Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 35, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 December 1902 — PARAGRAPHIC POINTERS [ARTICLE]

PARAGRAPHIC POINTERS

The Democratic state organ gives os an interior view of its apparatus for manufacturing statistics, when it "saysr "As the Sentinel has shown from Careful estimates of the amount of soot distributed over the north end of the city by the blind asylum smokestack, the daily waste of fuel is $57.43, or in one year $20,955.95." These soot-made statistics are the more appalling in view of the fact that If the state would build a, pipe line to the Sentinel sanctum it would have a ready-to-wear hot-air plant with a source of supply both free and never failing. "The tariff is an issue; it is a live Issue,” remarks the Greeneastle StarPress. From the effect the tariff question has had on the Indiana Democracy every time the party leadership has boldly taken hold of It, it might better be described as a live wire. The New England Anti-Imperialist League met in Boston on December 2nd, “two hundred ladies and gentlemen” being present The most important business transacted was the acknowledgement of a thousand dollar contribution from Mr. Carnegie, and the issuing of a call for more money with which to carry on the work. Next in Importance, probably, was the league’s announcement of its purpose to “destroy the Republican party.” If one . thing was conclusively demonstrated during the last campaign it was that the mythical issue of Imperialism Is a dead one, but If there are two hundred ladies and gentlemen left In New England who want to sit up with the corpse and collect money from Andrew Carnegie and other cheerful givers with a view to providing decent burial, that is their own happiness, and far be It from us to Jostle it.

Professor H. W. Wiley, chief chemist of the department of agriculture, an Indiana man by the way, is giving free meals to a dozen men in Washington for the purpose of trying out some theories of his on the pure food Question, and has had some difficulty In getting volunteers who were willing to be experimented on. If the government at Washington had made its free meal offer under the last tariff reform administration, half the population of the country would hava rushed to the banks of the Potomac.

President Roosevelt’s tariff recommendations have earned the criticism of the newspapers which were active In bringing upon the country the Wil-son-Gorman tariff law and what followed It. Since the country indulged In the tariff reform debauch of 1893 to 1896 it is not inclined to take seriouslv the editors who want the country to take another round of that variety of pleasure.

The Albany Argus Is not pleased with the result of Mr. Hill’s campaign In New York, and has started the cry: “Overboard with our Jonah.” In view of the fact that our Democratic friends do not seem to have any votes to spare, it is perhaps not unkind to suggest that it would be better to hunt for a Moses than for a Jonah, although the Jonahs may be plentifully present and the Moses hard to find.

The Commoner denies that Mr. Bryan sent letters to ills Indiana friends advising them to do things to the state ticket of the Indiana reorganizers, bu.t intimates that his followers in this part of the country knew what to do without it being necessary for him to use any postage stamps In pointing the way. “The harmony in Indiana.” he writes, “was a one-sided affair.” The only way to have two-sided harmony Is for Mr. Bryan to have his way. and for the other fellows to be good. Earthquakes are reported from Guam and the Hawaiian Islands. There is no reason to believe that If our Eastern possessions were seismically shaken off the fttp, Democratic leadership would go Into mourning over the loss of the expansion Issue. In fact, somg of the gentlemen ■who were most vociferous on the subject In the early stages of the present congress, have for some time been looking around furtively In the hope of finding a spot where they might gracefully get off.

"It la beyond quaatlon that the ne*ro la becoming a Tery serious problem la all parta of the country,” aaya the Indianapolis Sentinel. Why not parasaouat the laaue and make the Hon. B. Pitchfork Tillman the peer laaa leader In 1104? The gentleman can carry hla state on this platform, while It has been recently demonstrated that this fa more than Governor Hill, Mayor Johnson, Senator Gorman. General Olney or Cokftiet Bryan can do la their respect)re commonwealths on that or any other issue. The report es State Fish Commlsatoner Z. T. BwSeney of Colnmbus. ■our In press, will he distributed tlmmgh members of t*a legisUtare. ■SOhKM&JStISSSSi ons hundred colored pictures of flah and gains win accompany articles by •pednUsts an banting and Ashing la Indiana. It will dlacass the river and

lake systems of Indiana, baits and teres, hunting dogs, the Audubon society and nature study In the schools. A decision by the supreme court at Washington on the Indiana mortgage deduction law is hoped for during the present term. This law, passed by the Indiana legislature of 1897, and successfully defended by Attorney Genoral Taylor in the courts up to the present time, has benefited 80,000 taxpayers in Indiana who have secured deductions aggregating $40,000,000. Not only has this prevented double taxation of small householders, but It has encouraged persons of moderate means to acquire homes by lifting an unjust burden from their shoulders. An Associated Press dispatch from Mexico City says, in discussing the movement for the abandonment of silver basis in the republic to the south of us: "In one respect the struggle outlined over the gold standard Is one of city against country; the large farmers and planters, it is said, fear the gold standard, even though the present dollars are retained and given an artificial value, will cause a rise in the wages of their laborers, and hence they are strong partisans of silver.” As an interesting bit of history it may be remarked that there is a political leadership still seeking to do business in this country which no longer than two years ago deliberately proposed to put the United States where Mexico is now, from a financial standpoint, on the ground that such action would be In the interests of the wage-earner! A considerable group of these leaders are already trying to forget it, but how long will It be before the American people will be ready to trust a leadership which went so far wrong in 1896 and 1900?

The representatives of British labor unions who have been Investigating industrial conditions in the United States, publish the following conclusions concerning the condition of the American wage-earner: “Counting the extra outlay in rent and clothes — for food and all else are cheaper—the American workman is 25 per cent better off than the workman in England. On the whole he is far better cared for in respect of good sanitation, general comfort and better equipment than we are, and on the whole he lives as long or longer in harness than the English workman. This ‘too old at fifty’ principle does not prevail among the workmen wherever if may be found. We speak from observation. Here pauperism or penury in old age is almost unknown. The records of the English workhouses speak for themselves.”