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THE QUESTION STATED.

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But the

evolution, with the ballot as our only implement of warfare. producing class (farmers, mechanics and wage workers), must unite in one vast UNION and stand together, speaking with one voice.

The railroad corporations are determined to give free passes to all legislators, judges, etc. Be it so! Let laws be enacted declaring that all officials-"servants of the people"-from justice of the peace to president of the United States, shall ride free on all railroads. Accommodate the tendency. Make it fit in as a part of the social system. "Resist not evil," but convert it into good. Outflank the enemy, utiliz-ing omnipotent forces. Who could destroy electricity? But it is possible to utilize, for the good of mankind, what once was considered only an evil-a "destructive force"-the thunderbolts of Jove. Thus the supremacy of mind over matter is displayed, and of good over evil.

VII. The Many and the Few.

I insist, therefore, that the plan of campaign which Sherman put in force against Johnson, we must adopt against trusts. We must outflank them. National wants must be met by national means. This is genuine "protection." The surplus in the national treasury, and new issues of "lawful money" to meet all demands and needs of the producers, should be distributed, not to national banks, but to the states, to be loaned by county treasurers to the farmers, like he school fund is loaned at a rate of interest not above one per cent per annum, with unlimited time. Co-operative manufacturing and co-operative mining should be instituted by national aids, the factories and mines being leased to the workers by the government at not above one per cent per annum of cost. Farmers should vote tax and build mills, factories, slaughter-houses, etc. etc., as they do school houses, operating them under supervision of boards of directors, of their election, as they now run the schools to the end of bringing forth finished products, and not alone raw materials.

But this great undertaking must be preceded by land-limitation laws, forbidding ownership, by corporations, of agricultural, grazing and mineral lands, and confining the individual owner to a reasonable homestead, the government purchasing, at an appraised valuation, all surplus lands, paying for them in lawful money of the United States, and re-selling them on unlimited time (annual interest on purchase price not above one per cent) in small homesteads to individuals to be occupied and tilled by the bona fide purchasers, thus abolishing tenant and bonanza farming, and making the agriculturists independent as all producers ought to be.

The gift by the government to national bankers of their so-called "currency" (money) declared by law “receivable”—to be used by them until their banking business is finally wound up, is clearly a confiscation of the wealth of the many and its gratuitous bestowal on the fewrobbery of the people to enrich a favored class. It is the "sum of all modern villainies." In line with it was the deposit by the government of $60,000,000 of the national surplus, without interest, in the vaults of favored banks.

The United States government is at present a huge machine for robbing the many of their wealth and pouring it into the store-houses of the few-but only because the few are allowed to control is it so. The government is now, and has been for twenty years, controlled and used by the money power, with headquarters in Lombard street, London, as a supple instrument to oppress and rob the producing masses of our country. That power gathers tribute from the people of the United States beyond that paid by all the world besides, the sums derived by England from India, Egypt, and British America being not a

tithe of that paid in interest to the money power by our people, which amounts to not less than $1,500,000,000 annually.

Counting ten million voters in our land, this sum equals the average of one hundred and fifty dollars per year, or twelve dollars and lfty cents per month tribute paid by each man that casts a ballot in the United States, to the Rothchilds and Barings and their agentsexacted from us on the pretext of supplying the people a "tool of exchange based on gold"-"a dollar worth a hundred cents"-as foul a robbery, swindle and humbug as was ever devised by the cunning ingenuity of man.

This robbery, I am compelled to believe, was designedly brought upon us by means of a gigantic conspiracy-the same diabolical motives influencing its designers, and those who voted to execute it and the wicked leaders who carried it out-(president, cabinet and congress responsible for it) as influenced of old the traitors who bartered away the freedom of Ireland and Scotland.

"The English steel we could disdain
Secure in valor's station-

But English gold has been our bane-
Such a parcel of rogues in a nation."

VIII.

The Destiny of Humanity.

-Burns.

Effect follows cause. The two are indissolubly connected by natural law. Given the cause and the inevitable effect may be foretold with mathematical certainty. One great change comes and other great changes necessarily follow. Let one of the planets, for instance, leave its prescribed path in the heavens, and there will be immediate change of path of every orb in the universe. So the wonderful inventions of the nineteenth century affecting production are bringing about momentous social changes all in the same direction-all in the direction of human advancement. But the friction to be overcome is great. Our civil war was the result of this friction. But the car of progress did not pause. Hark! how great a noise is heard today in the labor world, of strikes, the shooting down of workingmen by guards, detectives and policemen in arms. It is the creaking of the wheels of the great car upon their axles, heated until they smoke; for the friction is as great now, and from the same cause, as in 1860 -the greed of a selfish few. What may we expect? Another civil war? God, forbid!

Will the enormous "trusts," the immense combinations and aggregations of capital, that have gathered and are still gathering in great lumps, as butter gathers in the churn, will all these be able to pool their selfish interests and unite against the people in one huge lump, and become what the British aristocracy has ever been and still is, a banditti?a cave of robbers? And shall they marshal armies and dictate the laws, president and congress, governors and legislatures, and the federal and state courts continuing to be ever willing instruments in their hands? Thus has the British government been always a willing and supple instrument in the hands of the British aristocracy. And the American governments, of states and nation, are willing and supple instruments in the hands of monopoly today, and have been for many years.

There is no middle ground to be occupied now more than there was in 1860, The toilers of our country must be either absolutely freemen or absolutely slaves. There can be no permanent compromise on the basis of wage industry. Profit-sharing will do, if the profits shared shall amount to an equitable division of profits, determined by the common voice and not fixed by the dictum of a "boss"—a petty

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autocrat. The overgrown power of concentrated wealth must be neutralized by the votes of the toiling many. This can never be done in the presence of a great military organization like the national guard, which will certainly be used by the few to enslave the many. Our gov ernment is rapidly drifting toward despotism. The machinery of coercion is being cautiously and covertly perfected "so as not to arouse opposition." There is danger that soon the people will find themselves fast bound, hand and foot-prisoners of war to a mongrel, AngloAmerican aristocracy.

Such will inevitably be our lot and the condition of master and slave continue indefinitely, the few idle reveling in luxury, the many industrious groveling in poverty, unless by universal suffrage, voicing an advanced condition of education and general knowledge of governmental science and social economy on the part of the people we may be enabled to hold what the fathers bequeathed us-equality of rights.

These rights we ought surely to maintain and perpetuate through the coming generations for at least "a thousand years."

"A thousand years, our own Columbia;

It is the glad day so long foretold

It is the glad morn whose early twilight
Washington saw in days of old."

The American masses ought to be ever on the alert. They ought not to sleep in the presence of the enemy. The English masses under the leadership of the great Gladstone are beginning to arouse themselves from the sleep of centuries. Soon the workingmen of all nations will, I trust, become the world's law-makers. Then will the equality of all men and the enfranchisement of woman result universally. The benefits of mechanical inventions will become a blessing alike to all. There will be no poor. Each will have ample time for mental culture. Harmony will prevail. No strikes; no scaling down of wages; no enslavement of labor; no monopoly of lands; no bonanza farms; no capitalists; no usurers; rent abolished; interest abolished; all alike free; all alike rich; no prisons; no poorhouses;-there will be only co-operation.

God is one.

Co-operation is as grand a word as was ever uttered. Man shall be one. "Be ye one as I and the Father are one" is the divine command. This is co-operation. It is oneness-unity. What a magnificent meaning has our national motto: “E pluribus Unum— out of many one"-when applied to the race of mankind. This is the destiny of humanity-one family-all working together for the special good of each and the common good of all-a world-wide "trust" -a universal combination of the world's workers for the common welfare. This is co-operation-the sun-burst of democracy-the realization of the dream of Jefferson.

ESSAY II-THE BONDAGE OF THE MANY.

I. The Loyalty of Labor.

The words of Cardinal Gibbons, Archbishop of Baltimore, in his letter to the Roman propaganda, defining the purposes and aims of the order of Knights of Labor, dated February 10,1887, are a most just and timely tribute to the poor toilers of our country, who by the tyranny of combined capital are menaced with a bondage more oppressive than chattel slavery itself. He says: "It is a fact, well known, that the poor toilers have no inclination to resist or break the laws of the land, but simply to obtain equitable legislation by constitutional and legitimate means."

The "poor toilers," let it be borne in mind, are the so-called "dan

gerous class" that the worshippers of Mammon have armed the national guard in all the states of the Union to overawe, and hold, by means of Gatling guns and repeating rifles, in subjection to the "rich man" in authority. In the words of that same patriotic prelate: "It will suffice," he says, "to mention the fact that monopolies not only by individuals, but corporations also, have already excited complaints from the workingmen and opposition from public men and national legislators as well; that the efforts of those monopolies, not always unsuccessful, to control legislation for their own profit, cause a great deal of anxiety to the disinterested friends of liberty; that their heartless avarice-which, to increase their revenues, ruthlessly crushes not only the workingmen representing the various trades, but even the women and the young children in their employ, makes it plain to all who love humanity and justice that not only the workingman has a right to organize for his own protection, but that it is the duty of the public at large to aid him in finding a remedy against the dangers with which civilization and social order are menaced by avarice, oppression and corruption."

The "common people" speak with one voice for peace, progress, enlightenment, philanthropy, unity, brotherhood, self-sacrifice, honesty, devotion, and whatever else is approved of God. Nothing is upheld, applauded or perpetuated by the voice of the people that the people believe to be wrong. The majority approve what is right, love what is right, and do what is right as far as they have knowledge of the right; and when they have seemed to approve what is wrong, love what is wrong, or have done what is wrong, it was when they were deceived into believing the wrong to be right. Upon this Gibralter of truth is built the impregnable fortress of democracy. The millennial day will dawn on the world when the people truly govern, when the common opinion is registered in the laws. not the average opinion of any one class or select part of the population, but that of all men and all women. This average opinion of all will be the nearest approach to perfect government that mankind can ever reach-enlightened, let me always insist, by the divine precepts of the New Testament.

Many good people (active, earnest and patriotic) are too busy with material things to give due consideration to the hidden movement which we term "the onward march of civilization." But what is civilization? It is the ripening of humanity. Reform is the breaking away of the clouds of selfishness that have prevented the light and warmth of the "Sun of Righteousness" from mellowing the beautiful fruitage of the garden of God-the world of humankind. The ideas that beam from the sermon of Jesus on the Mount are the source of modern civilization. They antagonize war, cruel punishment and the lust of gain. It is the leaven of his love that has expanded the common conscience, rendering chattel slavery intolerable, wage slav ery an incongruity, and that assures to the toilers of all nations the speedy inauguration of co-operative industry, universally. The "New Republic" is the brotherhood and sisterhood of the human race, a civilized world living under the shadow of the Tree of Liberty-the fulfillment of the prophecy of the American bard concerning the increase of the stars of our flag:

"And those stars shall increase till the fullness of time
Its millions of cycles has run-

Till the world shall have welcomed its mission sublime
And the nations of earth shall be one."

-Cutter.

*Through all the successive conditions, the criterion of truth is ever advancing in precision and power, and the maximum is found in the unanmous opinion of the whole human race.-"Intellectual Development of Europe."-Draper.

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I deny that there would be wars if the people absolutely governed. I deny that there exists in any country a "dangerous class," if the lust of gold and the lust of power were extinguished in the hearts of the selfish few that have usurped the government of the world and enslaved the peace-loving many. I maintain that the poor workers (like those wantonly shot down at St. Louis) are harmless as the lamb in the presence of the wolf, until driven to frenzy and despair by outrageous oppression; and that armed interference, by the authorities of city or state in the disputes between employers and employed, is unbearable tyranny-the climax of wrong.

The employer calls on the governor for help, and national guards are sent, nominally to "preserve the peace," but really to defeat the workingmen, and for this object alone has the national guard come into existence in the United States.

The king of Great Britain made war upon our fathers, instead of granting them justice. O blind worshipers of force, do not, I entreat, bid defiance to the lessons of history! Whence came the brave men that carried the stars and stripes to triumphant victory in the war of 1776? in that of 1812? and in that of 1861? They came from the farm, forge and factory. Under the burning sun of summer, in the glare of the furnace, and amid the din of machinery, inured to toil— disciplined in the school of labor; behold invincible, incorruptible men -in the grandest sense of the word,

"Men, high-minded men,

With powers as far above dull brutes endued

In forest, brake and den,

As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude;

Men who their duties know,

And know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain,

Prevent the long-aimed blow,

And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain."

II Confidence in the People.

The foundation principle of the American government is confidence in the people. All rights are inalienable that belong to them, including the right "to keep and bear arms." To say that a public officer can declare any right of the many null, is to place him above the people. All officials are their servants. The people are king and lord, and their rights are paramount.

But little by little the power of the people is being undermined and the power of the official class strengthened. The moment the machinery of state, manipulated by the official class, becomes more powerful than the people, will liberty inevitably perish. Hence no standing army can be legally "kept up in time of peace" in any state of the American Union. Hence to disarm the people (the real militia) forbidding them to “parade or drill with arms in their hands, without license of the governor," and at the same time keeping up a standing army of "state regulars" in time of peace, is to strike a dagger deep into Liberty's heart-is revolution.

And right here I indict the monopolies that have grown so great in our country that legislatures, governors, and judges of courts have become their obedient tools-I indict them before the bar of the people for the crime of "conspiracy" to overthrow democratic liberty. I charge them with having already overthrown it in the establishment of a standing army in every state of the union, having clothed the governors with dictatorial powers, and having armed a select band of state regulars, enlisted for five years, paying them to parade and drill

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