Newspapers / Hickory Democrat (Hickory, N.C.) / Dec. 6, 1906, edition 1 / Page 4
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' PRESIDENTS ETC. Continued from page 1. and effective way possible. ~»ut so jar as possible the abuse cf the if » power should be provided against ,by P some such law as I advocated last |T year. Lynching. In connection with the delays of | the law, I call your attention and the attention of the Nation to the pre valence of crime among us, and above all to the epidemic of lynching and mob violence that springs up, 1; now in one part of our country, now in another. Each section, North, South, East, or West, has its own t* faults; no section can with wisdom spend its time jeering at the faults of another section; it should be busy I ■ trying to amead its own shortcom ings. To deal with the crime of cor | ruption it is necessary to have an awakened public conscience, and to supplinient this by whatever legisla tion will add speed and certainty in the execution of the law. When we deal with lynching even more is necessary. A great many white men are lynched, but the crime is pecu . .liarly frequent in respect to black men. The greatest existing cause ot ' lynching is the perpetration, especial ' ly by black men, of the hideous crime t of rape—the most abominable in all the category of crimes, even worse than murder. Mobs frequently avenge "the commission of this crime by themselves torturing to death tl\e man committing it; thus avenging in | bestial fashion a bestial deed, and reducing themselves to a level with the criminal. Lawlessness grows by wnat it ' feeds upon; and when mobs begin I to lynch for rape they speedily ex- P tend the sphere of their operations and lynch for many other kinds ol crimes, so that two-thirds of the I lynchings are not for rape at all; while a considerable proportion of | the individuals lynched are innocent " cf all crimes. Governor Candler, of Georgia, stated on one occasion some years ago: "I can say of a verity that I have, within the, last month, saved the lives of half a dozen inno cent negroes who were pursued by s the mob, and brought Hhem to trial \ in a court of a law in which they were acquitted." As Bishop Gallo way, of Mississippi, has finely said: "When the rule of a mob obtains, that which distinguishes a high civi lization is surrendered. The mob | which lynched a negro charged with rape will in a little while* lynch a white man suspected of crime. Every I Christian patriot in America needs to lift up his voice in loud and eter |. i-al protest against the mob spirit v that is threatening the integrity ot 1 this Republic." Governor Jelks, ot Alabama, has recently spoken as follows: "The lynching of any person lor whatever crime is inexcusable tnywhere—it is. a' defiance of orderly , government; but the killing of in | nocent people under any provocation is infinitely more horrible; and yet innocent people are likely to die when a mob's terrible lust is once , aroused. The lesson is this: No good citizen can afford to countenance a deflnance of the statutes, no matter ■what the provocation. The innocent frequently suffer, and, it is my ob servation, more usually suffer than the guilty. The white people of the South indict the whole colored race on the ground that even the better elements lend no assistance what ever in ferreting out criminals of their own color. The responsible colored people must learn not to har- their criminals, but to assist the officers in bringing them to justice.. | This is the larger crime, and it pro vokes such atrocious offenses as the one at Atlanta. Tthe two races can never get on until there is an under standing on the part of both to make common cause with the law-abiding against criminals of any color." Moreover, where any crime com mitted by a member of one race against a member of another race is avenged in such fashion that it seems, "a? if not the individual criminal, but the whole race, is attacked, the re v suit is to exasperate to the highest degree race feeling. There is but one h'.cafe rule in dealing with black men as with white men; it is the same 1 ;ule that must be applied in dealing with rich men and poor men; that is, to treat each man, whatever his coior, his creed, or his social position, with even-handed justice on his real worth a? a man. V/hite people owe it quite as much to themselves as to the colored race to treat well the colored [ man who' shows by his life that he deserves such treatment; for it is surely the highest wisdom to en courage in the colored race all those I individuals who are honest, industri ous, law-abiding, and who therefore ■■k; makes good and safe neighbors and V 1 citizens. Reward or punish the indi- I 1 vidual on his merits as an individual. J I Evil will surely come in the end to [/ both races if we substitute for this If just rule the habit of treating all the L ■■■, members of the race, good and bad.i £ alike. There is no question of "socia'' equality" or "negro domination" in * volved; only the question of relent f lessly punishing bad men, and ot I tecuring to, the good man the right to his life, his liberty, and the pur suit of his happiness as his own qual itles of heart, head, and hand enablf him to achieve it. Every colored man should realize | that the worst enemy of his race is j; the negro criminal, and above all thf liCgro criminal who commits the dreadful crime of rape; and it should be felt as in the highest degree an m offense against the whole country f and against the colored race in par ticular, for a colored man to fail tt I help the officers of the law in hunt I* ing down with all possible earnest- IJ ,neES and zeal every such infamous offender. Moreover, in my judgment, K the crime of rape should always be Ili punished with death, as is the case |M with murder; assault with intent to cemmit rape should be made a capit- • al crime, at least in the discretion of , the court; and provision should be made by which the punishment may follow immediately upon the heels of the offense; while the trial should be so conducted that the victim reed not be wantonly shamed while giving testimony, and that the least possible publicity shall be given to the details. The members of the white race cn the other hand should understand that every lynching represents by just so much a loosening of the bands of civilization; that .the lynch ing inevitably throws into promi nence in the community all the foul and evil creatures who dwell therein. No man can take pait in the torture of a human being without having Lis own moral nature permanently lowered. Every lynching means just so much moral deterioration in all the children who have any knowledge ot it, and therefore just so much ad citional trouble for the next genera tion of Americans. Let justice be both sure and swift; but let it be justice under the law, and not the wild and crooked savag ery of a mob. There is another matter which las a direct bearing upon this matter of lynching and of the brutal crime which sometimes calls it. forth and at other times merely furnishes the excuse for its existence. It is out of the question for our people as a whole permanently to rise by tread ing down any of their own number. Even those who themselves for the moment profit by such maltreatment of their fellows wnl in the long run a'so suffer. No more shortsighted policy can be imagined than, in the fancied interest of one class, to prevent the education of another class. The free public school, the chance for the boy or the girl to get a good elementary education, lies at the foundation of our whole political situation. In every community the poorest citizens, those who need the schools most, would be derived ot them if they only received school fa cilities proportioned to the taxes they paid. This is as true erf one portion of our country as of another. K is as true for the negro as for the white man. The white man, if he is wise, v, ill decline to allow the negroes in a mass to grow to manhood and wo manhood without education. Unques tionably education such as is obtained in our public schools does not do good citizen; but it does much. The lowest and most brutal criminals, those for instance who commit the crime of rape, are in a great major ity men who have had either no education or very little; just as they tre almost invariably men who own no property; for the man who puts money by out of his earnings, like the man who acquires education, is usually lifted above mere brutal criminalty. Of course the best type of education for the colored man, taken as a whole, is such education .is is conferred in schools like Hamp ton and Tuskegee; where the boys and girls, the young men and young Tomen, are trained industrially as well as in the ordinary public school branches. The graduates of these schools turn out well in the great majority of cases, and hardly any of them become criminals, while what little criminality there is never takes the form of brutal violence which in vites lynch law. Every graduate ot these schools —and for the matter of that every other colored man or woman —who leads a life so useful and honorable as to win the good will and respect of those whites whose neighbor he or she is, thereby helps the whole colored race as it can be helped in no other way; for next to the negro himself, the man who can c!o most to help the negro'is his white neighbor who lives near him; and our steady effort should be to better the relations between the two. Great tho the benefit of these schools has been to their colored pupiis and to the colored people, it may well be questioned whether the benefit has not been at least as great to the white people among whom these colored pupils live after they grad uate. Be it remembered, therefore, that the individuals who, whether from lolly, from evil temper, from greed ior office, or in a spirit of mere base demagogy, indulge in the inflam matory and incendiary speeches and writings which tend to arouse mobs and' to bring about lynching, not only thus excite the mob, but also tena by what criminologists call "sugges tion," greatly to increase" the likeli hood of a repetition of the very crime against which -they are inveighing. When the mob is composed of the people of one race and the man lynched is of another race, the men v:ho in their speeches and writings either excite or justify the action tend, of course, to excite a bitter race feeling and to cause the people of the opposite race to lose sight of the abominable act of the criminal himself; and in addition, by the prominence they give to the hideous deed they undpubtedly tend to excite ii. other brutal and depraved natures thoughts of committing it. Swift, re lentless, and orderly punishment un ler the law is the only way by which criminality of this type can permanently be supprest. Capital and Labor. • In dealing with both labor and " capital, with the questions affecting both corporations and trades unions, there is one matter more important 5 to remember than aught else, and Otbat is the infiinite harm done by preachers of mere discontent. These are the men who seek to excite a 5 violent class hatred against all men 1 of wealth. They seek to turn wise vnd proper movements for the better '.•ontrol of corporations and for doing c sway with the abuse connected with -• -.vealth, into a campaign of hysterical -- excitement and falsehood in which s :he aim is to inflame to madness the brutal passion of mankind. The e sinister demagogs and foolish vision e tries who are always eager to under o take such a campaign of destruction I sometimes seek to associate them j telves with those working* for a ! genuine reform in governmental and social methods, and sometimes mas querade as such reformers. "In re alty they are the worst enemies of the cause they profess to advocate, just as the purveyors of sensational slander in newspaper or magazine are the worst enemies of all men wno are engaged in an honest effort to tetter what is bad in our social and governmantal conditions. To preach hatred of the rich man as such, to carry on a campaign of slander and invective against him, to seek to mislead and inflame to madness hon est men whose lives are hard and who have not the kind of mental tiaining which will permit them to tppreciate the danger in the dectrines preached—all this is to commit a crime against the body politic and to be false to every worthy princi ple and tradition of American nation al life. Moreover, while such preach ing and such agitation may give a livelihood and a certain notoriety to some of *those who take part in it, end may result in the temporary political success of others, in the long run every such movement will cither fail or else will provoke a reaction, which will itself result not merely in undoing the mischief wrought by tho demagog and the agitator, but also in undoing the good that the honest reformer, the true upholder of popular rights, has pain lully and laboriously achieved. Cor luption is never so rife as in com munities where the demagog and the agitator bears full sway, because in such communities all moral bands become losened, and hysteria and sentamentalism replace the spirit of sound judgment and fair dealing as between man and man. In sheer re volt against the squalid anarchy thus produced men are sure in the end to turn toward any leader who can -estore order, and then their reliet at being free from the intolerable 1 urdens of class hatred, violence, and demagogy is such that they can not lor some time be aroused to indigna tion against misdeeds by men of wealth; so that they permit a new growth of the very abuses which were in part responsible for the origi nal outbreak. The one hope for suc cess for our people lies in a resolute and fearless, but sane and cool-head ed, advance along the path marked out last year by this very Congress. There must be a stern refusal tp be misled into following either that base creature who appeals and panders to the lowest instincts and passions in order to arouse one set of Americans against their fellows, or that other creature, equally base but no baser, who in a spirit of greed, or to ac cumulate or add to an already huge lortune, seeks to exploit his fellow- Americans with callous disregard to their welfare of soul and body. The man who debauches others in order to obtain a high oflice stands on an evil equality of corruption with the man who debauches others for financial profit; and when hatred is town the crop which springs up can only be evil. The plain people who think —the mechanics, formers, merchants, work ers with head and hand, the men to whom American traditions are dear, who love their country and try to act decently by their neighbors, owe it to themselves to remember that the most damaging' blow that can be given popular government is to elect mi nuworthy and sinister agitator on a platform of violence and hypoc :;sy. Whenever such an issue is rais ed in this country nothing can be gained by flinching from it, for in snch case democracy is itself on trial, popular self-government under iepublican forms is itself on trial. The triumph of the mob is just as evil a thing as the triumph of the plutocracy, and to have escaped one danger avails nothing whatever if we succumb to the other. In the end the honest man, whetner rich or poor, who earns his own living and tries to deal justly by his fellows, has as much to fear from the insincere and unworthy demagog, promising much and performing nothing, or else per forming nothing but evil, who would tet the mob to plunder the rich, as irom the crafty corruptionist, who, :or his own ends, would permit the common people to be exploited by the very wealthy. If we ever let this Government fall into the hands of men of either of these two classes, we shall show ourselves false to America's past. Moreover, the dema gog and the corruptionist often work hand in hand. There are at this mo ment wealthy reactionaries of such obtuse morality that they regard the public servant who prosecutes them when they violate the law, or who fceek to make them bear their proper share of the public burdens, as being c-ven more objectionable than the violent agitator who hounds on the inob to plunder the rich. There is nothing to chose between such a reactionary and such an agitator; fundamentally they are alike in their selfish disregard of the rights of others; and it is natural that they should join in opposition to any, movement of which the aim is fear lessly to do exact and even justice to all. . Railroad Employees' Hours and Eight- Hour Law. I call your attention to the need 1 .of passing the bill limiting the num ; her of hours of employment of rail , road employees.- Tne measure is a t very moderate one and I can con l ceive of no serious objection to it. r Indeed, so far as it* is in our power, ; it should be our aim steadily to i reduce the number of hours of labor, l with as a goal the general introduc i lion of an eight-hour day. There are r industries in which it is possible that I the hours of labor should be reduced; l just as there are communities npt 1 far enough advanced for such a l movement to be for their good, or, 3 if in the Tropics, so situated that 3 therp is no analogy between their i- needs and ours in this matter. On the •- Isthmus of Panama, for instance, the i conditions are in every way so differ ent from what they arc L~ c Liat an eight-hour day would be 'Absurd ; just as it is absurd, so far as the Isthmus is concerned, where white labor can not be employed, to bother as to whether the necessary work is done by alien black men or by alien yel low men. But the, wageworkers of the United States are of so high a grade that alike from the nemely in dustrial standpoint and from the civic standpoint it should be our object to' do what we can in the direction of securing the general observance of an eight-hour day. Labor of Womer. and Children. The Congress at its last session wisely provided for a truant court tor the District of Columbia; a mark ed step in advance on the path of properly caring for the children. L»et me again urge that the Congress pro vide for a thoro investigation of the conditions of child labor and of the iflbor of women in the United States. More and more our people are grow ing to recognize the fact that the questions which are not merely of industrial but of social importance outweigh all others; and these two questions most emphatically come in the category of those which affect in the most far-reaching way the home life of the Nation. The horrors incident to the employment of young children in factories or at work any where are a blot on our civilization, ft is true that each State must ulti mately settle the question in its own way; but a thoro official investiga tion of the matter, with the results published broadcast, would greatly help toward arousing the public con science and securing unity of State action in the matter. There is, howev er, one law on the subject which should be enacted immediately, be cause there is no need for an inves tigation in reference thereto, and the failure to enact it is discreditable to the National Government. A drastic and thorogoing cnild-labor law should lie enacted for the District and the Territories. Employers' Liability. Amcng the excellent laws which ihe Congress past at the last session was an employers' liability law. It was a marked step in advance to get the recognition of employers' liability on the statute books; but the law did not go far enough. In spite of all precautions exercised by employers t i.here are unavoidable accidents and even deaths involved in nearly every line of business connected with the mechanic arts. This inevitable sac rifice of life may be reduced to a minimum, but it can not be complete ly eliminated. It is a great social Injustice to compel the employee, or rather the family of the killed or disabled victim, to bear the entire burden of such an inevitable sacri ! flee. In other worus, society shirks its duty by laying the whole cost on the victim, whereas the injury comes irom what may be called the ligiti mate risks of the trade. Compensation ior accidents or deaths due in any line of industry to the actual condi tions tinder whlch'"thdt "MfQU&tFy'xs' carried' on, should be paid by that portion of the community for the benefit of which the industry is car ried on —that is, by those who profit by the industry. Ii the entire trade lisk is placed upon the employer he will promptly and properly add it to the legitimate cost of production and assess it proportionately upon the consumers of his commodity. It is therefore clear to my mind that the law should place tnis entire "risk of a, trade" upon the employer. Neither the Federal law, nor, as far as I 3m informed, the State laws dealing with the question of employers' lia bility are sufficiently thorogoing. The Federal law should of course include employees in navy-yards, arsenals, and the like. Investigation of Disputes Between Capital and Labor. The commission appointed by the President October 16, 1902, at the request of both the antracite coal c perators and miners, to inquire into, consider, and pass upon the ques tions in controversy in connection v/ith the strike in the anthracite re gions of Pennsylvania and the causes out of which the controversy arose, m report, findings, and awards expreSt the belief "that the State and Federal governments chould provide the machinery for what may be ailed the compulsory investigation ot controversies between employers and employees when they arise." This expression of belief is desepVing of the favorable consideration of the Congress and the enactment of its provisions into* law. A bill has al ready been introduced to this end. Withdrawal of Coal Lands. It is not wise that the Nation should alienate its remaining coal lands. I have temporarily withdrawn from settlement all the lands which the Geological Survey has indicated as containing, or in all probability containing coal. The question, how . ever, can be properly settled only by legislation, which in my judgment ■ should provide for the withdrawal of ' these lands from sale or from entry, ■ save in certain especial circumstanc -1 cs. The ownership would then remain ■ >n the United States, which should s not, however, attempt to work them, but permit them to be worked by - private individuals under a royalty system, the Government keeping I. such control as to permit it to see • that no excessive price was charged - consumers. It woulci, of course, be as l i.ecessary to supervise the rates - charged by the common carriers to . transport the product as the rates , charged by those whp mine it; and > the supervision must extend to the , conduct of the common carriers, so - that they shall in no way favor one 3 competitor at the expense of another, t The withdrawal of these coal lands ; would constitute a policy analogous t to that which has been followed in i withdrawing the forest .lands from ordinary settlement. The cosl, like t the forests, should be treated as the r property of the public and its dis e pcsal should be under conditions e which would insure to the benefit > of the public as a whole. —— ~ Corporations. The present Congress has taken long strides in the direction of se curing proper supervision and con trol'by the National Government over corporations engaged in interstate business—and the enormous majority of corporations of any size are en gaged in interstate business. The passage of the railroad rate bill, and only to a less degree the passage of the pure food bill, and »the provision for increasing and rendering more 'effective national control over the beef-packing industry, mark an im portant advance in the proper direc tion. In the short session it will per haps be difficult to do much further along this line; and it may be best to wait until the laws have been in operation for a number of months be tore endeavoring to increase their scope, because only operation will £how with exactness their merits and'their shortcomings and thus give opportunity to define what further remedial legislation is needed. Yet in my judgment it will in the end be advisable in connection with the packing house inspection law to pro vide for putting a date on the lable and for charging the cost of inspec tion to the packers. All these laws have already justified t-jeir enact ment. The interstate commerce law, for instance, has rather amusingly fal- ( eified the predictions, both of those ( who asserted that it would ruin the i ailroads and of those who asserted ihat it did not go far enough and , would accomplish nothing. During the last months the railroads have shown increased earnings and some of them unusual dividends; while during the same period the mere taking effect : of the law has produced an unpre cedented, a hitherto unheard of, number of voluntary reductions in freights and fares by the railroads. Since the founding of the Commission there has never been a time ot equal length in which anything like to many reduced tariffs have been put into effect. On August 27, for instance, two days before the new iaw went into effect, the Commis sion received notice of over five thousand separate tariffs which rep resented reductions from previous rates. It must not be supposed, howerer, that v/ith the passage of these laws it will be possible to stop progress along the line of increasing the pow er of the National Government over the use of capital in interstate com merce. For example, there will ulti mately be need of enlarging the powers of the Interstate Commerce Commission along several different lines, so as to give it a larger and mere efficient control over the rail roads. It can not be too often be repeated that experience has conclusively shown the impossibility of securing by the actions of nearly a hundred different State legislatures anything but effective chaos in the way of dealing with the great corporations . which.> • do-^not.. operate •■exclusively! i within the limits of any one State. In some method, whether by a national license law or in other fashion, we must exercise, and that at an early date, a far more complete control than at present over these great cor porations—a control that will among other things prevent the evils of excessive overcapitalization, and that will compel the disclosure by each big corporation of its stockholders end of its properties and business, whether owned directly or thru sub eidiary or affiliated corporations. This will tend to put a stop to the securing of inordinate profits by lavored individuals at the expense whether of the general public, the stockholders, or the wageworkers. Our efforts should be not so much to prevent consolidation as such, but eo to supervise and control it as to see that it results in no harm to the people. The reactionary or ultracon servative apologists for the misuse of wealth assail the effort to secure such control as a step toward social ism. As a matter of fact it is these leactionaires and yltraconservatives who the themselves mcst potent in increasing socialistic fecliag. One of the most efficient methods of averting the consequences of a dangerous agi tation, which is 80 per cent, wrong, is to remedy the 20 per cent, of evil as to which the agitation is well founded. The best way to avert the very undesirable move for the govern mental ownership of railways is to secure by the Government on behalf of the people as a whole sdeh ade quate control and regulation of the great interstate common carriers as will do away with the evils which give rise to the agitation against them. So the proper antidote to the dangerous and wicked agitation against (he men of wealth as such is to secure by proper legislation and executive action the abolution of the abuses which actually do ob tain in connection with the business use of wealth under our present sys tem —or rather no system—of failure to exercise any adequate control at' all. Some persons speak as if the exercise of such governmental con trol would do away with the freedom of individual initiative and dwarf in-J dividual This is not a fact. It I would be a Veritable calamity to | fail to put a premium upon individual ; iniative, individual capacity and fcifort; upon the energy, character, and foresight which it is so import ant to encourage in the individual. | But as a matter of fact the deaden ( ing and degrading effect of pure J socialism, and especially of its ex , treme from communism, and the i destruction of individual character , which they would bring about, are in part achieved by the wholly unregu , lated competition which results in a ! single individual or corporation ris | ing at the expense of all others' , rntil his or its rise effectually checks j , all competition and reduces former' J competition of utter inferiority and; | subordination. , In enacting and enforcing such leg t islation as this Congress already has to its credit, we are working on a coherent plan, with the steady en s v y ' 'deavor to secure the needed reform by the joint action of the moderate men, the plain -men who do not wish anything hysterical or danger-, ous, but who do intend to deal in resolute common sense fashion with the veal and great evils of the pres-! ent system, The reactionaries and the violent extremists show symp toms of joining hands .against us. Both assort, for instance, that if logi cal, we should go to government ownership of railroads and the like, the reactionaries, because on such an issue they think the people would stand with them, while th£ extremists, care rather to preach discontent and agitation than to achieve solid re sults. As a matter of fact, our po- j sition is as remote from that cf t!»§; Bourbon reactionary as from that of j the impracticable or sinister vision- 1 ary. We hold that the Government should not conduct the business of the nation, but that it should exer cise such supervision as will insure its being conducted in the interest of the nation. Our aim is, so far as may be, to secure, Cor all decent, hard working men, equality of op portunity and equality of burden. Inheritance and Income Tax. The question of taxation is difficult in any country, but it is especially diffi cult in ours with its Federal system of government. Some taxes should on every ground be levied in a small district for use in that district. Thus the taxation of real estate is peculiarly one for the immediate locality in which the real estate is found. Again, there is no more legitimate tax for any State than a tax on the franchises conferred by that State upon street railroads t and similar corporations which operate wholly within the State boundaries,' sometimes in one and sometimes in several municipalities or other minor ( divisions of the State. But there are many kinds of taxes which can only be 1 levied by the General Government so as to produce the best results, because, among other reasons, the attempt to impose them in one particular State too often results merely in driving the corporation or individual affected to some other locality or other State. The National Government has long de rived its chief revenue from a tariff on imports and from an internal excise tax. In addition to these there is ev-j ery reason why, when next our sys-' tem of taxation is revised, the Nation al Government should impose a grad uated inheritance tax, and, if possible,' a graduated income tax. The man of great wealth owes a peculiar obligation to the State, because he derives special' advantages from the mere existence i of government. Not only should he { recognize this obligation in the way he leads his daily life and in the way he earns and spends his money, but it should also be recognized by the way in which he pays for the protection the State gives him. On the one hand, it is desirable that he should assume his full and proper share of the burden of taxation; on the other hand, it is quite as necessary that in this kind of taxation, where the men who vote the tax pay but little of it, there should be clear recognition of the danger of inau 'glidratihg "&njf such system save in a spirit of entire justice and moderation. Whenever we, as a people, undertake to remodel our taxation system along the lines suggested, we must make it clear bejond peradventure that our aim is to distribute the burden of sup porting the Government more equit ably than at present; that we intend to treat rich man on a basis of abso lute equality, and that we regard it as equally fatal to true democracy to do or permit injustice to the one as to do or permit injustice to the other. j Technical and Industrial Training. ' It would be impossible to overstate (tho it is of course difficult quantita tively to measure) the efEect upon a nation's growth to greatness of whatj may be called organized patriotism, which necessarily includes the substi tution of a national feeling for mere local pride; with as a resultant a high ambition for the whole country. No country can develop its full strength so long as the parts which make up the whole each put a feeling of loyalty to the part above the fealing of loyalty to the whole. This is true of classes and it is just as true of classes. The industrial and agricultural classes must work together, capitalists and wageworkers must work together, if the best work of which the country is capable is to be done. It is probable that a thoroly efficient system of edu cation comes next to the inflfluence of patriotism in bringing about national success of this kind. Our federal form of government, so fruitful ot advantage to our people in certain ways, in other ways undoubtedly limits our national effectiveness. It is not possible, for instance, for the National Government l , take the lead in technical industrial education, to see that the public school system of this country develops on all its technical, industrial, scientific and commercial sides. This must be left pnmahily to the several States. Nev ertheless, the National Government nas control of the schools of the Dis ™ ° f Columbia, and it should see tnat these schools promote and encour age the fullest development of the scholars in both commercial and indus trial training. The commercial train 'wifu * 4 m one of its branches deal 7£Ll° Teea trade " The industrial training is even more important It should be one of our prime objects as , a nation, so far as feasible, constantly |to work toward putting the mechanic the wageworker who works with his .hands, on a higher plane of efficiency j and reward, so as to increase his effec dSStT IK the economic w orld, and the dignity, the remuneration, and the power of his position in the social Agriculture. The only other persons whose wel w[J,ls as y ital to the welfare of the whole country as is the welfare of the wageworkers are the tillers of the soil ' sav th-?? erS ' K 1S a mßre truism to, say that jio growth of cities no ODmftnt ° f wealtb - no industrial devel-l f ll atone for aQ y 'ailing off! lin the character and standing of the! farming population. During the nast 1 ! few decades this fact has been reSi i There n f ver " lncr easing clearnesl ! iS tLf f° ° l nger any fallure to real-' h ® ri hat farming, at least in certain ™ nc ( s es ' must become a technical and scientific profession. This means that there must be open to faraS? the chance for technical and scientific training, not theoretical merely but of the most severely practical type. The farmer represents a peculiarly high type of American citizenship, and he 1 must have the same chance to rise and develop as other American citizens , have. Moreover, it is exactly as true of the farmed as it is of the business man and the wageworker, that the ul timate success of the Nation oi/which he forms a part must be founded not alone on material prosperity but upon high moral, mental, and physical devel opment. This education of the farmer —self-education by preference, but al so education from the outside, as with ' all other men —is peculiarly necessary ! here in the United States, where the frontier conditions even in the newest States have now nearly vanished,where ' there must be a substitution of a more j intensive system of cultivation for the f old wasteful farm management, and wheFe there must be a better business organization among the farmers them selves. v -. - Several factor? must co-operate in the improvement of the farmer's con dition. He must haVe Jhe chance to be educated in the widest, • sense —in the sense which keeps ever in view the intimate relationship be tween the theory of education and the facts of life. In all education we ' should widen our aims. It is a good thing to produce a certain number of trained scholars and students; but the education superintended by the State must seek rather to produce a hundred good citizens than merely one scholar, and it must be turned now and then from the class book to the study of the great book of nature itself. This is especially true of the farmer, as has been pointed out again and again by all observers most competent to pass • practical judgment on tne problems of i our country life. All students now rea lize that education must seek to train the executive powers of young people i and to confer more real significance i upon the phrase "dignity of labor," and to prepare the pupils so that in . addition to each developing in the highest degree his individual capacity for work, they may together help cre ate a right public opinion, and show in many ways social and co-operative spir it. Organization has become neces sary in the business world; and it has accomplished much for good in the world of labor. It is no less necessary j for farmers. Such a movement as the I grange movement is good in itself and is capable of a well-nigh infinite fur ther extension for good so long as it is i kept to its own legitimate business. The benefits to be derived by the as sociation of farmers for mutual advan i tage are partly economic and partly sociological. ! Irrigation and Forest Preservation. I Much is now being done for the States of the Rocky Mountains and Great plains thru the development of the national policy of irrigation and forest preservation; no Government policy for the betterment of our inter nal conditions has been more fruitful of good than this. The forests of the White Mountains and Southern Appalachian regions should also be preserved; and they cannot be unless the people of the States in which they lie, thru their representatives in the Congress, secure vigorous action by the National Government. . Memorial Amphitheater at Arlington. I invite the attention of Congress to the estimate of the Secretary of War for an appropriation to enable him to begin the preliminary work for the construction of a memorial amphithea ter at Arlington. The Grand Army of the Republic in its national encamp ment has urged the erection of such an amphitheater as necessary for the pro per observance of Memorial Day and as a fitting monument to the soldier ; and sailor dead buried there. In this I heartily concur and commend the matter to the favorable consideration of the Congress. Marriage and Divorce, i lam well aware of how difficult it is to pass a constitutional amendment. Nevertheless in my judgment the whole question of marriage and di vorce should be relegated to the au thority of the National Congress. At present the wide differences in the laws of the different States on this subject result in scandals and abuses; and surely there is nothing so vitally essential to the welfare of the nation, nothing around which the nation should so bend itself to throw every safeguard, as the home life of the av erage citizen. The change would be good from every standpoint. In par ticular it would be good because it would confer on the Congress the pow er at once to deal radically and effi ciently with polygamy; and this should be done whether or not marriage and divorce are dealt with. It is neither safe nor proper to leave the question Of polygamy to be dealt with by the several States. Power to deal with it should be conferred on the National Government. •. When home ties are loosened; when men and women cease to regard a wor thy family life, with all its duties fully performed, and all its responsibilities lived up to, as the life best worth liv ing; then evil days for the common wealth are at hafid. There are regions in our land, and classes of qur popula tion, where the birth rate has sunk be low the death rate. Surely it should need no demonstration to show that wilful sterility is, from the standpoint ®f the nation, from the standpoint of tne human race, the one sin for which the penalty is national death, race death; a sin for which there is no atonement; a sin which is the more dreadful exactly in proportion as the men and women are guilty thereof are * n °th er respects, in character, and bodily and mental powers, those whom for the sake of the state it would be well to see the fathers and mothers of many healthy children, well brought up in homes made happy by their pres ' *■? Ce ' _» man > no woman, can shirk the primary duties of life, whether for °f ease and pleasure, or for any , other cause, and retain his or her self respect. 1 American Shipping. i f me once a 6 ain the attention ior the Congress to two subjects con jcerning which I have frequently be ; fore communicated with them. One is j the question of developing American ! shipping. I trust that a law embody , ing m substance the views, or a major I Part of the views, exprest in the report °? •* » su bJect laid before the House at its last session will be past. I am well aware that in former years ob ■ jectionable measures have been pro-
Hickory Democrat (Hickory, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
Dec. 6, 1906, edition 1
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