The Meridian times. (Meridian, Idaho) 1909-1938, 1912-06-07

port! Can you look forward now and
see your children in the sweatshops?
Can you see yourself and your family
living in tenement surrounded NV
people OF all nationalities. with habits
and tastes far inferior to yoursq DO
you want to leave the free. open coun-
try, the flowers, the running brooks,
the birds and all rural life means to
you, to go into the squalor and filth
and sorrow and disgrace of a great
city? Do.syo want to ride ten and
! hfteen and twenty miles every MORN
ing to your work and back again at
night? Do you want to feel the teeth
or the cold, heartless, cruel life of
the city? Do you want to live in a
community where you do not know
your nearest neighbors? Do you want
to exist selfishly for yourself alone,
where no one has any interest in you
and where you are the merest iota in
the great plan of things?
What You Are at Home.
Where you now live you are factor
IN the community; you are respected
| and, If you are a square fellow. are
| looked up to by men who are worth
more money than you. In the coun-.
try we do not gauge every man by his
| bank account, He is what he is. be-
cause We have an opportunity to know
MS heart, to know what sort of life
he lives. In the city, men have little
opportunity of getting close together.
1t Is struggle for the almighty dol
lar. Men go down in the morning
with an idea of taking away from
some other fellow a necessary amount
of money to run their families through
the day. 1t is a case of business riot
from morning to night.
Would you take on this sort of a
proposition and give up the ideal life
you live in the country where you are
respected and loved; where you take
part in the political affairs of the
community and where the small boys
look up to you as a good mechanic,
a square man and good citizen?
Get Into the Fight.
In your town there is not at the
present time more work than there
should be. Does it not stand to rea-
son that the mail order houses work.
ing under the proposed parcels post
law will work an injury and make
even less work for you? 1t is your
duty as an American citizen who loves
his family, his home and his fellow
business man to stand with these,
shoulder to shoulder, in this fight for
preservation-a fight in which no man
should enlist without a full under
standing of the evil, and with no false
notions of the enemy he has to COM
bat?
The Bill Far Reaching In Evil.
Too many people in talking about
the parcels post evils refer to them
only as affecting the merchants. The
result of this is that the average in
dlV1dual disregards the merchants DO
sltlon in the matter and announces
that he will buy where he can buy for
the smallest amount of money. He
does not stop to realize that the bust
ness of the merchant is an index to
the entire community. If the mer-
chant is prosperous the people are
prosperous and vice versa.
parcels post refer to it's workings in
the old countries!
But wait!
instead of this being an argument, !
Tor parcels post, it is exactly the re- |
verse.
What is the average small town in
France, for instance?
A hamlet of sordid, clod-lfke people
who group themselves about a tavern
and the government tobacconist who
sells tobacco and stamps. They buy
by mail. Their very ignorance is a
biting reflection upon the parcels
post. Their schools are a joke, their
markets are beyond their reach, they
nave no gas, no electric light, no mod
'rn convenience of any sort. Would
'ou raise your children amid such
'tultifying influences?
And yet this is exactly what the
'arcels post and mail order house
Will bring to America in time, if the
people of the country towns do not
rise and crush the evils.
See Your Editor About It.
Talk with your local editor about
he situation. He will be posted.
Work up feeling against mail order
Louses and parcels post. This is your
ght. Do not be afraid to go to the
var. Just as your fathers have, in
ines gone by, and perhaps you your
elf did when your country called. All
'ars are not fought with powder and
he'll. Some wars, even fiercer than
hose where blood was shed through
ne avenues we naturally associate
18th war, have been quite as sangu-
larry.
In my humble opinion, country life
the United States is the more nat
raj life, by far. 1t is the life to be
lost desired. If 1 were to have my.
ay would take the people out of
he sordid, weakening, slavish life.
lie dirty, hooking, cold and cruel city
nd set them upon the land, around
lie villages of this country. I wouId