The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1900-03-03
ONLY REMEDY.
G. G. Clemens Discusses Social
ism and Its Aims.
Declares 1t the Only Solution of
Political Problems.
IN FAVOR OF TRUSTS.
Would Keep Machine and Make
All People Stockholders.
Deserted Bryan For Heartless
Policy Toward Corporations.

night. 1t marked his formal deSertlOn
to the ranks of the Socialist party with
which he announces he will forevermore
be identified. 1t was proposed to per-
feet a Socialist organization. but be-
cause of the limited number in attend
Tance this move was postponed.
In his speech Mr.. Clemens said:
Modern socialism, the socialism of
the socialists, is not vague nor Utopian;
it is plain, everyday common sense
Its founders were not ignorant crack
brains. Karl Marx, Rodbertus and
Iasalle were all lawyers and men OF
great erudition. Ferdinand Lasalle was
the most brilliant advocate in Germany
in his day. Humboldt deemed his
philosophical work the greatest that
had been written; a law book he wrote
was declared the best for a century;
and after his death Bismarck praised
Lasalle in parliament, declaring his
friendship for the distinguished social
list and telling of happy hours spent in
his interesting society. Karl Marx
wrote a great work on political
economy. Rodbertus was a. jurist and
a professor of law. Such men founded
modern socialism, and it should be as
sumed that it is at least good common
sense.
Socialism has nothing to do with the
home, with morals, with education, with
religion. 1t is purely economic-a pro-
posed system of managing the things
to which men must have access or die
and the things which make for the COM
fort of physical life. Topeka has for
years owned and operated an electric
light plant, yet people have gone right
on getting married and divorced as
usual Kansas City owns her water
works plant; yet there are homes in
that city, respectable homes, the schools
run as they used to, the churches are
still open, even the annual amusement
called a city election is provided with
the same regularity as before.
Socialism does not attack private
DrOperty-the things one has for his
own comfort or pleasure. You have a
beautiful home? Keep it: You harm
nobody by that. You have horses,
books, pictures? Keep them. Social
ism Will not disturb you. A farmer
has a quarter-section and tills it. He
is harming nobody, and if he prefers
to work his farm for himself which
would be foolish, socialism viii permit
him, while it pities him. But a gen
tleman in London owns a thousand
acres of Kansas land that he does not
use and which he never expects to even
see. What possible reason can he have
/ for claiming that land but that he
wishes to live off the labor of Kansas
men who bend their tired backs and
/ till it? Can any man need a railroad
/ all for himself? Is a street railway a
! mere private convenience for some
man who lives in the suburbs and must
! have some way to get to town? Does
q man need a coal mine for the sole
( purpose OF IeeO10S MS own furnace or
/ CRATE? The object of the owners of all
| these socially necessary things is to
| make mOney-to live off the labor of
/ people who work. Things of this char
! acter are property socialism proposes
/ the people shall own and mana ge-nOt
| the homes and the private possessions
! of the people. Your child is ILL., A Ger
| tain drug would save its life; without
! that drug it must die One man owns
/ all there is of that drug, and so holds
] 1I,TT Z
| or death. He refuses you, and your
! child dieS-needleSsly dies. While your
| hot tears were falling upon the still
/ face in the coffin, would it not seem to
! you wicked, devilish, to leave such
| power in the hands of any man or
| class of men? Well the owners of coal
! mines have the power to freeze you and
! your family to death. The men who
own the forests and quarrieS can deny
/ you the material to build you home.
Those who control the food products
/ of the land have the power to produce
famine at will-the power to starve
you to death. Is it not plain common
/ sense that the resources of nature-the
| things to which all must have access or
| PERISH; IS 1t not common sense that
the means of supporting physical life
| and of making it worth living, should
not be left in the selfish control of men
or class, but should be social property.
! held and used for the good of all and
Socialism is the only pontical phil
osophy to which the people can turn
| for the solution of pressing political
| problems; for every political problem
of today is an industrial problem See
/ the helplessness of alleged statesmen
| in the presence of the trusts. Mr.. Bryan
! proposes that the miserable trusts shall
be required to register before they are
assigned to rooms in the states hotel
so if they don't behave their neighbors
| will talk about them when they get
/ back home. The industrial commission
| seems to favor the same drastic meas
ure. It is like the eastern professors
| cruel suggestion that we should ostra-
| else the trust managers; that no work
| ing man should ever again invite Rock
/ archer or P1erpOnt Morgan or any of
| that crowd to dine or sleep at his house
! am pretty radical, but I do not pro-
! pose to be a party to such awful, hOr-
| rible, heartless and revolutionary policy
toward even the managers of trusts. So
| I have had to leave the Bryan party be-
| cause my humane disposition revolts at
| the cruelty he advocates We socialists
! merely propose to make everybody a
stockholder in the trusts and then keep
the machines to use in our business. Is
| not that the only common sense course ?
At all events, it is the only course; and
Socialists can rest easy; you will have
to come to them
The speaker denounced the treatment
| of the miners of Idaho by a free silver
governor, and the shooting of unarmed
men at Latimer, and called attention to
| the significant fact that although Mr..
! Bryan had expressed much sympathy
| for people in the Philippine Islands and
| in South Africa, he has not yet said one
| word about the treatment of working
men at home He seems to be far
sighted. He can see misery or a wrong
only at the distance of one-third the
circumference of the globe
He also called attention to the fact
| that in Massachusetts last December,
the Democrats fused with the Republic
cans to try to defeat the Socialists; and
declared that wherever Socialism be-
came dangerously strong, the Demoera-
| tic party would always unite with the
awful Republicans to beat it.
1 yet men ask me to stay with a