The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-03-06

gies. No sensible person will ever pra,
to be delivered from toll. What 1 an
contending for is this: Human life is O
greater value than money. health is o
greater Importance than stocks ana
bonds. In the chase after the gold there
are those who would trample over the
| rights of humanity and sacrifice life r
the attainment of their object.
| During the last winter, for more thar
two weeks at stretch. we were en-
gulfed in smoke; we were obliged tc
| breathe the impure air, to walk about
| with sore eyes and sore threats and
wishing with all our hearts that we had
never seen the place. l think it is
the commendation of Judge Lindsay
| that he has decided to compel the own
ers of mines and smelters to rid the city
of the gas-laden air. l know full well
| that the smoke from smelters and mines
| means employment to thousands of the
| sons of toll, and that the city is made
| by the mining industry; that without
| these the city could not exist that men
toll of their own free will and business
| men are here of their own choice.
admit all this. 1 am looking at the
question from moral rather than from
business point of view. We have no
right to poison the air and sunlight
necessary for the health of the people.
We have no right to corrupt the waters,
to contaminate everything with filthy
vapors, to soil the homes, the churches
the business places. the hands and face
and clothes. when these things can
easily be avoided. We have no right to
put dark mask over Mother Nature.
am contending for the preservation of
pure air and clear sky for an oppor-
tunity OF the countless millions of stars
to shine upon us. for the sun to reveal
its glorious sunrise and sunsets, for
the earth to be decked with beautiful
flowers and shrubbery and trees, for in
sect lift to play and sport in our gar
dens and for birds to sing and make
melody.
These things will do much to make
Butte one of the great cities of the
Northwest, it will attract people here
who believe in building homes as well as
business enterprises. Butte. one of the
wealthiest of cities. has no flowers. no
trees, no birds, no pure air much of the
time and no pure water She it literally
barefooted but not bareheaded: the
smoking cap is almost constantly over
her head
"A city to be great must plan not
only to increase her commerce. to en-
large her volume of business, but also
to make it habitable, comfortable and
agreeable to live in. If I had any in
f1uence l should recommend to our fac
tories and smelters and mines and
homes the use of bituminous coal. I
should also recommend the smoke con-
Stunning device of the kind that has been
tried in St Louis with great success
This would to a very large extent do
away with the smoke nuisance. But
we ought not to stop here. The city
should plant trees and plants especially
on the grounds of our public buildings,
and induce the people in various ways
to plant trees and shrubbery in the
yards and along the sidewalks. In this
way in few years the Offensive smells
will be replaced with cleanliness and
beauty.
THE great trouble with the citizens of
Butte has been that they came here to
get rich and expected to return to the
Eastern states and therefore have taken
very little interest outside of money
making. But Butte has come to say
and it will be the great growing city
of the Northwest I also believe that
the moral and spiritual culture of the
city will depend very largely upon this
physical renovation. 1t is an uphill
| business to build morality in the m DIST
| of filth and under environments that
| make toll cherries and crushing to body
and mind. There is connection be-
tween the physical and the spiritual
lHdl we CdllllOl overlook. Inc ln1uence
of nature over mind and heart is puri-
flying and refining; it touches the eye
of the soul, the beauty from without
forming beauty within. Some of these
days we shall see very clearly that there
is a great deal of indirect Christianity
in pure air, clear sky in the grandeur
of the midnight heavens, in the voice
of birds in the mountain brow clad with
trees and flowers in homes adorned with
' ii III
groves in cities that have bands of mu-
sic certain afternoons These things are
precursors of a higher civilization.
Some of these days we shall con-
denim the nuisance of building tenement
houses, of people living in cellars and
garrets and dugouts. These things are
a disgrace 10 a Christian civilization
Some one will say. what business have
you as minister to dabble in these
things? My answer is tWof0ld. First.
nothing is foreign to the gospel that is
for the good of mankind; second, that
before we can have any great improve
ment in the morals of the community
there must be Improvement in the out
ward surroundings.
If the things about US are mean
Wretched, miserable and man is denied
his natural born rights of fresh air, pure
sunshine clear water, a good hOme-his
'hdh,eS loi betoiillIlS d 'HilSlidn are
slim. Butte needs an organization not
alone for the publication of the atmos-
phere but also for the publication of her
morals. y society formed for the pur-
pose of encouraging in every way clean
illness, for the identifying of the city
with trees. shrubbery and plants. for
the building of homes with modern ideas
of sanitation, for changing its charac-
ter from mining camp to city that
Will be the pride of the West and the
glory Of Montana, such an organization
would prove in its work to be of ines
Unable value to the present and future