People's Pilot, Volume 6, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 September 1896 — The Farm Renter in Mexico . [ARTICLE]

The Farm Renter in Mexico .

The following is taken from the letter of the Chicago Record’s special correspondent, Trumbull White, now traveling in Mexico for- the purpose of discovering the actual condition of affairs there. Mr. White is a free silver man and his companion, William E. Curtis, is a gold man, and their letters appear alternately each day. The following was written Sept, 9th, and was published Sept. 19 th: “There is one element of the farming population of the United States that has been a little uncertain where it stood during recent seasons. The farm renter paying cash rent, has been finding himself at the end of the year with little left for his own profit, if indeed he was able to pay the rent at all, and support 'himself. I had a particular wish to learn the condition of farm renters in this state, and found a surprise in the ccmparison. I, sought specific cases which could be investigated, rather than generalities. ' “Senor Susano Ortiz resigned his position as an officer in the Mexican army ten years ago, after honorable service. As he expresses it, at that time he had no resources and nothing ip the world except his horse, his sword, his revolver and $7,000 of debts. He rented a farm near Durango, and in less than five years he had paid all his debts and-had $20,000 in cash. He is now making about $4,000 a year profit on his rented farm. He has between 400 and 500 acres, eight miles from Durango, and for it he pays a yearly cash rent of S6OO. He devotes himself to crops of corn and chili. “F. J. Bradley, an American, has a farm containing 300 acres of tillable land and considerable pasture land just outside the city limits of Durango. For it he pays SI,OOO a year cash rent. In the five years that he has occupied it he has saved $15,000 from his crops of corn and potatoes and from the stock he has raised. But of course it must be remembered that these savings are in Mexican dollars. /“In this state it is becoming very common for peons to rent tracts of ten or twenty ac«es from the haciendada by whom they have been employed, paying a rental in a share of the crop. In numerous such instances they have not only made a living, but have and gained independence. In this way the next class upward is continually being recruited from the peon class, and it is but fair to say that by such accretions the entire general level of the people is being slowly but certainly raised.”

Gold will fall in value to its natural level, and silver will rise to its old bullion value of $1.29 per ounce the moment the mints are opened equally to both gold and silver. The anti-silver man asks the farmer how he is going to get the silver dollar after the miner has got it coined. Ask the a.s.m. if he thinks the silver miner lives on rarified atmostphere. These excursions on free railroad passes to the republican shrine at McKinley’s home, reminds us of the pilgrimages in India to see and fall under the wheels of the great juggernaut. All the bonds of the United States are payable in coin, gold or silver, and if Bryan is elected they will be paid according to the contract.

General Grant said that the great war debt should be paid in silver and that it depended upon the American miner to produce it from the mountain. It is worth a railroad employee’s job to be caught without a McKinley button on his coat and a McKinley picture in in his front window. In free silver Mexico a pair of good shoes, made to measure, cost but $4, and wear well. The same shoes in gold standard United States cost $6. The Gold Standard Conspirators ''have their lieutenants at work in every school district. ‘ The gold of the world can be cornered by the Rothschilds in 24 hours, and they have done it. It costs nothing to travel if you happen to be a railroad employee on a pilgrimage (compulsory) to Canton, O. Clothings made to order in Mexico are cheaper than in the United States; are made of better material and wear longer. Nearly all the gold in the world is held in banks, all under the control of the Rothschilds and and their great banking combi--nation.