Virginia free press. (Charlestown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1832-1916, 1913-03-06

The tariff by the imposition of pro-
hibitive duties, shuts out foreign COM
petition. Thus secured from interfer-
ence, the trusts come into being for
the purpose of killing offlhome compe-
tition. Such concerns as refuse to join,
are crushed. Production, distribution,
and price are then at the discretion Of
the trust captains. and the pendulum
that regulates them swings between
rapacity and caution.
would take pencil, sit down, and
figure up the increased cost of living
in the last five years an increase, so
economists agree, largely due to the
evils of the tariff. the formation OF
trusts. Clothing and shoes doubled in
cost .and cheapened in quality meals
quadrupled in price, building materials
SO high that homecoming has become
a castle-in Spain proposition with many
people.
Let me-getting out of concrete for
moment-give concrete illustration
of tarif-trust workings here in my own
State. In the days of crude machinery
and small plants, and before the dis
covery of beet sugar, graduated sugar
sold for less than five cents pound.
Colorado produces, from beets, three
times the amount of sugar that it's
people use. And yet, the cost of Cob
RADIO sugar in Colorado is the cost of
raw sugar in Hamburg, Germany, plus
the cost of ocean transportation, plus
the tariff, plus the freight rates from
New York to Chicago, with the result
that the price per pound is from eight
to ten cents.
If were woman in 1918 would
make this table:
l. The opportunities for extortion
offered by the tariff and the full adj
vantage taken of these opportunities
by the trusts.
2 The nature OF the, franchises I'M
der which gas. water, street car, tele-
phone, and electric light companies
operate, and how they were secured
8. The hours OF labor, the conditions
Of labor, and whether my State had
upper labor laws, and laws governing
D5mpensation in case of death or acct
dent
| would study this table and make
Investigations with ard to it, for the
purpose of determining how far these
three calses IRE responsive for invol-
untary poverty. And before doing it
| would rid my mind of the vicious idea
that all thrifty. Industrious people are
we'll TODD, and that Only the shiftless
and inefficient are poor
No less an authority than Miss Fran
ees Willard declared that drunkenness is
more frequently caused by poverty than
poverty by drunk gene -. Before went
up)n the Juvenile bench | granted
/ hundreds of divorces, and in the majority
| of cases | could trace the cause to the
irritations of poverty, the dreary, try
ing struggle to make both ends meet.
| And now, upon the Juvenile bench as
| the sad tales Of sordid lives unfold, |
find that the shame Of girls and the
cfimlnality Of boys are largely attribu-
BILE to involuntary poverty-the in
ability of parents to make both ends
| meet-to keep home-to find time
for love and training IN days that have
| bo,ro rriyeo 70 5-,1J
/ would not be discouraged by the
seeming mysteries of the Initiative,
Referendum. and Recall, but would try
to understand them as tools of popular
government-thing designed to give
people control over their public servants
| to the end thai temptation NAV be re-
moved and corrup ion eliminated They
are meant to make politics clean.
! When a cook is hired, she is the
] housewives representa- tive in the
/ kitchen. but the prudent housewife
does not part with control over the
cook and the kitchen. This is the
principle Of the Initiative. Referendum
and Recall II public servants do net
pass law that is demanded, the people
can initiate the law by petition and pass
il at an election If public servants
enact legislation that the people do not
want-giviRg some outrageous fran
chise, for instance-the people cap petit
ton thatit bereferred. and vote it down
at an election. If public servants enact
legislation that the people do not want
giving some outrageous franchise, of
instance-the people can petition that
it be referred, and vote it down at an
election. The Recall is nothing more
than the right to discharge any cor
rupt' unfaithful, or inefficient servant.
/ Where nothing is left to sell. nothing
is left to buy. The people are secured
in their rights, and their representative
are no longer tempted by brides.
| should be vitality interested in the
question of international peace, par.
ticularly when / understood that the
money wasted on one battleship would
build hundreds of miles of good roads
establish better schools and generally
make for more wholesome, expan-
siVe environment. Especially would
try to secure for myself and others
higher concepsion of patriotism thai
mere willingness to take arms in wa
! of conquest-I would count superiorit!
! matter of morals. industry, and com
merce, not merely something that car
be proved only by force.
But more than anything, if wer
women in 1913, l would bend energie
upon my town or city with the exac