The weekly true Democrat. (Tallahassee, Fla.) 1905-1912, 1907-09-20
THE PASSING OF
THE5DEMACOGUE
Starke Telegraph Promuigates Some
Optimistic Views.

Optimistic Views.
The Telegraph is beginning TO feel
sorry for the candidate, State or ma
tional whose stock ia trade is appeal to
popular prejudices, Calamity bowling
in the taco Of the highest wages for
labor and the highest prices for the
products of the farm that have been
known in years is an uphill business.
Those who are wont to become wrought
up by the wall Of the demagogue sim
ply refuse to be wrought, because they
know from their own experience that
no Such conditions obtain as the dema-
gogue would have them believe. In our
own State, for instance. there are per-
sons and newspapers who have been
particularly active during the past year
or two in their efforts to educate the
masses up to a hatred Of and prejudice I
against all manner Of industrial enter
priseS. They have told us necessarily,
and still tell us, that the railroads and
other enterprises that happen Co have,
end must have. large means arc tramp
ling us under. foot and drawing our very
hfc's blood The speciality OF these
calamity howlers is To shed crocodile
fears over the condition of the farmer.
There Is method in this, for whatever
else you may say of the demagogue he
is not without his full quota OF cunning.
He thinks the man who tolls In the
field, necessarily removed by his voca-
ton rom intimate association and fire.
uuent exchange of ideas with his neigb-
hors and Friends, is the man most easily
wrought upon by his vaporinpsl But
he underestimate the iptellieen4 Of
the farmer. Although his h6fne Is
some what isolated and he is daniedthe
close touch with affairs that issenioyed
hy the inhabitants of the congested
centcrs of population, the farmer IS
reading and thinking and reasoning on
his own hack and The cry Of wolf
don't have near the terrors for him
THAT it did a few years aeo He secs
with his own eyes that his land his
borscs, his cattle and his hogs have
,o1dlly increased in value ia the pro-
portion that the development Of the
a.otc has Increased the supply Of mon
Uy and the demand for his proDertV.
gnd l3 hag seen WITH his own eyes tho
steady increagc Ia the price Of every
thing that he produces on his farm un-
I'll ut present there is hardly a single
item of produce that is not bringing
him at least 25 per cent more tlrtn it
did two years ago. Sea Island cotton,
one OF the money crops Of this county,
for instance, has increased in price dur
ing the past two years until it Is nav
quoted at 80 cents per pound, a figure
not reached before in twenty years or
more. These things have happened,
too. az a time when the demogOgical
politician has been loudest in crying out
against what he is pleased to term the
"monied interests. 1t is small won
der, then, that the farmers can no
longer be haranRued into believing the
hand Of the world is against him and
that his salvation lies in constant
warfare on everything else. He has
learned from experience that he pros
pers in exactly the same measure that
the balance of the country prospers,
and instead Of joining in hue and cry
against the universe he is rejoicing in
the general prosperity and wishing sue
cess 20 every business enterprise in the
reckoning correctly that the
railroads and the mills and the stores
and the shops must make money and
prosper II their owners and employees
arc to be able TO pay top prices for the
products Of the farm and the orchard
and the garden
With this awakening and broadening
OF opinion on the part Of the farmers,
the last hope Of the poltjcaldemagogue
vanishes. for he has thrved on decep-
tion and prejudice, and surely the peo-
pie upon whose prejudices he has de-
pended for sustenance will not be led
back into antagonsm of the Industrial
interest upon whose extension and sue
cess their own prosperity is shown by
present conditions to be so largely de-
pendent.