Democratic Sentinel, Volume 13, Number 31, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 August 1889 — ORDINANCE. [ARTICLE]

ORDINANCE.

An Ordinance regulating the sale of goods, wares, and merchandise by transient merchants within the corporate limits of the Town of Bensseloer, Indiana, and declaring an emergency: Section I. Be it ordained by the Board of Trustees of the Town of Rensselaer, Jasper county, Indiana, at a regular meeting held in the Town Hall in said Town, August 12th, 1889: That it shall be unlawful for any non-resident, transient merchant to sell, or offer to sell any goods, wares or merchandise of any kind whatsoever, within the corporate limits of said Town of Rensselaer, without first procuring of the Town Clerk a license to sell or offer to sell said YOods, wares, or merchandise as bes re said, a»d shall at the same time pay to the Treasurer of said Town the sum of $2 for license to sell one day; $lO to sell one week; $25 to sell one month; SIOO to sell six months. Any person violating any of lhe provisions of this section shall upon conviction be fined in any sum not exceeding $lO for each offense. Section 11. A transient merchant is a person, or firm of persons who come into the town with a cheap lot of goods, or has said goods shipped into the town before or after his arrival in said Town, and sells the same, or offers to sell the same without paying any taxes, license, or other fees *or said privilege, and then in a few days, weeks or months leaves +he town and goes to another.— One who has no fixed, or permanext abiding place. Section 111, An emergency exists for the immediate taking effect of this ordinance, therefore the same shall be in force from and after its passage.

When tbe Republican party fastened upon the eountoy the high protective tariff which is productive of the stnks, lock-outs and distress now so prevalent over the land, the results of which is proving so disastrous as to alarm the leaders of that party to tuch an extent as to raise the probabil ity that Congress wdl be called in extra session to revise that policy? it was opposed by all true Democrats and the effect as now witnessed accurate ly predicted. Tariff reform! is now, and has been for many years the battle-

cry of the Democratic party. — The above tariff bill—or ordinance, if you please- meets with its un » reserves condemnation, and -o far as we can learn has but few defenders in the republican ranks in this locality. If it were designed only for the purpose of raising revenue for the corporation the inten would not be so bad, even though that power is vested in no body except Congress, but when it assumes the proportions of a “protective” instrument it assumes a force which Democratic platforms have time and again deried to be within the power of even Congress to give.— It is class legislation insofar as it assumes to tax a “person, or firm of persons who eotae into the town with a cheap lot of goods, * * and sells the same, or offers to sell the same,’’etc., * * “and then in a few days, weeks or months eaves the town and goes to another.” It do?s not say “inferior” goods, but “cheap”, and is designed te increase the prices to those charged by competitors already in business —thus taxing the many consumers for the benefit of a :ew. Again, the definition of a “transient merchant”, as defined >y the ‘ordinance’, s» ction 2, will not apply to a “person, or firm of persons who come to the town with a lot” of goods marked up to or over the prices charged by “permanent” merchants. It is a tariff —a tax on the consumer, and is calculated to impress more directly upon the minds of our people the abominable character of the laws of similar import enacted by Congress.

Slippers 10 cents per pair, up; children’s shoes 25 cents per pair, up; women’s kid shoes, silk-work?d button holes, 75 cents per pair up; men’s congress she es $1 per pa.r, up; boots $1.50 per pair up. Chicago Bargain Store. Down in Posey county and other parts of the state, the farmers have foi med an ssociation for the purpose of securing their groceries and goods’at reduced prices. They arrange with a certain dealer to furnish what they want at a very sm >ll profit and reserve the right to inspect his books and invoice sheets to make certain that he jis carrying out his part of the agreement. This arrangement, while beneficial to the farmeis generally, works disaster on other dealers than the one who enters the combmation. There is much complaint about it and some anxiety is manifested, lest such associations become general. We presume that farmers have as much right t y organize for self-protec-tion as any other class of people and since we have the twine trust, the sugar trust the merchant’s trust, the butcher’s trust, the miller’s association and a hundred other similar combinations it seems to be high time that the farmers were beginning to look out for themselves. The whole system of - trusts, however, is

wrong and is the outgrowth of our pernicious policy of high tariff or protection for the few. Under the stimulus of a highly protective tariff our manufacturing and other interests have grown so enormously that the market for manufacture ed products have become overstocked and as a consequence these combinations are formed in order to limit the production and maintain prices. Other industry s, catching the spirit of the times, also organize for the protection and advancement of their particular business until to-day the vast conmereial intercourse of this country is carried on by means of hese combined influences. Hereofore the farmer has stood alone,

the isolated victim, the prev to the combined onslaught of every other business. He has been fleeced when selling and gouged when buying. Is it any wonder that growing restless under such a systematic assault he should become tir. d and cast about for spme means of self-protection? Unless our business system soon changes we shall expect to see the farmers controlling the market for their products, fixing their own prices on what [they stipulating what they will pay for what they buy, just as other industries have been doing for years. —Exchange. Tha high protective duties imposed through the instrumentality of republican legislation, in its creation of trusts, increasing the cost of living, reducing the wages of labor and farm products, is fast bringing about a state of things that wilt recoil with disastrous effect upon the authors and upholde s of the system, unless a backward step is taken. The burdens imposed by the government upon the masses, in the interest of the few, are already too great. Town corporations should be exceedingly careful ’ not to impose additional tax in order to keep up prices, else they may precipitate the policy alluded to in the above as having been organized in Posey county. “It is said, “A word to to the wise as sufficient.” Women’s hand-turned shoes; men’s kangaroo, dongola and calf shoes, all standard brands, a specialty at the Chicago Bargain Store.