The Neihart herald. [volume] (Neihart, Mont.) 1890-1901, 1899-05-13
INALIENABLE RIGHTS.

A murmur OF regret rises all over
this land at the course pursued by
the striking miners at Wardner and
Canyon creek. While laborers, skill
led and unskilled, have rights to pro-
tect, and while every respectable
citizen of this country desires to see
those rights protected, the opinion
still prevails against the wholesale
destruction of property in retaliation
for wrongs committed. In America,
no wrong man may do us is suffic-
lent to justify our course in destroy
ing his property. For under our
federal constitution the right to hold
property is coeval with the rights of
life and liberty; and the state con-
stitution says the right of property is
"INALIENABLE." The bigness of the
word ''inalienable" is fairly we'll un-
derstood when we consider that no.
thing has ever yet climbed over it.
Yet the enormity and extremity of
the Wardner trouble is not equal to
the daily depredations upon popular
rights in the name of law and the
trust. Stupendous corporations and
monstrous combinations of capital
are forming over the land until not
one single branch of industry is left
uncovered. The day of individual
enterprise is past, and all men una
BILE to own stock in the trust and
draw dividends therefrom, must con-
tribute to its success. All the
common comforts of life are first han
died by trusts. If you buy anything
you must buy it of the trust. If you
would sell, you must sell to the trust;
and in either case the trust controls
the price. Thus, not only are the
poor growing poorer, but they are
even being robbed of the facilities
of earning an independent living,
and must slave for the trust or get
off the earth.
Illustrating this subject very Wv
idly comes personal letter from
Mrs. Josephine Van Blarcum of
San Pedro, Honduras, addressed to
Judge Bennett Of Neihart. We had
the pleasure of reading the letter
and have excepted that portion of
the letter which bears upon this sub
ject.
Mrs. Van Blarcum says: "We
have experienced considerable
boom here, and great many peo-
pie have come into the country to
put in banana and cocoa plantations,
besides quite few were contemplat-
ing the importation of fine cattle,
and going into stock raising, but
when the mail came in today, we
got news of the STEAMBOAT TRUST,
that it had bought out the two lines
of steamers and that fares have gone
up from $16 to $50. Freight rates
too have advanced 40 cents per cwt.
But that is not the worst. They can
ruin our banana trade, by giving
barely nothing for the fruit. 1t is
only about IA cents a bunch now,
which leaves a fair profit. But the
trust will cut the price of our pro-
ducts to the barest living margin.
We expect them to cut the price of
bananas to 5 cents bunch, which
will fairly ruin the industry"
Here is described system of le-
galized robbery from which the au-
thorities tell us there is no way of
escape. The same conditions exist
in the United States only on
grander, more glorious scale. And
not one thing is being done to hind
er the movement or mitigate it's eff
fects. We take the position that
the trust is wrong in principle, and
that its course is just as wrongful as
is that of the Wardner strikers.
The capitalist may rob and plunder
the entire world of producers and
suffer no material opposition. But
when oppressed toilers retaliate by
conduct which is virtually the same,
they are imprisoned and severely
punished. All the HERALD desires
to see between capital and labor is
square deal, and there is good reason
to believe that labor has been cold
deoked in the trust movement.