The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1900-09-14
con,mercialisnn.

The address OF Miss Jessie Ackerman
before the w. c. r. U. in the M. E.
church of this town, last Thursday even,
ing, was the most powerful indictment of
the prevailing spirit of Commercialism.
this community ever had the privilege of
listening to. Though not intended to be
an arraignment of our rotten to the core
commercial Christian civilization, it was
all the more powerful an indictment of it.
When she told of waiting on the Congo
river il Africa for the arrival Of an Amer
lean steamer which brought a company of
missionaries to convert the heathens of
the dark continent, and in that steamers
hold were stored thousands of barrels of
whiskey and rum to further debase, de-
bauch and brutaiize the natives, the
awful sham of our Christian missionary
system in conjunction with our satanic
commercialism civilization stands out as
the sham of shams.
And when she described scene in
India where she stood on an eminence
which overlooked wide fertile valley
and with spy-glass in hand swept that
valley for miles covered with poppy
flowers from which the opium, that has
made charne1 house of China, is dis
titled, while FIVE million Hindoos were
starving for bread, the he1lish spirit of
English commercialism is unveiled and
shown in all of its CHASTITY repulsive
nature.
When she conversed with Ii Hung
Chang in China and he pointing over a
rich province said, if that whole province
were rooted in it would constitute one
great charnel house covering eighteen
millions of human beings of opium
smokers, sacrifices on the altar of the
English god of greed.
Again she saw in the city of Philadel-
phia five hundred men assembled in con-
vention, dressed in the finest of broad
cloth, with diamonds sparkling in their
shirt fronts, wearing silk hats and carry
ing gold headed canes. And when she
inquired, "who are these men Z" she was
told they were members of the Brewers
Association. One of the men assembled
the platform, carefully laid aside his silk
hat and gold headed cane and proceeded
TO make speech. He told the members
.what they should do to extend their bus
mess and expand the "trade." One of
the most important duties was to gather
the boys in and treat them to beer in
order to cultivate an appetite for it and by
that means expand the trade" He was
commercial expansionist. He advised
that twenty dollars week in nickles
should be distributed among the boys of
the street in order to teach them to go up
to the saloon bar and call for beer.
Miss Alderman having seen our COM
mercialism Christian civilization in for.
eign lands as propagated by the govern
ing class of England and its adoption by
Americans. turned from it heart sick and
sore, after nine years of experience, as
mockery which she would no longer
waste her life in striving to spread, that
our own country needed missionary labor
as badly if not more than heather lands,
is her deliberate judgment And though
she did not bluntly say in SO many Saxon
words, she did in effect, that our CON-
mercialism Christian civilization of greed
Is civilization whose feet are fast on
hell. What Miss Alderman has witnessed,
of it seems to justify her belief
The carnival of plumber which marked
our Spanish war experience and which
has been continued in Cuba and Porto
Rico, and carnival of blood and devasta-
tion which has marked the administra-
TONS career, in following the advice of
England, in the Philippines, seems to
justify the dark picture drawn by Miss
Alderman aud by numbers of our leading
statesmen and scholars, of all political
parties.
1t is fortunate that many Of our best
men and ablest intellects are sounding
notes of warming. calling to the people to
note how the administration has gone
astray from every principle of what has
always been declared true Americanism.
The question is not party question any
longer but looms far above mere party
considerations. The question in between
McKinleyism and the Republic