Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 22, Number 101, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 September 1901 — HOW THEY HURT ’EM. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

HOW THEY HURT ’EM.

HARD BLOWS DEMOCRATS INFLICTED ON TRUSTS Party of the “Peepnl” Landed Very Violently on Corporate Wealth and Power When It Wat in Power—or Klee It Didn’t 1 Didn’t the Democrats hit the trusts hard when they weije in.power? Didn’t they hit the whisky trust when they extended the time for paying the ninety million dollars taxes due the government? Didn’t they lam it to the, sugar trust when they dallied with the tariff bill until the trust had scraped tlje earth for raw sugar and brought it In free under the McKinley bIU? Didn’t they sock It to the trusts again when they repeated the anti-trust provision of the McKinley bill which imposed a fine not exceeding $5,000 on persons convicted of entering into a trust, and then enacted an anti-trust law that prescribed no penalty against trusts, except among Importers, who are not organised and never have been? Don’t they make the trusts tremble when they assert that only the protective tariff fosters them, while it Is known that trusts are organized and flourish in free trade England? Qon’t they land another staggering blow, to the trust octopus when they threaten to bust It, when It is known that their national chairman, James K, Jones, belongs to one of the biggest trusts in America? Didn’t they hit the Ohio trusts hard when they denounced them in their platform in 1899 and thefl weut to Washington, D. C., and picked out the rankest monopolist and trust stock owner to run for Governor? Didn’t the New York Democracy present a fine spectacle as a trust fighter with a ringleader whole pack criminally connected with the American ice trust? Didn't Chairman Jones land another broadside into the octopus when he offered an amendment to the Porto Rican tariff bill to return the duties on sugar imported from that Island to the person from whom they were collected, which would have put over $600,000 back into the bands of the sugar trust? —Bridgeton (N. J.) Pioneer. Sarcantic Uncle Sam. I found Uncle Sam In a variety of moods this week. He had been reading a lot of clippings from the freetrade papers. “I don’t know whether to laugh or get mad,” he said, as he rather angrily threw the stuff one side. “I don’t suppose it does much harm, but I do get provoked sometimes at the free-trade trust and its organs. I don’t like to believe these folks are dishonest and malicious, and they can’t be ignorant. I wonder if they really want to get me into trouble again just as I am enjoying the best and most prosperous years of my existence. It does seem as if there were always a few folks who must eternally be stirring up things. It’s always been the way from the Nul--11 tiers to the Antis. No one knows what the Almighty made snakes and potato bugs and mosquitoes for. I suppose it’s so the millennium wouldn’t come too soon. These free-traders really ought to have a corner of the earth to themselves, where they couldl>e in hot water all the time. They evidently have no fear of the hereafter; it would be so in keeping with the temperature they like here. I‘would like to spend a few years in peace. There will be no need of general tariff changes for years. The Diugley law is working like a book, and I don’t want business disturbed for ten years at least. I rather guess It won’t be either, if Bryan has his way. ’Why, he is the best friend we have, when you tliluk it all over. If he only keeps the free-traders from coming into power, he ought to have a monument as high as Washington’s. That man is preserving the country, if you only look at it that way.” “You seem rather sarcastic. Uncle Sam,” I observed. “Nothing of the kind,” he replied. “That fellow Bryan Is a rank freetrader. He wanted the job of being my jnanager. I don’t blame him for that. It’s a worthy ambition for any man. But Bryan didn’t go about it right. He knew he couldn’t be elected on a free-trade issue, so he hollers for free silver. That didn’t work, and he then hollers anti-imperialism, whatever that is. And that didn’t work. Now the Democrats have found out their mistake and want to shelve him, and he threatens to break up the show. I’d make a pretty emperor, wouldn’t I? Gosh! Imagine me walking around with a crown upon my forehead. No! I’ll stick to the old tile. But these freetraders remember that the only Issue they’ve won in forty years is the tariff, and they think they can work the stuff over in new form and dish it up. But the people got 90 nauseated with It the last time they ate it that they don’t want to even taste it now. If the truth were known the cooks themselves don’t want to eat their own broth. I don’t blame ’em, either. It’s pretty thin stuff for these times.” “What do you attribute ns their motive or reason?” I asked. “No motive, no reason; pure cussedness. It’s been in the race since the garden of Eden, and I guess we’ll always have the varmints with ps. Some of ’em good men, too. Fact is, they're too good for this earth; can almost see wings sprouting on some of ’em," and the old man walked away with a half* concealed leok of contempt on his usually good-natured face. No Note of Deopalr. One fact In connection with the recent drought must bare struck even the most casual observer of passing event*. In all the accounts that have come from tbs West of crops burned up and ex-

pectations disappointed ihere has been no note of despair. No fact indicates the great advance the country has made during the past five years more than this does. Let any one imagine, If he can, the result of such a drought as that just ended coming in 1895. The country was then laboring under the disasters brought on by Grover Cleveland’s low tariff policy. The production of manufactures had been cut down in every direction. and in some instances it had ceased entirely. If a long-continued and widespread drought had occurred in the summer of 1895 the loss and suffering entailed would have been almost incalculable. It would have needed years to recover from it. ‘ Now, thanks to five years of protection, the country is rich. If has a large reserve force which it can draw upon in case of need. Consequently the loss In crops by the recent drought will not mean a reduction to poverty as It would have done in 1895, but only a reduction of the expected deposit in the savings bank by the farmer and the workingman. This can be borne without complaint. And that is why there Is no note of despair in Western comment on the drought.—Philadelphia Press. stalwart Hepnblicaniam. The work of the lowa State convention must be viewed with satisfaction by loyal and thinking Republicans all over the nation. It nominate! strong and clean men for the various State offices. Its platform is a clear-cut, progressive statement of Republican principles. The convention justly congratulated Congress upon its currency legislation and upon its dealings with Porto Rico, Cuba and the Philippines. “The policy of this government toward the islands,” it said, “has followed inevitably upon our expulsion of the authority of Spain. It has been dictated by the conditions present, has been consistent with the spirit of the constitution, and the paramount consideration has been to secure the lasting welfare of these peoples whose fortunes and destinies have become in a large degree dependent upon us.” The convention indorsed the policy of protection as the foundation of our industrial and financial independence, but it also recognized that that policy is a practical one whose applications must change with circumstances, and Indorsed “the policy of reciprocity as the natural complement of protection, and urge its development as necessary to the realization of our highest commercial possibilities.” In its declarations concerning so-call-ed “trusts” the conventioir recognized them as useful instruments for the nation’s Industrial advancement, but asserted, “the right residing in the people to enforce such regulations as will protect the Individual and society from abuse of the power which great combinations of capital wield.” No thinking observer of Industrial progress could ask for more. None interested in combinations can find the lowa attitude unfair or oppressive. The lowa convention has spoken clearly, fairly, and worthily of a great Republican State. While the contest for the various nominations was keen, it was without rancor. The lowa Republicans have preserved their old and commendable habit of doing all their fighting before the nominations. Uinted and harmonious, ably led, advocating principles that appeal to every loyal and fair-minded American, the Republican party in lowa enters upon the campaign with the best prospects. —Chicago Inter Ocean. Carpet* and the Tariff. In the natural course of events the tariff schedules- will from time to time need modifying. But those who profess to believe that the modification should-consist in a complete elimination of the protective principle should take note of testimony given before the United States Industrial Commission in New York the other day, when the following facts were shown: In 1870, 90 per cent of the carpets used in the United States was Imported. At the present time 90 per cent is made at home, and the value of the American output Is $75,000,000 annually. Every housekeeper knows that since the home Industry was established carpets have Improved in quality and faJUeu in prices, while at the same time a great wage-distributing enterprise lins been established. There is nothing in these’ facts that should cause carpet buyers, or owners of carpet factories, or workers therein, to look with flavor on propositions to take protection out of the tariff.—Rochester Democrat and Chronicle. A Pronperlty Hllhonette.

WanteJ—A Psnlc. ' It is enough Jo say of the Ohio Demo* oratlc platform that It favors “the abolition of the so-caJled protective system and the substitution In, Its place of the traditional Democratic policy of a tariff for revenue,” The people have not forgotten the Wilson-Gorman tariff and Its period of calamity.—St. Louis Globe-Democrat.