A PLEA FOR JUSTICE.
You must not mistake me. I would not take a single comfort; nay, not a single luxury from those who have the most. I would not deprive anybody of anything they have or want; but I would so distribute the proceeds of labour that those who produce the comforts and luxuries should have their share of them; that they should have everything that the most favoured now enjoy. In this land of fruitfulness and plenty, if all the labour there is were constantly employed every man’s home might be a palace, and want and sorrow be banished from the country. Am I asking too much for those who have endured long years of toil and suffering to bring this beautiful country to its present condition? Am I asking what you are not willing that they shall have? Am I asking anything more than justice? If you grant them less than justice God Almighty will come some day, visit you and set the matter right, as he visited the South and liberated the downtrodden blacks. So if you do not heed my warning, remember that there is One whom you cannot ignore.
But there is still another way by which the industries are taxed in favour of the non-producers. The railroads, which ought to be, and which, managed properly, would be, a great advantage to the industries, are now at once their blessing and their curse. There are now 75,000 miles of railways in the country, built at a cost of $4,658,208,630: their earnings are $404,000,000 annually. But here is where the people are hoodwinked. This sum does not begin to represent the actual amount paid by the people for fare and freights. Almost the whole of the freighting is done by “lines”—the Red Line, the Blue Line, the White Star Line, and a hundred others, all which have special contracts with the railroads to carry freights at just a living rate, while the lines charge the people all that they can stand to pay, the difference in these two sums going into the pockets of the owners of the lines. And who are they? The owners, managers and officers of the railroads who resort to this to blind the people’s eyes about the profits of railroading, which they could not otherwise conceal, because they are obliged to make annual exhibits. But the lines carry off the profits, while the operating expenses of the roads, their interests and dividends are left for the exhibits. If the companies made 20, 30 or 50 per cent. dividends, the people would not stand it: but the managers play upon them with their lines and blind their eyes while they pocket the profits.