Rensselaer Union, Volume 6, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 December 1873 — Are We Verging Upon Revolution? [ARTICLE]

Are We Verging Upon Revolution?

/ Is Tt*not a remarkable circumin this land of plenty ; and saloon alter reaping an immense harvest people should be suffering for bread? Only a month has passed Since, al the suggestion of bur President, a day was universaUy observed by the people of the United Str.tes as a season of thanksgiving and prayer to Almighty God for His many blessings to us as a pec pie during the past year, prominent among which was a bountyful harvest that had filled the land with an abundance for man and his domestic animals.— Scarcely have the triumphant notes of gladness ceased to issue from costly organs and chase the echoes from carved pillars, down carpeted aisles, and over softly cushioned seats, in the gorgeous churches whtre meek and humble worshippers come cloth'-d in elegant silks and fine broadcloths to lift up fcontnte hearts in devout adoration to Deity for the loving kindness which places the good things of life within reach of the families of stock and gold gamblers, national bank officers, railroad kings, protected manufacturers, high government officials, members of congress, editors and proprietors of city journals that receive government patronage or are subsidized by capitalists, and of popular ministers whose characters are like gilded tombs —scarcely have these people digested their stuffed tnrkey and recovered from the exhileration of the champaign with which their dinners were swallowed, than a piteous wail for bread comes from the famishing thousands next street.

Congressional committees consume hour after hour trying to devise ways to furnish cheap transportation to Eastern markets for the surplus products of the West. Meetings of producers are held in various parts of the country, to try and solve the same great problem. Newspapers and wise men throughout the land have turned their attention to unraveling this vexing riddle, and discussions of it are heard on every side. There is more meat and breadstuff in the great Mississippi valley than people know what to do with, yet from the midst of this abundance the cry of thousands comes up that they are starving, though surrounded by vast store houses literally bursting apart with their weight of pork, beef, flour and grain. They can get no employment, and have no money to buy the food they actually need, and which begs, a market. At Cincinnati, Indianapolis and Chicago immense meetings were held last week by people thrown out of employment and without money, who came to discuss how they are to live through the winter. Each of these meetings was attended by thousands who said they were pressing closely upon the verge of starvation. What cause has produced this condition of suffering? Who are to blame for it? What is the remedy, and how should it be applied? Something must be done speedily to relieve this distress else there will be riot and bloodshed, for people cannot long endure starvation. Such immense demonstrations are not prompted by mere curiosity, but a more powerful and relentless force is behind. These men are not the class who meet to make speeches, pass resolutions and nominate candidates for office. No trivial or ordinary occasion will bring them together in such numbers as attended these meetings. They are men commencing to get hungry; people whose children begin to cry for bread; men whose wives are becoming faint and sick from fasting; they are industrious poor people who are refused work and have no money with which to pay rent or buy clothing, fuel and food. They met to counsel with one another and discuss what they shall do under the circumstances. American laboring classes are better educated than their European cousins; they reason more and act less from impulse; they feel they have a voice in making and executing the laws, consequently they hold them in more sacred respect. But hunger and civilization do not flourish together. The disposition of hunger is much the same the world over, whether it is exemplified in man or beast Ferocity w its companion wherever it dwells. Civilization makes men slow to commit violence, but starvation is more powerful than civilization, and when it goads its victims to madoew their fury is demoniacal

Large numbers of men will not starve to death within reach of food without struggling for life. Such meetings as those held last week in the cities which may be called national granaries and pork houses, are gathering clouds that may presage terrific storms.

It is not meet for Congressmen to wrangle long in order to secure themselves prinqely salaries when tax-payers want bread. It is not right for the President of a democratic republic to be. paid five dollars an hour, while the wives and children of those who elected him are starving. Capital must harken to the appeals of Labor for food when pinching times prevail in the midst ot plenty, if it would rest secure among its possessions. If. wealthy monopolies in America, which have grown up under the fostering care of tariff laws and all manner of special legislation, now mean to refuse work at living wages to the poor man whom they have deceived with specious sophisms about the benefits and constant, liberal wages which a protective policy would assure him, let them collect their valuables and find a safe retreat until the storm breaks and spends its ungovernable fury. Bread meetings are sometimes forerunners of bread riots. Bread riots under circumstances now prevailing here in the West may indicate either that Capital is unjust towards Labor, that unwise statesmanship disturbs the relations of society, that the administration of government is profligate or corrupt, or that there is a combination of these evils afflicting the people.— The trouble may be corrected by reformation or revolution. In a republic, reformations can usually be effected through the ballot box; but bread riots are often indications of approaching revolution. Are we verging upon such a calamity?