Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 20, Number 68, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 April 1899 — BOOM IN FULL BLAST. [ARTICLE]

BOOM IN FULL BLAST.

AN INDEX OF UNEXAMPLED PROSPERITY. Dealers in Agricultural Implements Report a Lively Business Throughout the Northwest-Good Times for Farmers —Trusts Should Be Doomed. An index of the unexampled prosperity now inundating the farming regions of the great Northwest is furnished by the lively boom that Is being experienced by dealers in agricultural implements. Last year was an extraordinarily good year for the sale of all kinds of farm machinery. During the previous period of depression there had been a very appreciable check to the normal demand for this class of merchandise. The farmers manifested a disposition to make the old machines do the work and worry along without any expansion of their equipment until better times came. The good times that 'they had been hoping for came shortly after President McKinley’s inauguration. Last year the demand that had been bottled up far five years or thereabouts broke loose. Factories, distributors and dealers were pretty well swamped with orders. Early in the harvest season the manufacturers of harvesters announced that they would be unable to fill any more orders. Had it not been for the slow maturing of the crops In this vicinity serious inconvenience would have been caused by the scarcity of harvesting machines. All lines of farm implement manufacturing shared in the boom.

Being the first year of general buying after several years of economizing it was naturally supposed that 1898 would continue to figure as the high water mark of implement buying for many years of simply normal demand. Particularly was it predicted that the reaction would certainly make this year a poor one in that line of business. These predictions are not going to be verified. The year 1899 is going to set a new high water mark in the agricultural implement trade. Manufacturers and distributors report that so far this year their shipments of farm machinery have been from 20 to 25 per cent larger than in the supposedly banner year of 1898. With good weather and fair crop prospects during the spring the showing will increase rather than diminish during the year. Factories are working day and night to AH the orders that are pouring tn. Distributors have welcomed the late unfavorable weather, for it has given them time to fill orders for machinery to be used in spring work that would otherwise have had to go unfilled. The boom is on in full blast again. It will be a little curious to see how the fellows who insist on trying to construe present conditions into “sham prosperity” will explain this reliable indication of real prosperity among the farmers of the Northwest The theory that was applied to the wage raising movement—that it was a bribe to labor tendered by the trusts—will hardly hold good in this case.—Sioux City Journal. All Volunteer* Can Come Home. President McKinley has administered a crushing blow to all the anti-adminis-tration howlers, in his order that all the volunteer soldiers who desire to leave the service must be promptly given discharge. The treaty with Spain has finally been concluded, and on the very day the ratification of the peace treaty occurred all the army commanders were notified that the war with Spain has been settled with a treaty of peace and all the volunteer soldiers in Cuba, Porto Rico, the Philippines and elsewhere, who desire to return home must be honorably discharged from the army with the least possible delay. President McKinley has kept faith with the people and with the soldiers. The order for the discharge of all the volunteer soldiers who desire to return home is sufficient explanation of the reason why the regular army has been rushed to the Philippines during the past three months, and still further proof of the President’s never varying desire to carry the will of the people into effect—Des Moines Register.

Bryan tn Hl* Blindness. Little wonder is it that the Jeffersonian Democrats of the East are calling for a new party leader with the courage of his convictions and intelligence to grasp the difficulties of the present situation. Little wonder is ft that the disciples of Jefferson and Jackson repudiate the leadership of Bryan when he poses as a nerveless demagogue, as he did at Milwaukee. Mr. Bryan is trying to commit the Democratic party to an out-and-out anti-annexation policy. If be is to make the platform and be the Presidential candidate of bis party in 1900 the Democrats will enter the campaign antagonizing the principles and policy of Jefferson and devoid of the sturdy Americanism of Jackson.—Chicago Inter Ocean. Trust* Are Everywhere. There are trusts in Germany, Austria, Italy and Russia, as well as every other country which has great industries or natural resources valuable enough to attract large sums of capital in their development. The trusts are doing more damage in some of those countries than they are doing here. Nevertheless the Republican party will keep up its warfare on the trusts. It has been fighting them from the day they first made their appearance. It is the only party which has had either the courage or the intelligence to strike a blow at the illegitimate practices of the combines and to restrict them in their operations. It is a satisfaction, therefore, for the country to know that as the Republican party is going to remain in control of the nation for years to come its vigor-

ous and practical work In maintaining the people’s interests In this as in till other fields will be kept up.—Bt MM Globe-Democrat _ to Dowa with th* Trust*. Trusts can be formed in any ctvflisMP country. There are trusts in England, where free trade is one of the of the government Trusts can flAurlsb in those countries which • use diver money as well as in those countries where gold is the only standard of value. AU trusts were conceived and organized in selfishness. The first trust brought together producers, cheapened the cost of manufacture, and increased? the profits of the men concerned. The march of invention, of new processes, has invariably been faster than has been the lowering of the price of the finished product to the people. To say that trusts have reduced the prices of manufactures is to state a thing which is false. Trusts take refuge behind this lie in order to justify themselves in the opinion of the people. Trusts are organized for the purpose st Increasing profits. Products would Mg cheaper to-day if there were no trusts. I A hundred competing factories are better for the people than is one corpora* tion which controls or operates five hundred factories. Recently trusts have been created for purposes of speculation. A great many 1 men have become rich in this way dtSS Ing the past year. The losses which are inevitable wifi fall to those who? are caught with watered shares in their possession. All trusts, therefore, are harmful to the people. All trusts are created in order that the people may be robbed in one way or another. The only course open to the several States | and to the United States is to destroy the trusts. The Republican party leads in reforms. The Republican party should make immediate and relentless war upon trusts. The Republican platform in Ohio this year should be built upon this idea. The Republican Congress which will meet next December should take up the trust question at once. Mr. 1 1 McKinley should be renominated and re-elected on the declaration that aB trusts are dangerous, dishonest, and must be destroyed. The fight should be | hard and fierce. Down with the trusts! —Cleveland Leader. Prosperity I* General. M The general advance in wages Is aa evidence that prosperity has become general instead of being confined to eer- ' tain classes. It may be that the workingmen. of the country are in no better condition than they were in former years, so far as wages are concerned, for the advance in the cost of living, may have been equal to the advance in wages. Still, they are in much better condition in other ways. Where two; years ago hundreds of thousands of workingmen were idle, they are now employed, and their wages have kept ' pace with the increased cost of living. This is evidence of general prosper*! ity, for the advance in nearly all commodities has benefited the producers, especially the great mass of American producers, the farmers. If this increased cost of living had not been followed by an advance fn| wages, prosperity would have been one-sided and oppressive to the work- ? ingman. As it is, all are now prospering together and in like degree. Theg advance agent did not belie his show. | Everything advertised on the bffl»| has been exhibited.—Tacoma (Wash.) Ledger. A Wonderfully Good Record. . Last week’s statement of business failures in the United States was ths| best made in a long time. Many other weeks this year have shown remarkable improvement compared with the good conditions existing in 1898, but last week was a record-breaker. In the corresponding part of last year the number of failures reported to R. G. Dun & Co. was 232. The latest figures are only 141. The decrease, for a single week, is 109. That Is a falling - off of no less than'47 per cent. It is at the rate of about 5,700 failures in » ; year. Such figures are nothing less than the evidence of a revolution In busL| ness conditions, and it must be borne in mind that the state of trade and industry was not bad a year ago. The rate of improvement is the most extra- j ordinary which can ba found, taking into account the comparative good conditions which existed in 1898. Tho| present state of business is excellent and the outlook is good. Trust* and the Tariff, The craze for trusts Is great growing. Their own future as well as j their effect upon the Industrial and commercial world is something which cannot yet be foreseen with anything like certainty. If they shall prove to be as bad in fact as they are in the anttelpa-1 tlons of many persons, and in popular opinion, generally, there is no doubt j that the American people wffl find remedy for them. But the man whol knows that there are more trusts with-1 out protection of their products in tb»| tariff law than there are with such pro-I tection, and who still contends that the ; remedy for trusts is to take away the protective tariff, is a demagogue, whos?4 the man who believes that any politicall party is responsible for the system has a ready-made remedy for its evils « should begin his work of reform at the primaries in voting for men whom h*rj is sure are wiser than himself.—Milwaukee Sentinel. Relative Importance. Many of the free-traders say that the Dingley law has been ' 9 • Jr**'