generally
with labored articles to prove that
wheat was certainly going to rise to a
very high price, and that they must
hold their wheat"
We were president of the state Alli-
ance at the time, and, perceiving the
dangers Of such an act, we wrote an ar
ticle telling the farmers that no one
could forsee the future price of wheat;
and that when they got fair price for
it-a price that in their judgment was
right and reasOnable-to let their wheat
go; that the Alliance would not advise
them one way or the other; they must
follow their own judgment of what was
right and wise; that if they all held
their wheat there would come a great
smashup in the price when they at
tempted to rush it on the market all
at once.
Mr.. Muller replied to this by severe
attack upon us; and told the farmers
that we had been bought up by 1.-The
get the farmers whiat fer a song; that
we were the enemy of the farming
community, etc, etc.
The result proved that we were right.
AS soon as the Minneapolis wheat
ring disposed Of their holdings the
price fell to very low figures; and there
upon the Republican politicians turned
around and said it was the Farmers
Alliance that was responsible for the
loss, because their president, Mr.. Dom
nelly, had advised the farmers to hold
ON to their wheat.
We have been kept busy year after
year, answering the falsehood we
smash it in one place, and it pops up
its head in another; and it's last ap-
pearance is in the columns of the Wi
mona Republican
We move ask our friend, Sinclair, to
make the amende honorable and say to
his renders that We never advised the
fornoorc nP
country, at any time, to hold their
wheat
If the price of our staple commod-
tiles was left uninfluenced to the great
natural law of supply and demand, we
might prophecy the future with some
chance of being right: but every enc
knows that it is not; it is in the power
of SPECTATORS to put up or depress the
price of any commodity, and all the
farmers can do is out of succession of
gigantic robberies to save such little
scraps as may place them above want,
provided they deny themselves all the
luxuries and advantages of civilized life.
If the farmers had a fair show, they
would be princes in the land; as it is,
they are infested with vermin that de-
vour tham-and then lie about those
who would defend them.
The charge made by the Owen crowd
that we are in pay CT Jfm Hill, is but
faint echo of that older charge that we
were in the pay of the wheat ring.
The only answer an honest man can
make to such rogues is to point to the
average results of his life. We have
never robbed the people, and we have
never defended any ring that did rob
them. We have lived in Minnesota
forty-one years and if we had any of
the instincts of public plunderer they
should have cropped out long ago.
PROSPERITY