What’s the difference between a street curb boodler and one that sells out for a promise of an appointment? Ans.—One gets his money before voting while the other gets it afterwards, if he does not get left—principle same.—Batavia (O.) Democrat.
Why are all the candidates opposing Hoke Smith? There must be some reason for it. Everyone had faith in him, believed him far superior to a majority of other people, until he got into the race. Why this change? Why so many attacks upon him? Is it because he is advocating reforms which have already been adopted by several of the other Southern states? It must be because he stands for something, and is not ashamed or afraid to tell what it is.—Marietta (Ga.) Courier.
With Clark Howell devoting most of his time to “cussing” out Tom Watson, Hoke Smith is sailing smoothly on to the gubernatorial chair.—Dalton (Ga.) Citizen.
The New York Sun puts it this way: “If John Mitchell’s statement at the miners’ convention is not a bluff, there will be either an enormous increase in the coal bills of the American people or the most costly and disastrous strike the country has ever seen.” But what do the mine owners and the striking mine workers care about that, so long as the people who buy the coal are willing to bear their suffering in silence—paying without a murmur any price the coal barons put on their product; and feeling well assured that nothing will be done by the suffering people to change the laws by which these barons are enabled to inflict this suffering.—Waterbury (Conn.) Examiner.
During the last ten years stocks and bonds amounting to $12,500,000,000 have been floated in this country. This additional capitalization of the industries and railroads of the country is about equal to the total value of all grain crops raised by the farmers during the same period. It is one-third more than the total value of the products of all mines in the country for the same period. It is equal to one-eighth of the total wealth of the United States in 1900. That is the way the “great” financiers absorb the wealth produced by the toilers of the nation. After studying the above statistics you may realize the force of Gov. Johnson’s statement that fictitious valuation and the consequent tax on the producers is the great curse of this country. Ignatius Donnelly used to tell a story about a hen that laid an egg in a nest fitted with a false bottom. The egg disappeared, and the hen laid another, continuing in her vain effort to have an egg show up in the nest until there was nothing left of her but the feathers. The fictitious capitalization is the false bottom that takes the products of the laborer, leaving him nothing to show for his efforts.—Willmar (Minn.) Tribune.