The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1908-02-19
WATERS REPLIES.
Continued from Page one.)

other patrons of these railways knew
nothing and of course could not avail
themselves of its advantage 1t Il
just this kind of favoritism and law
breaking behavior that has sprung
small-sized French revolution in
Kentucky. where the tobacco trust
has by its merciless monopoly, aided
and abetted by the railways, ruined
the market and destroyed the price
Tor every raiser of tobacco who pro-
poses to be Independent of 1t.
The Standard Oil rebates obtained
from railways is a national infamy
There never was time when the
railways were not anxious to lay their
knitting down to be ravished by
some predatory horde in their mar
aud1ng expeditions against the people
The railways completely with the
beef trust, in permitting it to have
the advantage of its own cars at spec
fal rates, throttled all competition and
shut out all others from like business;
and to such an extent that the very
beefsteak we grill for breakfast has
no knowledge of the fall in price of
the steer from which it was cut
1.-THE sugar trust and the Colorado
coal trust rebates obtained from rail-
ways hungry to be debauched, is an
other chapter of business dishonesty
and crime, and in it, was also and
again mixed up, the great system rep
resented by this gentleman.
1.-THE Northern Securities company
conspiracy against the people, gang
of corporate train robbers, by which
an elemental increase of stock, if air
and water are such, was proposed to
be the foundation for impregnable,
unassailable railway charges where
the people were to be hopeleSSly and
helplessly marooned. This shameful
story has the glamour and smack of
some devil-may-car romance of a
Caribbean corSair.
And to come to your own city; the
secret rebates on grain granted by
this great railway to one firm in your
city, giving 1t secret rebate on ev-
cry bushel of grain bought by 1t,
charging all the others the published
rate, and in addition thereto, giving
this firm the secret privilege to
further invade the published tariff of
rates sufficient to obtain the grain
for shipment over it's line to the gulf,
every dealer and stop
ping every mill; this is the story that
struck Kansas City the hardest and
wounded it the deepest. Let me fin
ish this slight reorganization of the
tergiversations of the railways. ana
you will notice the conventionality of
that word, in their conspiracfes
against the people, with one look
duction of the Illinois Central to the
final browning Of Hartman as the
archangel Of all commercial devil
ment, and we may we'll believe they
are sufficient circumstances to rouse
any people to righteous and indig-
nant wrath.
1.-THE very day the speech of this
gentleman was published, the presi-
dent in his message to congress
charged the chief executive of his
by name, an unusual thing,
with personal knowledge and CONN.,
vance with the rebating at Los An
geles.
Should Plead for Mercy.
1.-THE plea of the railways for mod
Grafton should be changed to one for
mercy: no soul in reach of any plan
IF salvation can get moderation or
obtain mercy until he disgorges what
remains in his till of the unnoly swag.
The speech of the gentleman, taking
nto consideration the criminal his
.ory of his road, reminds me OF the
ooy, who having butchered both his
parents and having been found guilty
On the first ballot, of murder in the
irst degree, when standing for SEN
fence, was asked by the judge II ne
mad anything to say why the sentence
Of the court should not be pronounced
On him, replied with an equal fervor
and warmth to that exhibited by the
gentleman in his speech, and said, I
hope the court will have mercy on a
poor orphan
1.-THE railways have never stood in
with the people; they have at all
lines kept a. band of janizaries, train
al in the wiles of the rubber heeled.
shut door politician, between them
and the people, who have seen to 1T.
hat the line of cleavage should be
kept open and distinct, and who nave
in protection of their nefarious en-
pIoyment, formulated schemes against
IL y, q
the railways, making tne very niea'
On which they fed. The hired go-be-
+ween is at best an adventurer; any
flag is his, and he is as utterly with
out honor as Adam was OF an UNI
bilious The Hessian may bear their
gun, but he is not their soldler'
when the opposing forces depioy INTO
the open, he starts down the track
ike a runaway engine, gathering
and speed as he flies.
"His address was founded, as he
seemed to claim, on the vlrulence or the
peop1e in marrying the railroads and
one of the most conspicuous threads
woven through the fabric of his mag
nificent Grafton was, that the people
should not be trusted to control or man
age the government, and ought not to
have the privilege Of voting directly Tor
United States senators. Please Dear in
mind. if his speech had been in per-
helion with the legislature, he would
bate on a primary law giving the peo-
pie such power. He is not the first
astronomer that miscalculated all
eclipse. The legislature had just pass
ed a primary law making the United
States senators subject to be chosen by
the primaries Of the people. 1t argues
almost with absolute conclusiveness,
that If the speech had been made be-
fore the passage Of that law, 1t was
proper argument, and If made after,
that it was but a criticism upon the
passed law. or that portion of
It was so dovetailed in the meshes Of
his address. that it could not be ex-
plunged without loss of symmetry OF a
destruction Of it's autonomous euphony
Questions HIS Motive.
why he should have left the thread
of the stream down which he was float
ing gaily as If he were on a barge on
the Nile, bewitched by the lull of the