The Marietta journal and courier. (Marietta, Ga.) 1909-1918, 1914-07-31
WASHINGTON LETTER.
Washington City,

Washington City,
July q, 1914
The little furry over the Labor
Unions in Georgia has set me to
thinking. | have never had time to
bother about ancestry but l am sure
that if l We're to trace back | would
find that some where and some time
those from whom | descended suf-
fered from unspeakable injustice and
oppression. BY no other reasoning
can ! account for the way | feel to
ward things that | see in this coun-
try almost every day-some Of the
people rolling in wealth beyond the
dreams OF Creosus and others suffer
ing from hunger and privation-
pale ghosts, walking around in the
fTaveyards of the living
X ~ q
One day last winter | was leaving
the beautiful white marble building
N which the Senators have their Of
fees and | saw in the street two old
women. On the gray head of each
was bundle of old lathes, fully as
many as could be hauled on a wheel
barrow. Honestly, never saw such
9 load carried by human being in
my life
These lathes had been picked up
on one of the squares near the Capt.
oil where big buildings had been
torn down to make room for an ad-
uition to the Capitol Park The old
women were bearing the kindling to
IN alley in which they lived, ia
sight of the Capitol. 1t was a pitiful
sight for me to witness in the very
center of our Government.
The next day was passing by the
spot at which they had gathered
another armful of the old lathes. A
man had just ordered them to throw
their burdens to he ground and they
lad done so. lie was waving them
away with gruff words Crestfal-
len, they turned slowly toward thei,
humble abode in the alley.
1t was as though the dead limbs
that lay on the ground in the forest
mad been denied to two old women
20 keep them warm.
And before my eyes rose the
mighty Capitol of great and pros
porous Nation, and | saw in my
minds eye its fields, it's factories,
its plenty and it's wealth.
God pity us.
Is
catch a car, go through the city,
out by the White House, past beauti-
3ul parks and half way up to the
plateau which they call Mount
Pleasant. | come upon the equestrian
statue Of a great general of the war.
Facing it, and at the summit of the
ridge, where two streets meet, is a
marble palace. l do not know. but
t may have cost a million dollars, or
half million, any way.
-NON uOl huOW NuO lives IN
hat house. He may be good man.
mention his home only as a type
But | do say there is too much diff
ference between the mansions of the
Tich and the cabins of the poor-too
much difference between the home
Of Rockefeller on the Hudson and
3he cabins of his miners in Colorado.
\
Speaking about mines: Were you
ever down in a coal mine? You
don't know what night is, you who
look up at the stars and see the calm
beauty of the moon
Night, night eternal black as
blindness itself Such is coal
mine
Once I was travelling in the Cum
0erland Mountains and IS twilight
gathered | passed through mining
village. The men were coming out
Of the mine. On their caps, still
lighted, were the lamps which thew
had worn far underground. They
mad come from the darkness of the
mine to the darkness that called the
world to slumber. No sunlight
theirs. Night, eternal night.
And you think these men will
never lose their heads and strike?
And when in their insanity and poy-
erty they do some wild act you re-
quire that they shall be shot?s
What do you expect Of these Gagged
beasts of our industrial life?
The man who sits beside warm
fire in winter ought to think gte,