Confiscation | Page 6

naked savage has found that it is a good thing to have
something to sell, and our agriculturists are brought into competition
with territory the New World over where a plow or harvester was
unknown ten years ago; instead of having a monopoly in the European
markets, as was the case a few years ago, where they could dispose of
their surplus, they are now compelled to feed it to their hogs, which, as
a source of profit, ranks even now with the thing they are fed on.
But we are not depending on foreign markets for enough to eat and
wear. Those things are here, not there. We may have lost the foreigner
as a customer, but what prevents us from eating that which he refuses
to buy. We look back a hundred or more years, and cry out in horror at
the inhumanity of those then in power, in allowing human beings to be
burned alive and living creatures to be torn to pieces on the rack. Those
who will look back to these times will be no less astounded at the
inhumanity and imbecility of those now in power in allowing starvation
while food is actually rotting for the want of consumers. The question,
then, is, can we not formulate a policy that will work harmoniously
throughout the whole country for the benefit of all sections and every
individual? Can we not find some way out of the swamp into which the
masterful greed of a few and the dense stupidity of their legislative
tools have mired us?
If we cannot, then let us submit, with the best grace possible to our
masters who know how to lay on the lash when their dividends are at
stake.
The resources of the United States have hardly been touched upon; but
in less than a hundred years individual greed has done its work, and the
people are bankrupt. They have been legislated out of everything, and
the one function of our government, as at present conducted, is to see

that this legislation is enforced. Yes, it is beyond the reach of
contradiction that this government, that was founded in the interests of
All, has degenerated into a merciless taskmaster, ever ready to beat into
submission the slaves of the country, when their few owners give the
word.
But this treatment should be expected. It goes with ownership. Give me
the ownership of men, and all else goes with the title - how I shall
clothe, feed, and lodge them, and how I shall keep them on the grind.
Of course, the wise ones will say, Was it not our own chosen
representatives who made all those laws that gave our resources and the
people themselves over to the favored few, and must not we, the
principals, grin and bear it, and live up to whatever contracts those
representatives, our agents, made in our name?
It is not, however, how we were despoiled, but how we are to recover
the plunder, that is interesting us just now. Is there a way out of the
night of despair? is the question that should be met, and, if possible,
answered. Finding a way out of a difficulty is one thing, however, and
having the courage to take it is another. Modern surgery has discovered
much, but without the courage to use the knife mankind would not have
been the gainer. The prayer meeting has its uses, but those who expect
to obtain political or industrial deliverance in that quarter can set out
their rain-gauges and go there; but those who know the nature of the
fellow who has been grabbing all in sight will make him let go in the
old-time way by using a force superior to his own - a force that he will
feel when it comes down, supposing the power to feel is left in him.
We have no hatred of the rich - nor love of the poor, for that matter.
They are both fishers for gain, and one gets it, and the other don't; but
his basket is just as large. But we are a lover of justice, and if one is too
much for the other would handicap him, and thereby make the struggle
for existence more even for both. The weakling, will always be a
weakling, whatever laws are passed for his benefit, and the drudgery of
the world will ever be his portion; from it he can never escape, but he is
entitled to his life, and if the able denies him, what is necessary to it,
then Justice must step in and take his part.
Volumes could be padded in showing how this can be done, but we can
demonstrate in this brief work how poverty can be obliterated as a
feature of