Kansas agitator. [volume] (Garnett, Kan.) 1890-1905, 1900-03-16

w. S. Bryan, the populist editor Of
the St. Louis Journal of Agriculture,
writes as follows in recent issue OF
that excellent weekly:
"a gentleman who resides at Read
ing, Mo-, does not like the Valley
Democrat, and wants us to stop send
ing it to him, which, Of course, we will
do with pleasure-but not until after
he gets this copy. This gentleman
claims to be Republican, but he Is
mistaken. He has strayed off into the
path of the Knickerbocker breeches
imperial English party, and is no more
a Republican than the devil is saint.
We will prove it to him. The Repub-
lican party was always a bimetallic,
double-standard party. II he doubts
this let him read the speeches Of Abra-
ham Lincoln, the editorials of Horace
Greeley and the writings and speeches
of Jas. G Blaine and all the other old
heroes of Republicanism, and he will
see that we are right. The Republican
party never declared for the single
standard until Mark Hanna got 1t by
the throat and choked all the honesty
of principle oit of it. Even Mckinley
was a bimetallist until Mark Hanna
bought him by paying his debts.
80 much for Republicans as bimet-
.allists. Now this Knickerbocker
breeches Missouri imperialist says,
THE idea of double-standard dollar
L. L., oh Nd nuhlQ- t1n6ar0
yard or double-standard bushel. NO
one is silie enough Chats his spelling)
Ito advocate a double-standard OF
weights and measures Oh, Wisdom!
thy name is Solomon! Suppose our
friend were keeping store, would he
not find it convenient to have two
yardsticks of precisely the same
length, so that if one happens to get
lost or broken he could use the other?
or, suppose he had two bushel meas
ures, and his old gray mule kicked
a hole in one of them, wouldn't 1t be
convenient to have the other one near
at hand to measure his grain with?
Or, to carry the parallel little fur
Their, suppose he had only one pair OF
pants, what would he do while his
good wife put patch on the hole in
the seat? Or, yet again-how would
he like to wear trousers with only
one leg ?-single-standard trousers!
We imagine that the silver leg would
get rather numb these cold days.
And now will our friend excuse us
while we tell him a little story? A
certain man knew where he could buy
a thousand yards of cloth for thou
sand bushels of wheat, and he also
knew that he could retail the cloth to
his neighbors for two bushels OF wheat
per yard. But having no wheat, he
borrowed thousand bushels from
neighbor, agreeing to return 1t at a
certain time, with 100 bushels extra
for interest; and so he bought the
cloth and resold it to his neighbors,
thus acquiring wheat enough to pay
his creditor and have good profit
for himself. But when he hauled the
wheat over to his neighbor, that sharp
individual had adopted the single
standard. He had knocked the bot
tom out of one of his bushel measures
and nailed it on top of the other, and
this was what he brought out to
measure the wheat in. The borrower
protested, but the other fellow got his
shotgun and told him to measure the
wheat in the single standard or he
would arrest him as an anarchist and
a repudiator.. AS he had no shotgun
he was bound to submit, and he not
only gave up all his wheat, but was
still in debt 100 'single-standard'
bushels for interest. As he drove