The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1898-01-14
The Menace of PIutocracy.

today is we'll nigh supreme.
| At the close of the war the milionaires
of the country could have been counted
on the fingers of a single hand, and the
wealth was reasonably we'll distributed.
There was large middle class, and the
extremely rich, OH the one hand, and the
abjectly poor, on the other, constituted
but small per cent Of our total popula-
| ton.
Thirty years ago no man was idle,
unless idleness were a matter of choice
with him. There was no difficulty in
finding work at remunerative wages.
The small dealers and manufacturers
could find profitable fields for the exercise
of their energies and the operations of
their genius.
The country boy Of brain and pluck
could go to the city, embark in trade, or
enter profession, and climb to the top
of the ladder.
The farmer could, in modest style, send
his boys and girls to college, and lay by
snug sum of money for rainy day.
Thirty years have passed since these
conditions existed, and as we look over
the country today we are terror-tricken at
the change. Today quarter of a million
persons own more than eighty per cent of
ali our wealth, while the middle class is
being rapidly eliminated and the ranks
I,a 81 ta1
to millions of recruits from the well-to-do
to such an extent that the abjectly poor
largely outnumber those belonging to the
middle class.
Today idleness is not the exception,
but rather the rule. Skilled laborers are
seeking all over the land for work, with
out obtaining it; and if, perchance, one
should be more fortunate than his fellows,
he must work at greatly reduced wuges.
Only the other day was discussing the
question of wages with skilled mechanic
in Birmingham, and he said to me:
''There are plenty ofhouses being built
here, and can get all the work can do
at one dollar and twenty five cents day,
but cannot support my family on this"
A few years ago he could earn three to
four dollars per day.
On the railroads, in the South, men
work fourteen hours day, as section
hands 1.-THE most labooious work imag-
inable) at from seventy-fve to ninety
cents per day.
Today the small dealers are being
driven out of business by the department
stores, and the small manufacturers have
been crushed by the large combinations
of capital
Should the country boy Of today go to
the city, he could never hope to rise to
eminence, either i'll profession or bus.
iness for equal opportunities no longer
exist
The farmers of the country are barely
existing, their farms are under mortgage,
and their boys and girls must stay home
from school and college to help pay the
interest on the mortgage.
Briefly stated, these are some of the
| changed conditions.
And we have not far to seek for the
cause. 1t is the encroachmenl of capital
upon labor. The plutocracy, which al
ways places capital above labor, has held
undisputed sway in this country for thirty
years, and it has we'll nigh succeeded in
crushing all vitality out of labor and
gathered into its capacious NAV all the
fruits of toll.
Our plutocracy is an aristocracy formed
on wealth. Money is its chief corner
stone, greed and avarice its only incent,
ives. Plutocracy proposes to rule the
world through the power of gold. While
the people have been fighting great polit-
ical battles over false issues under the
guidance of foolish or dishonest leaders,
the plutocracy has so entrenchsd itself in
power that its position seems almost i'm
pregnable.
1t knows we'll how to appeal to the
cupidity in the human heart, and with its
ill-gotteu gains it buys newspapers, cor
rupts legislatures. controls Congress and
the Senate, and owns the courts 1t die
tates the nominees of conventions, and
then tells the workingman to vote the
ticket or starve
Should patriot appear upon the scene.
with brains and capacity to lead the peo-
pie, and undeceive those who have been
blinded or prejudiced, all the power of
plutocracy is directed toward his undoing
The hireling press, the paid iackeys, will
hound him down in every conceivable
way. Even should he succeed in coming
into high position the attacks will be
kept up. He will be cajoled, fattered
and tempted. If he will not be bought,
if he is found 10 be ineorruptible, other
means will be resorted to for his destruc-
ton.
Thus does plutocracy fight, beneath the
black flag Of the pirate, taking all that is
in sight, while its ipsstiate appetite ever
clamors for more.
If it makes such gigantic strides for the
next dozen years as it has in the past
thirty. the plutocracy will become the
absolute master of this country.
Then, with the army and navy to back
it, REINFORCED by the courts. the railroads,
the telegraph companies, the newspapers,
and the money of the world, what chance