December 22, 1888 Vol. IV, No. 25Whole No. 103

CONTENTS:

Notes of an English Trip. Encouraging Letters Concerning the New Plan of Campaign. Over the Border—Things Booming in Canada. Shall We Invade New Jersey. What We Should Do. Now Comes Montana’s Chance. Smoke on the Horizon. In One Cause—Henry George’s Liverpool Speech. Editorial Notes. The Single Tax Idea. Little Homes and Little Farms. Ballot Reform. The New Democracy. A Christmas Story. The Single Tax Club House. They Held an Experience Meeting. Now’s the Time to Strike in Ohio. Straws Which Show the Wind. Mother Antoine’s Lad (a story). Concerning the Fortunes of T. Thompsen^sic[?], Gambler (a sketch). What Do the Animals See? To Help Single Tax Strangers. Queries and Answers. Making Laws at Washington. New Ideas, Methods and Inventions. Art Publications.

I got back from England on Sunday in the Etruria, and greet again the readers of THE STANDARD. I had intended, when I left, to write from the other side, but from the time my veteran friend Thomas Briggs grasped my hand on the deck of the steamer in Southampton water to the last discernible flutter of a handkerchief from the Irish single tax men who said good bye to me at Queenstown, I found too much to see, to hear and do, to allow of writing. It may be worth while now, however, to jot down some rough notes of matters that interested me and will, I think, interest the readers of THE STANDARD.

“Now that the election is over, you need a rest—come, start with me to-morrow morning for a three weeks’ trip to England,” said William Saunders to me on the day before we sailed. When I heard the shouts from the approaching tender in Southampton and saw the placards of “Welcome”—and still more when, at the Waterloo station, the surging crowds of Mr. Saunders’ constituents who had been waiting from two o’clock in the afternoon to half-past ten at night, pressed round us, I realized that I would not get much rest in England. And though I staid there longer than I intended, I didn’t. But I got something much more stimulating—a vivid idea of the great progress the good cause has been making in Great Britain since I was there last—four years ago. During this time I have known, both from private correspondence and from the indications of the press, that beneath the surface our ideas were making steady and rapid way. But I did not realize how much had been gained until I got to England and had opportunities to talk with our friends there and feel in many ways the change in public opinion.

As I have often said to those who felt impatient to see tangible results from the agitation and discussion of the land question, time is a necessary element in thought. There is in the progress of ideas, a period analogous to that period in the history of a plant in which germination goes on. The seed must swell and the roots push out in darkness and silence, ere the first indication of life can appear above the surface. Our ideas have been passing through that stage of growth in Great Britain, and are now on the verge of entering—nay, they are already beginning to enter, the region of practical politics, where they will draw strength and vigor from forces that are to the diffusion of thought what the air and the sunshine are to the growth of the plant.

From all sides forces have been and are now converging to press the land question to the front in Great Britain. The Irish land agitation and the political difficulties that it has brought, the growth of a similar agitation in the Scottish highlands, the tithe agitation in Wales, the falling in of leases in London and other cities, carrying with them the transfer to the ground landlord of blocks of valuable buildings, with enormous increase of rents, the discussion of the nature and effects of mining royalties, the growth of democratic sentiment, the increasing social discontent, the decadence of the old agriculture, and the rise to political importance of the agricultural laborers, the attention that has been drawn to the condition and housing of the poor in the cities, the weakening of the trades unions—in fact the whole trend of events and of thought has been in the direction of forcing the land question upon public attention. And that a few individuals should be deemed to be the absolute owners of the land on which, and from which, a whole nation must live, if they are to live at all, is a thing so utterly monstrous, so clearly opposed to the first and strongest perceptions of natural right, that it can only be maintained on condition that it is not

p. 1, col. 2 discussed. No matter how timidly it is begun, there is in the nature of the human mind only one end to any discussion of the right of landlords to levy tribute on their fellow creatures for the use of what was here before man came. And even the agitation and discussion of such palliatives as “free trade in land,” leasehold enfranchisement, judicial rents, laborers’ allotments, landlord purchase, etc., has but helped to swell the strong current that is urging thought (in many cases insensibly) to the recognition of the equality of natural rights in the element indispensable to all human labor and all human life.

Our friends who “have seen the cat” have, without much organization or outward demonstration, been working away on the other side of the Atlantic as they have been working here. But other forces, even those of opposition, have been aiding their effort. And now the advance that has been going on in thought is beginning to push into the sphere of practical politics.

From every point of view it is evident that the land question or the labor question—call it by which name you will, for they are both names for the same things, the injustices and difficulties that spring from the divorce of the two prime factors of production—is the burning question of the immediate future in Great Britain as in Ireland. That something must be done about the land even the most blindly conservative are beginning to see. And as motion seeks the line of least re- sistance, so, in all degrees, is the growing animosity to landlordism, the awakening appreciation of general rights to the use of land, beginning to concentrate on the line of the single tax. Of the many indications of this, the two most significant, because in themselves they become causes which set powerful agencies at work, are the recent declaration of the general conference of liberal associations at Birmingham in favor of the taxation of ground rents and the opposition of the liberal party in the house of commons to the appropriation of £5,000,000 more for the purchase of Irish estates under the Ashbourne act. To my view these have the same importance in English politics as President Cleveland’s message of a year ago which turned the face of the democratic party against protection and towards free trade had in American politics.

The establishment of a peasant proprietory^sic, by buying out the agricultural landlords in favor of the agricultural tenants, has up to this time been the social aim of the Irish parliamentary party—their idea of the final solution of the land question—their notion of what “the land for the people” meant.

It has also been the idea of Mr. Gladstone and the official liberal party. While Mr. Gladstone’s administration was coercing Ireland in the endeavor to stamp out the land league, it placed a land purchase clause in the bill which instituted judicial rents. And that not working, Mr. Parnell, as soon as he got out of Kilmainham prison, started a land purchase joint stock company of his own, which bought an estate at a big price and undertook to sell it to tenants, but which seems to have passed into oblivion, if not into bankruptcy.

In 1855^sic after passing the act for the assimilation of the county franchise with the borough franchise—an act which placed the ballot in the hands of some millions of crofters, cotters and agricultural laborers—Mr. Gladstone appealed to the country. In spite of the fact that the Irish vote in England and Scotland was cast for the tories, he went back to St. Stephen’s with a strong majority. Then came his change of front on the Irish question and the introduction of the home rule bill, accompanied with a proposition for the buying out of Irish agricultural landlords to an extent which it was estimated would require from £120,000,000 to £150,000,000. The home rule scheme was a hybrid one. It had been framed by Mr. Gladstone without consultation with important colleagues, and contained a clause justly objectionable to British feeling—the elimination of Irish representation from the imperial parliament. But what the tories made even more use of than this, in their appeal to the voters, was the purchase proposition. They set forth in the most vivid ways they could devise the immensity of the sum for which John Bull was to be made responsible in order to buy from Irish landlords farms for Irish tenants. They placarded the walls with figures a yard long, and calculated how many railroad trains would be required to draw the amount if put in sovereigns and how many steamers to carry it if put in shillings. This time

p. 1, col. 3 Mr. Gladstone had the Irish support, but he was defeated, and the present government resting on a coalition of tories, and liberal unionists came into power.

During the interval between Mr. Gladstone’s parliamentary defeat and the general election, the Ashbourne act appropriating £5,000,000 for the purchase of Irish estates on behalf of the tenants, came down from the House of Lords, and was passed through the House of Commons with liberal acquiesence^sic and by liberal votes. It has taken hold, for it was really what Davitt called it at the time—a “landlord’s relief bill,” at the expense of the nation. In order to make sure that the tenant would buy, it asked nothing whatever of him except that he should consent to have his rent re- duced in the present and receive a fee simple estate in the future. This is based upon a government advance to the landlord of the price agreed upon with his tenants, the tenants being charged with three per cent interest and one per cent annual contribution for a sinking fund. This in forty-seven years, it is calculated, will reimburse the government.

The £5,000,000 first appropriated has been quickly exhausted—having gone, as the liberals now charge, into the pockets of the London companies and the great tory landlords who have interest with the present government, while John Bull has received in return for his solid cash the privilege of recouping himself by collecting rent from an Irish tenancy for forty-seven years.

The tiger has tasted blood. The Irish landlords are naturally eager to convert into money, at the risk of the general taxpayer, properties that under existing conditions no sane private investor would think of purchasing. And Irish tenants are ready enough to avail themselves of a reduction in the rents they are now paying, with an assurance of ownership in forty-seven years.

The tories were not honest in their opposition to Mr. Gladstone’s purchase scheme, but merely acted on the principle of any stick being good enough to beat a bad dog with. Even then the more thoughtful must have realized that the only way to save the Irish landlords was by buying them out, and the only way to check the land movement was by creating, at whatever risk, a larger class of land owners. But political parties. struggling^sic for power, are not governed by the more thoughtful, and great as was the bribe offered by Mr. Gladstone to the Irish landlords it was not sufficient to overcome their dread of the home rule which was to accompany it in his scheme, or to silence their hope that a tory government might bring back the good old times, when to promptly pay his rent was in Ireland deemed the first duty of man.

Now that they are themselves in power, now that the depth and strength of the land movement are better appreciated, now that the Irish landlords, and their English and Scotch creditors, are pressing for more money, and now that the conservative effects of increasing the number of land owners have been shown, the tories very naturally turn to the same policy that in the political exigency of the last general election they denounced. But not to turn too sharp a corner, all that the government ventured to do at this session was to propose to appropriate £5,000,000 more for Irish land purchase.

The liberals, too, are in a different position. Mr. Gladstone is not in power, but in opposition. The whig element in his following has largely deserted him. He feels, as some of his recent extra-parliamentary utterances show, the rapidly gathering strength of the land movement in Great Britain, and realizes that the radical element in the liberal constituen- cies have already passed the point at which they would tolerate the idea of buying out Irish landlords or any other landlords.

As for Mr. Parnell and the Irish party they are put by this changed situation in a peculiar, not to say delicate position. Since Mr. Parnell came out of Kilmainham in 1882, and in fact for some time before, the whole weight and power of the Irish party has been thrown against all radical expression on the land question. They have muzzled Davitt, they have smothered Bishop Nulty, they have ostracised John Ferguson. The whole influence of the party has been exerted in turning the movement on its social side at least into an agricultural tenants’ beneficial society, in educating Irish sentiment into the belief that “the land for the people” meant, not, all the land for all the people, but some of the land for some of the agricultural tenants. Now come their enemies offering to make the agricultural tenants the

p. 1, col. 4 owners of their land on most liberal terms. But not only do the Irish leaders realize that what the tories say is true—that the conversion of tenants into prospective owners, under the operations of the Ashbourne act, is to shear the Irish national party of its power, but political necessity requires their keeping in touch with English liberals.

Thus it comes that in the debate, of which it was my good fortune to hear the most interesting and important part, the position of both parties was reversed, Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Parnell opposing what they had before supported, and the tories supporting what they had in the general election denounced. Both sides were hampered by their memories, and on the one side the bill was defended as a matter of temporary policy, and on the other side opposed on matters of detail. There were only a few voices, like that of Dr. Clarke, representative of the far northern Scottish district of Caithness, to declare that the Irish landlords had nothing to sell that did not in right belong to the Irish people, and that to substitute a larger for a smaller class of landowners would be but to continue and fortify the injustice by which the rest of the people were deprived of their natural rights.

But for all this the debate was significant. It showed not the inconsistencies of men or of parties, but the impulse of an advancing tide, forcing into changed relative positions the chips and corks that float upon its sur- face. It meant that English political divisions are aligning themselves to the great issue that is coming to the front; that the primary force of a growing perception of natural rights is bringing to its aid the secondary forces of party organization and political conflict.

The tories have taken a decisive step towards the last refuge of landlordism—purchase. The liberals and the Irish parliamentary party have taken as decisive a step against it. It makes little difference if the immediate step is as small a one as was the Mills bill in relation to the tariff question. It is sufficient to bring the essential principle into popular discussion.

In parliament the liberal leaders may [at?] the first step oppose purchase on matters of detail, as Mr. Mills and his fellows opposed protection on matters of detail, declaring that they were not free traders. But among the rank and file discussion must go on there, as it has gone on here, on the question of principle. The masses make no fine distinctions such as politicians do in minimizing a change of front. The popular machinery and weight and party feeling of the liberal party are now enlisted against purchase, and in radical clubs and local liberal associations support of Mr. Gladstone and opposition to the conservatives must now mean opposition not to any particular scheme for buying out Irish landlords, but opposition to all propositions for buying out any landlords.

On the Sunday after the debate on the Ashbourne act had begun, I visited a number of the London radical clubs (all organizations supporting Mr. Gladstone) in company with Mr. Saunders, Mr. Briggs and Mr. Patrick Hennessey. Pleading the Yankee weakness for asking questions, I tried to get at their feeling with regard to settling the land question by buying out the landlords. The response everywhere to this proposition was a unanimous and howling no; and everywhere there was the same emphatic declaration in favor of taxing them out. Everywhere and in all other ways that I could get any indication of the feeling of the masses that constitute the strength of the liberal party I found it the same.

Lord Randolph Churchill, when he declared that he would vote for the £5,000,000 bill because it was only a little thing, and so monstrously bad in principle that another one of the kind could never be passed, was right as far as the popular vote is concerned. What with their present majority the tories may be able to do before appealing to the country may be impossible to say; but with the masses of Great Britain, buying out Irish landlords or English landlords, in whole or in part, is past talking about. But the liberal party must deal with the land question. What shall it propose? The line along which both internal and external forces must inevitably drive it, is that indicated in the declaration it has already officially made in favor of the taxation of ground rents—that is to say, the line of the single tax.

In short the Birmingham declaration and the debate on the Ashbourne act have the same significance in English politics

p. 1, col. 5 as President Cleveland’s message and the Mills bill had in American politics. The idea of putting all taxes on land values is about to receive the same kind of aid from the liberal party in England, only far more directly and powerfully, that has resulted and is resulting to it here from the attitude in which the democratic party has been placed.

Nothing that I could say could show this more forcibly than the simple fact that before I left England I received a number of official invitations from local liberal associations to address them on the land question. Four years ago, when I was last in England, no liberal association would any more have dreamed of asking me to address them on the land question than a Pennsylvania democratic committee would have dreamed of in- viting me to favor them with my views on protection.

Of the same sort of significance was the invitation which I received, and gladly accepted, to address the united commtitees^sic of London for the taxation of ground rents. This body is largely composed of men who are working to put more taxation on land values. But they are ready to work, so far as both go together, with those whose aim is to put all taxation on land values.

And of still greater, and even more gratifying significance to me, was the reception given me by the council of the Liverpool financial reform association, a verbatim report of which, copied from the Financial Reformer, is printed in this issue. It indicates the complete junction of the absolute free traders with the single tax men. The Financial reform association was founded in 1848 by the more earnest friends and followers of Richard Cobden, and is the representative of that remnant of free traders who have never taken a tariff for revenue only to mean free trade. It is incomparably more energetic and influential than the Cobden club, of which American protectionists make such a scarecrow. It is in fact, in its influence upon public thought, by far the most influential association of the kind in the three kingdoms, for its Financial Reform Almanac is the text book and vade mecum for all the radical politicians [and?] speakers in the three kingdoms. As [will be?] seen, the Finaucial^sic reform association has declared, clearly and decisively, for the single tax, so far at least as needed revenues are concerned. This is all that is necessary for us.

What President Muspratt said of the steps by which the Financial reform association has been led to the single tax, is known to those who have for some years read the issues of the Financial Reform Almanac. It has been doing a wonderful work in educating the British people to the fact that the natural rights of Englishmen to the soil of their native land have been gradually lost, and the tenants of the state made virtual owners, by the process of shifting upon the masses of the people the burdens originally im- posed on the landholders.

In this respect I found a wonderful advance wherever I went on this trip. The more intelligent of the masses already know that the proposal to put taxation on land values is not what it was said to be when I first went to England, a “new fangled Yankee idea,” but the return to a principle which has in England all the sanction of antiquity.

It may be mentioned incidentally that the American protectionist referred to by the Rev. Harold Rylett is Nathaniel McKay whom the protectionist ring sent over to England prior to the last campaign to get up matter for frightening American workingmen. This McKay is, I believe, the degenerate son of the famous Boston ship builder, whose fleet clippers in the days ere “protection to American industry” had taxed the American flag off the ocean were one of our national boasts.

That union of effort between free traders and single tax men, which, so far as Great Britain is concerned, is indicated in the address presented and the speeches made at the Liverpool rotunda meeting, went on very rapidly on this side of the Atlantic during the last campaign and is going on rapidly still. One striking indication of this is the editorial of the New York Times on the single tax idea, which is reprinted on the fifth page of this issue of THE STANDARD. The real truth is that any free trader who gets past the illogical halting house of a tariff for revenue only, must become, if he follows his own arguments, a single tax man. Whether a single tax man limited, or a single tax man unlimited, makes for the present no essential difference. If we

p. 1, col. 6 can go together as far as putting all present taxation upon land values, those who do not want to go further will then be perfectly free to stop.

Other significant evidences of the change in English opinion with regard to the single tax were the opportunity afforded me by the Guild of St. Matthew to address a meeting of clergymen of the established church in Zion college, the opportunity afforded me by Dr. Parker of addressing a magnificent congregation at his mid week service in the City temple, and the conference of Congregational ministers which I met in Memorial hall at the invitation of Albert Spicer, who is probably the most influential layman of that denomination in England. This meeting was a private one, only Congregational clergymen being admitted, but it was a very gratifying one to me. The Congregationalists are the old Cromwellian independents, and their political influence in England is very great. Mr. Spicer, who is the liberal candidate for the next parliament from Monmouth Boroughs, was until some ten years ago very bitterly opposed to us, regarding us as communists and confiscators. But a trip to Australia led him to note the results of speculation in land, and on the homeward voyage he read “Progress and Poverty.” I also participated in a debate at the Streatham “mock parliament” before a much greater audience than the real parliament could have afforded. In Southwick, near Birmingham, I addressed a meeting of Knights of Labor, consisting of representatives from all over the Black country, where the order is taking firm root. Nothing could exceed the enthusiasm of these men or their intelligent appreciation of the bearings of the land question. The order in this part of England at least is doing a work that the order in the United States has been so largely diverted from by the conservative influence of Master Workman Powderly.

I passed the better part of two days in Glasgow, speaking one night at the City hall, and being entertained at a tea the next. I met many of my old friends, and got the most encouraging reports from all parts of Scotland. The Bridgeton division men have got their member, Sir George Otto Trevelyan, fairly planted on the line of the taxation of ground rents, and he has sent them a donation to their funds. They have also got their local candidates pledged. The Henry George Institute holds meetings every summer Sunday, when the weather is good, on the green, and on other Sundays in their hall. In short, not to go into details for which I have now no space, the good work is going on far better and faster than I had hoped.

Of the great meeting at Lambeth Baths, of the banquet given me in London, and of many other things which much pleased and encouraged me, it is not necessary to speak. The main impression of the trip on my mind is of the great progress of our ideas on the other side of the Atlantic, and of the far more rapid progress which the future promises. So large are the opportunities that seem to be opening there that I told our English friends before leaving that I would come back in two months and do what I could to help them. Whether here or there it is the same cause. HENRY GEORGE.

The Christmas story on the fifth page of THE STANDARD is by Hon. Sam W. Williams of Vincennes, Ind.

THEY ARE COMING IN FROM ALL PARTS.

The New Plan of Campaign Has Awakened Lots of Enthusiasm—At Work All Along the Line—It Looks as Though the Petitioners to Congress Will Be a Big Army.

The work of the Single tax enrollment committee starts off with every promise of brilliant success. Though the address and petitions were sent out less than a week ago, signatures are already beginning to pour in more rapidly than at any period during the work of the enrollment of Cleveland and Thurman voters.

In fact, signatures are coming in so rapidly that the chairman of the committee has not yet had time to have them thoroughly classified. They are coming from all parts of the country, and include the names of both men and women.

Many letters have been sent to Mr. Croasdale asking if women’s names will be enrolled. He asks THE STANDARD to say that they will be enrolled, and that they are particularly desired.

There are also thus far cheerful indications that contributions for the extension of the work, so as to include a distribution of literature will not be lacking.

During the past week one^sic lady accompanied a signed petition by her check for $100. Several other contributions of from one to five dollars have been received. They are all acknowledged to the individual sending them.

The correspondence of the committee shows that the new plan of campaign has not merely met with general favor, but that it has called forth the best activity of single tax men, who are by the way eager readers of THE STANDARD, and prompt to comment on every new proposition.

Andrew R. Paul of North Adams, Massachusetts is strongly in favor of Judge Maguire’s plan of invading some state, but prefers that Massachusetts shall be the one selected. His reasons are that the old Bay state is accustomed to leading in reform, and is thus far the only state that has adopted the Australian system of voting without which he has no hope of our cause anywhere. He says it only has two hundred and eighty thousand voters and he sees one obstacle to the success of his plan, which is that so many of these voters are “wedded to the humbug protection.”

Mr. S. D. Guion of Brooklyn says he would like to have an arm full of single tax literature; he could use it to good advantage. He writes that one republican signed this petition because he liked the idea of putting all taxes on land value, but insisted that he was as good a republican as ever.

Two men in the government service at Washington sent for one hundred petitions each, and they think they can use them all. Another in Charlestown, Mass., insists that he can get a thousand signed.

From all parts of the country the demands come for new petitions.

Dr. William C. Wood of Gloversville, N. Y., writes: “To me the principles that carried to their logical consummation must result in free trade, free land, and consequently free men, become more and more a matter of faith, and added to faith comes hope in their speedy triumph, and to hope, charity for those who wilfully refusing to examine, reject them. Dr. Wood is amused apropos of Mr. George’s return, when he thinks of the efforts put forth to cheapen the transporting of goods sent across the ocean, and the verdict of the people in favor of making up by taxation for any money thus saved to them.

E. E. Marsh of East Orange, N. J., strongly indorses Judge Maguire’s proposal to make the single tax fight in that state.

John Hosrock, who was formerly so efficient a worker in Camden, N. J., is beginning to display his old time activity in Pittsburg, his new home. Mr. Hosrock addresses any meeting he can get at whether it be a prohibition meeting, a prayer meeting or a political club, and never misses the opportunity to talk single tax. He writes that the Pittsburg club has ceased to meet. It is to be hoped that Mr. Roberts and the others will see to its prompt revival now that the work has been renewed.

Dr. R. Webb of Orange Valley, N. J., strongly indorses Judge Maguire’s proposition, and says he could do good work in that neighborhood if he had an abundance of tracts.

A. C. Hughes, secretary of the Single tax club at Youngstown, Ohio, sends samples of tracts and leaflets, that club is issuing to arouse the people of Ohio to an understanding of the disadvantage of the existing methods of taxation. Mr. Hughes says their club is growing so rapidly that the hall will hardly accommodate the members. One of their methods of work is to put, wherever they have opportunity, a letter sticker on which is printed “Single tax will do it.”

Mr. F. S. Arnold of Poughkeepsie, New York, says that the single tax men of Dutchess county were greatly cast down by the result of the presidential election, but now that work has been resumed in some form they are beginning to pick up heart. He says, “Your letter has awakened us, and the pushing of the petition with all the attending opportunities for distributing literature, for conversation, and the touch of shoulders will soon give our work enough to do and bring our cause to the front.”

Joseph Dana Miller writes that the single tax league of Hudson county, N. J., has become for the present a ballot reform league. It desires to communicate with single tax leagues throughout that state prior to holding a general conference to agree upon the form of a bill for ballot reform. The presidents and secretaries of such organizations are urged to put themselves into communication with Mr. Miller, and to offer any suggestions as to the best methods for work.

George F. Lewis, of Victor, Ohio, is an old gentleman in his seventy-sixth year, with all his means invested in real estate, but he has the vigor of mind that makes easy the acceptance of new ideas, and no fear that a tax on land values with exempt improvements will ever injure the useful members of a community. Mr. Lewis expresses his amazement at the way farmers in some parts of the country cling to the support of “this robber tariff.” He continues: “In pressing the claims for tariff reform, I have been astonished at the stubborn unreasonableness of some democrats in their adhesion to the fallacy that a high tariff assures a higher rate of wages to all workingmen.” One respectable farmer on whom I urged the levying of the single tax on land value said it would ruin them all.

Mr. Lewis says that the chief difficulty in arguing with these people is that they will not listen to arguments of any kind.

Things Booming Up in Canada—Our Friends Have Captured the Mayor of Toronto and Some of the Aldermen, and They are Making a Dead Set for the Provincial Legislature—The Anti-Poverty Society, Too, is Worrying the Preachers.

TORONTO, Canada, Dec. 12—I take advantage of a few spare moments to let you know how matters are progressing with us.

I know there is a superstitious belief in the United States that we in Canada are hopelessly given over to fossilized toryism, but there is no more ground for that belief than there is for that other American superstition, Protection to American labor. As a matter of fact, I doubt if there is a city in the world to-day of equal size so thoroughly permeated with the George idea as this good city of Toronto. You find it cropping up everywhere. A week ago last Monday the city council received a deputation of our anti-poverty society asking the council to unite in the movement for an exemption of $600 in the assessment of all dwellings, as a step toward the abolition of the taxes on the products of labor. The mayor and many of the aldermen favor the idea and a petition on the line we ask is pretty sure to be presented from the city council to the provincial legislature which has the making of assessment law for this province of Ontario. On the same evening the question of this exemption was decided favorably by the Young men’s liberal club, an independent organization on the same side of politics in general matters as the provincial government. The young liberals last year voted down a resolution in favor of the George idea, but the discussion of the $600 exemption was wholly upon the broad question of principle, and the resolution was sustained by a practically unanimous vote. I do not know that there is now a majority of straight out George men among the members of the club, but I do know that the best working members are nearly all of our way of thinking and that, except in a specially packed meeting, a straight resolution affirming the principle of confiscating rent for public purposes would be carried by two to one. The young liberals will send a strong deputation to urge upon the provincial government the propriety of the exemption of $600 on dwellings. The anti-poverty society sent a deputation of this same kind to the government about a week ago. Five out of the six ministers of the crown were there and the discussion was a lively one. Some of the ministers are hopelessly in the dark on the subject, but they will grant what we ask in a year’s time if not in the session of the legislature just about to open, for there are one or two of the best of them who see the cat almost as plainly as we do.

Last Saturday evening the Osgoode legal and literary society debated the “George question” as we call it here, and the decision of the chairman was that the single tax men had by all odds the best of it. There was a large audience present the majority of whom evidently sympathized with our views. This Osgoode society, I may explain, is an old established [organization?] of lawyers and law students, and has been the training school of some of the brainiest speakers and public men we have in Canada.

STANDARD readers may remember that the Anti-Poverty society asked the ministerial association of this city to hear a deputation who would try to set the preachers right on this question, they having said some absurd things about our views. They declined, and not in the kindliest way either, we thought. Some of the preachers, however, evidently feel that when things are not right and they don’t^sic know how to set them right, they ought at least to report fairly the views of those who claim to know how it ought to be done. Consequently Rev. John Burton, the leading Congregational minister of the city (a man of wide sympathies and of more advanced views than many of his confreres) was asked to read a paper on this subject. This he did on Monday. He hit organized charity very hard and declared for the land reform. At the same time he seems to look with a kind of big brotherly pity upon us people, who, he thinks, hope to cure all social evils with a single remedy. The ministerial association discussed Mr. Burton’s paper briefly after it was read and then adjourned the discussion for a week.

I relate these matters to show you that up here where Americans are so apt to think we are frozen up, we are making things warm enough in the way of the single tax agitation.

I noticed what Henry George said in the last STANDARD about carrying on the work by means of petition. If I understand him aright we are already on the line he favors in agitating for the exemption of $600 on dwellings.

A. C. CAMPBELL.

Judge Maguire’s Idea Seems to Have Struck Popular Favor.

In an article in last week’s STANDARD Judge Maguire suggested that Single tax men concentrate their strength for a campaign in one state, and named New Jersey as the best suited for the purpose. Here are some letters which have been received bearing on the judge’s plan:

Will Back His Indorsement With a Dollar A Week.

MOUNT VERNON, N. Y., Dec. 17—If a concerted effort is made to invade New Jersay^sic as suggested by Judge Maguire in THE STANDARD of December 15, I will back my endorsement of the plan with a subscription of a dollar a week until all state and municipal taxes in that state are levied on land values. I think it practicable to accomplish it within a few years. The effect will be to compel a similar measure in every other state the products of which compete with those of New Jersey.

I am a free trader, but I think the general argument can be more plausibly sustained from the point of the inexpediency of a tax on improvements than from the point of the inadvisablity^sic of a tariff.

As we progress the discussion by reason of the opposition it will arouse, will become more radical and will pass from expediency to justice. I believe when the public conscience has been quickened by an appeal to natural law in the direction of free land that the appeal to natural law in favor of free trade will be better listened to.

Let us remember also that there are other free traders than ourselves, and first assuring them of our co-operation, we can leave that special work more to them while we talk land.

But let us discourage the formation of a separate party. Let us indorse those democrats or republicans who favor our views. We, who, in the Second assembly district of Westchester county voted for Bradford Rhodes (a republican) as certainly voted for the Australian ballot as if we had elected a man on that sole issue.

Though our land tax is so important in its results, the amount of legislation it will require is so little, and the private claims on legislative attention are so many, that it would require much more time to push forward our measure if we only voted for straight single tax men than if we voted for those of other parties who favor in perhaps a smaller degree our plan.

What we want is, not offices, not a chance at private legislation, but a change in the tax laws. Let the politicians fight for the crumbs, but let us get the loaf.

All to whom I have spoken of Judge Maguire’s plan approve it. I urge a full discussion; pending that, I ask others to duplicate my subscription.

Our warfare during the past year has been desultory—all along the line. Let us follow the Napoleonic plan of campaign by massing our forces against the enemy’s weakest point. The landowners’ weakest point is where a multiplicity of interests—those of the sailor, the miner, the artisan, the working farmer and the day laborer (all our natural allies), are each found to be opposed by the landowner’s interest, and where no unfortunate clause in the state constitution shields him.

RICHARD WELTON.

Let Us Invade New Jersey.

BROOKLYN.—Judge Maguire has suggested the right kind of a suggestion. Let us adopt it. Concentrate all our forces on the state of New Jersey. To this we will willingly contribute.

C. SCHALKENBACK.

That Plan Moves the Blood.

NORFOLK, W. Va., Dec. 17.—Judge Maguire’s letter will move the blood of single tax men, and make their hearts go quick. One hundred and twenty-five thousand votes in New Jersey is not so highly improbable when we consider our experience in New York. It is a disheart ening task, this laying of a foundation as big as the United States; scarcely to be gone at more than languidly. But all gathered, as it were, on one spot, we should do hopeful work. Every stroke would tell, visibly, too. I believe that single tax men all over the land would pinch themselves gladly to supply funds for such a continued and hopeful campaign. And our theory once in practice in New Jersey, in two years—one year—less—every practical business man in New York would be howling for the single tax there, too. And the states would go down before us like ten pins. There seems some hope in this; let us hear from our leaders.

EDWARD K. ROBERTSON.

Let Us Begin Now.

BUFFALO, N. Y.—The suggestions and facts given by Judge Maguire in your issue of the 15th inst., under the heading “Shall We Invade New Jersey?” are so very important to the cause we advocate that steps should be immediately taken to put into operation the campaign of propaganda for the winter months and keeping it up until we have wiped out the private ownership of land. Let the good work begin now.

R. H. FERGUSON.

On for New Jersey!

BARTOW-ON-SOUND, Westchester Co., N. Y., Dec. 16.—I have carefully read Judge Maguire’s letter in the current issue of the THE STANDARD^sic and am fully convinced that his plan is the most feasible one yet presented. His words are inspiring and make the reader eager to participate in the fray. As I read I fancy I hear the rolling of the drums accompanied by the martial tread of the single tax legions advancing upon the fastnesses of the landlords and monopolists of New Jersey. The bombardment of these strongholds cannot begin too soon. As my part in the work I will contribute twenty-five cents each week while the war lasts. The amount is not very large, but it may buy enough intellectual dynamite to reduce a few of the outposts.

CHARLES A. CROUCH.

Let Us All Unite on this Plan.

RADNOR, Delaware county, Pa.—Among the many recommendations of plans for single tax men to pursue in order that we may secure early practical results, I see none which so approves itself to my mind as the editorial of this week by James G. Maguire. His suggestions seem to me practical and sensible, and would, if carried out, result in all that he anticipates. Let us all unite upon some plan. My vote is for this one.

WILLIAM H. FUSSELL.

Wants to Have New Jersey Invaded.

NEWARK, N. J., Dec. 15.—I have read with a great deal of interest Judge James G. Maguire’s article in this week’s STANDARD entitled “Shall we invade New Jersey?” and I want to express my earnest approval of his recommendation.

As a life time resident of the state, and as an earnest believer in the single tax idea, I agree that New Jersey can be made the lever with which to move the world, and I would go a step further than Judge Maguire by urging that the single tax man resident^sic in New York and Brooklyn should not only come over to New Jersey as teachers, but that they shall move over, making New Jersey their home. There are enough single tax men resident p. 2, col. 4 in New York and Brooklyn at the present time to carry every legislature district^sic in Hudson, Essex, Union, Bergen and Passaic counties, and thus hold the balance of legislative power, if they were voters in these counties.

New Jersey has been for a long time cursed with two systems of taxation—one for the railroad corporation and another for the people. The rate of taxation for the railroad is one-half of one per cent and until late years they paid, if they wanted to, on what they please to call “their” valuation, while the rate of taxation upon the people has run from one to two and a half per cent.

I urge that we offer up a vote of thanks to our Californian friend for his advice, that “We invade New Jersey.”

WILLIAM O. MCDOWELL, 20 Spruce street.

But He Suggests a Simplification in the Plan of Operations—Some Sound Ideas.

TACOMA, Wash. Ter.—I write to support the idea of Veritas Vincit—to concentrate all our ideas on one state, but think his plan too cumbrous for practical use. The pay roll of one hundred and sixty-seven men would be immense to start with. It would be much better to appoint one man at a time, and to begin with one township. Get a list of voters in the township; forward to each voter a copy of “Protection or Free Trade?” or “Progress and Poverty” or “Social Problems,” and after a week or ten days had elapsed send him THE STANDARD for a month. Thus spending about forty cents on each voter, plus expenses of management. As soon as one township is finished start and take up another; always picking out the townships that are the least populated, or those most difficult to get at. Do not try to organize, but leave the people themselves free to form clubs, etc.

I am but a poor devil of a house painter, but I will give $10, at the rate of a dollar a month, to start such a work. I feel confident of success, and hope that at least ninety-nine more men will send their names into THE STANDARD to start the ball rolling.

The voters are the ones that count. Each voter represents about five at least of the population. If he is not able to see the cat, some one in the house that he lives in will. I also feel confident that at least ten per cent of those we reach will become subscribers to THE STANDARD, which in itself will be an immense gain. I trust that the readers of THE STANDARD will give this matter their earnest consideration, and that some such idea will be carried out.

F. C. CLARKE, 1308 K street.

Commence With Rhode Island or Delaware.

MARATHON, Tex.—I believe we should concentrate our energies upon one state, and would say either Rhode Island or Delaware. We have money and talent enough to cover the whole of either of these states, and to make a personal appeal to almost every voter. After capturing that state we could try another.

I. B. WALLACE.

Concentrate on Dakota.

BELLEFONTAINE, O.—The colonists were defeated at Bunker Hill and the federal army at Bull’s Run, but the former were victorious at Yorktown and the latter at Appomattox. Free trade likewise will win. I heartily approve of Mr. Bailey’s proposition to concentrate our whole strength upon Dakota.

F. M. MARQUIS.

What Democrats Should Do.

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind.—In 1884 Cleveland and Hendricks received a plurality of [23,005?] of the popular vote; in 1888 Cleveland and Thurman received a plurality of 98.261^sic! Here is the victory. It needs no elaboration—it speaks for itself. In this campaign the democratic party advocated a great reform—the shifting of the burdens of taxation on those who could best bear them. The verdict of the election was not the verdict of the people. No democrat should feel disheartened at the result of the election. Whatever advantage was gained was on one side. It was an “educational” campaign, and was a gigantic success, no matter what some so-called democrats call it. It proved this, if nothing more—that free trade is not odious to the majority of the American people. All democrats should busy themselves in disseminating free trade literature, and in 1892 we will see whether or not an educational party can succeed.

HENRY C. LONG.

A Suggestion About a Name.

JAMESTOWN, N. Y.—Have just received the blanks for petitions from Mr. Croasdale. This idea of combining enrollment with petitioning is a masterly move, and I think will be successful. I think I shall be able to return several of the blanks signed; perhaps all ten.

May I make a suggestion? It would be that we single tax people call our organizations “Unions for the Abolition of Taxes on the Products of Industry.” Why do I do it? Because people are greatly ruled by names. For proof, witness the protective tariffs. Let them be called “taxes on foreign commerce,” or “impediments of exchange of commodities,” and see how differently people would look on them. And so with the single tax on land values. By proposing to only tax land values we will arouse animosities and antagonisms that we would avoid if proposing simply to exonerate industry from any taxes on its activity and fruits.

F. G. A.

Ballot Reform in West Virginia.

PARKERSBURG, W. Va., Dec. 15.—Printed heads for petitions to the legislature of West Virginia for the adoption of the Australian system of voting, together with a copy of the proposed bill, will be furnished free to any persons who may apply to me for them.

T. E. QUINN, Chairman Com. Electoral Reform League.

p. 2, col. 5

About Professor Garland’s Idea and Other Matters.

BOSTON, Mass.—I use my copy of THE STANDARD for missionary work, marking every article or paragraph which I think will arouse thought. I then inclose one or two of the excellent single tax tracts.

I think Professor Garland’s suggestion for printing single tax texts on note heads is a good one. But letter heads of the same nature would be better still, for then every single tax man would use them in his correspondence.

I hope the lecture bureau scheme will be pushed, for there are a large number of localities where our movement is backward, because of the lack of good speakers, and if these places could be treated to an exposition of the single tax doctrine once a year by a speaker of ability it would bring very many recruits into the ranks.

W. L. CROSMAN, Post Composing room, Boston.

To Facilitate Ballot Reform Work.

CHESTER, Pa.—Suppose the national committee on enrollment be authorized to publish a one-page pamphlet to contain the following:

1. A cut showing the Australian system of election in working order, such as was published in THE STANDARD on two occasions.

2. A short and concise statement showing the faults of our present system of balloting and how they could be remedied.

3. A request that if the man agrees with the foregoing he place his name and address in ink upon the coupon attached to the bot tom of the sheet. The signatures could be collected, and would be of great value to state and local committees in getting up petitions to legislatures. The national committee could furnish such a tract to clubs at small cost.

This method would facilitate the getting of signatures and save an enormous amount of tongue work for the canvasser.

Any one could start out with some of these in his pocket and get signatures. If the voters of a family were not in he could leave one with the request that it be signed and preserved until he called later on.

He could then collect the tracts, tear off the coupons containing the names and forward them to the state committee, where they could be made into petitions and sent to the state legislature. It seems to me that we should devote most of our energies to ballot reform, and that this is a cheap and effective method of doing so.

WM. L. NUGGETT.

We Must Instruct by Means of Simple Stories.

MORRISTOWN, N. J.—I have been much interested in reading the letters on “What We Should Do.” In my opinion, what we need most is a series of tracts illustrating the different points and written in a conversational and story telling style, somewhat like the “Stories for Farmers.” The great mass of people whom we have to educate are veritable children in intellect and so much occupied and worn with the struggle for existence that they absolutely will not read anything that is not written in the most attractive and entertaining manner.

I have seen people of different classes again and again read simple articles or stories and neglect the much more logical but more profound writings. Simple stories are the only way in which we can reach the overworked farmer. The prohibitionists are wise in this respect; and whether this is the cause of their growth or not, they are certainly growing in the face of tremendous obstacles. Stories for farmers are good as far as they go, but what we need is something showing how certain causes produce certain effects and how a change would remedy it. Yours, etc.,

S. E. FORD, box 521.

A Texas Man’s Idea.

WILLS POINT, Texas.—Let Henry George come to Texas and show the people the cat as it is shown in “Progress and Poverty” and very soon hundreds will begin to point it out to the ignorant many who never even as much as heard that there was a cat.

W. P. GIBBARD.

Wants a New Organization.

NEW YORK.—From many conversations with our friends in my district it appears to me that a meeting should be called for the purpose of decided organization. It should be settled at that meeting what title the organization shall have, so that as soon as deemed advisable we can secure a charter.

GEORGE MILNE.

A Call for a Conference Early in January—A Move on the Legislature Contemplated—Fall in! Fall in!

To Montana Single Tax Men: Realizing the urgent necessity of immediate action in regard to ballot reform and other questions of importance to single tax men;

We, the undersigned, request and urge every single tax man in Montana to meet with us at Helena, at the court house, at 2 o’clock p. m., on Wednesday, Jan. 2, 1889, to organize for immediate and future action.

Our legislature meets in January, 1889, and sits but sixty days.

If we expect to accomplish anything for electoral reform in the near future we have no time to lose. All that wish to attend will please notify Judge J. M. Clements, Helena, Mont., at once, so that proper arrangements can be made.

Those who cannot attend will please send such written suggestions as they wish to make.

Theo. Schweitzer, Meadow Creek, Mont. S. F. Ralston, Marysville, Mont. R. J. Forrey, Marysville, Mont. Geo. W. Padbury, Marysville, Mont. Joe Oker, Marysville, Mont. Watt Piercy, Helena, Mont. Geo. Stewart, Helena, Mont. J. M. Clements, Helena, Mont. W. E. Brokaw, Alhambra, Mont.

Brought Over Within the Last Six Months and Now as Enthusiastic as Any of Us.

PORT ANGELES, Wash. Ter.—Until about six months ago I considered Henry George a traitor to the cause of labor, and believed, as did many others, that he had sold out to the democratic party. Finally, however, I was able to “see the cat;” to see that by working with that party he was promulgating his principles and ideas among the members of that party; to see that, if successful, that party would owe much to him; to see that free trade was needed for the prosperity of the country, and that tariff reduction led to ultimate free trade; to see that the single tax was the only right and just tax, and that the abolition of other taxes would center the tax on land values alone. The republican ranks had no place for me thereafter, for I had become an out and out free trader and single taxer.

Mr. George showed his wisdom when he espoused the cause of Grover Cleveland, and p. 2, col. 6 although the fight was lost, yet will the battle be won. The people are thinking, and “truth is mighty and must prevail.” Another four years and the people will be ready to accept in full that which, this time, they would but have accepted in part. He has thus done more for the cause of labor than he and his party could have accomplished in many years single handed and alone. “Free trade! free land! free men!” is now the motto of our paper, The Commonwealth. Needless perhaps to say, that it will uphold Mr. George and his teachings, and will do what little it can toward showing the people of this territory the true light and the only remedy for that hopeless poverty which so degrades and disgraces our civilization.

E. B. MASTICK, Jr. Associate Ed. The Commonwealth.

And Where There is Smoke There is Fire.

DEFIANCE, Ohio.—In the Chicago Tribune of December 8, these words appeared editorially:

The land speculator made his appearance early in this country. . . . When the settlement was fairly under way the labor of those to whom he had sold or given would add vastly to the value of his unimproved possession. . . . The Illinoisans felt sore when they saw the lands all about them, which were owned at the east, growing in value with every furrow which they turned, every tree they felled, every fence they built. The Dakota farmer now sees all about him expanses of untilled land owned at a distance which he is expected to make valuable. He does not like the idea that another should reap where he has not sown and gather where he has not planted, and he is beginning to make war on him.

This is not much—it may be only smoke—but smoke is an indicator of fire. Let us hope that the stokers of the Tribune sanctum will stir up the fire regularly and give it a good draught.

That paper has been one of the most bitter and unfair of the opponents of what it is pleased to call “Georgeism.” In fact it has been one of the “White Caps” of journalism, whose mission was to regulate disreputable economists and it has not yet shed off its old acrimony. Although in the article above referred to evidence is seen of carelessness as to the vested rights of non-resident land speculators, it asseverates that this is all there is to the Dakota movement and solemnly explains that “the attempt now making in Dakota to change the system of taxation so that all the burdens shall be thrown on the land and personal property be relieved, has been confounded with the Henry George single tax plan, which it does not resemble.” It gives the timely information that the George single tax plan is “to turn over to the state to be put up at auction to the highest bidder, the land which they have moistened with their sweat and made fertile with their labor,” and it says “those who imagine that the Dakotan is going to give up the fruits of his labors, turn himself into a state tenant according to the George plan, are vastly mistaken.”

GEO. T. ALPRESS.

Two Encouraging Signs in Chicago.

CHICAGO, Dec. 8.—Two important notes of progress in this city may be recorded. The Statesman magazine, edited by Walter Thomas Mills, a man of brains and liberality, is admitting single tax discussions to its pages, two notable articles appearing in the December number, one by Chas. M. Wetzel, the other by James Malcolm.

That is one thing.

The other is the serious attention given the single tax doctrine in the editorial columns of the Chicago Tribune. Recently several articles have appeared on the subject, the ground taken being favorable to the single tax as a mere fiscal device, but hostile to it as directed against landlordism.

Its arguments are of the usual character; its conclusions just what we would all expect. The matter for congratulation on our part is that the Tribune treats the doctrine seriously, and indorses our means. That it damns our ends is of small consequence. It is uphill business preaching landlordism nowadays in the face of evictions in Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Meanwhile, agitation continues and converts are multiplying.

W. W. BAILEY.

Getting Signatures Is as Easy as Rolling Off a Log.

ALEXANDRIA, Minn., Dec. 12.—I never before realized how easy it was to get signatures to the petitions asking the legislature to submit to the people an amendment to the constitution permitting the exemption of personal property and improvements from taxation. During the last three days I have snatched a few minutes now and then from business to solicit signatures, and obtained fifty-three. There were only four refusals. I am satisfied that if I had time and could make a straight canvass I could get nine out of ten men to sign.

W. H. VAN ORNUM.

To Louisville Men.

Those single tax men of Louisville who have the courage of their convictions are requested to meet at Liederkranz hall, Market street, between First and Second, at 8 o’clock on Thursday evening Dec. 27, for the purpose of conferring as to the best means to adopt for starting the agitation in that city.

Organized in Olean.

A single tax association has been organized in Olean, N. Y. George Ball is president and Timothy Horan secretary. The members of the association are very much in earnest and intend to make many of their townspeople see “a great light” before the winter is over.

THE TRUE FREE TRADERS OF ENGLAND STRIKE HANDS WITH THE SINGLE TAX MEN OF AMERICA.

The Financial Reform Association Declares For the Tax on Land Values—Proceedings of the Great Meeting in Liverpool to Present an Address to Henry George.

The following verbatim report of the presentation of an address to Henry George by the council of the Financial reform association we take from the December issue of the Financial Reformer, the organ of the association:

On the 30th of November Mr. George was presented with an address by the council of the Financial reform association. The meeting was held in the Rotunda lecture hall, which was crowded to its utmost capacity, many being unable to obtain admission. Mr. Muspratt, the president of the association, who occupied the chair, in his introductory remarks, said:

President Muspratt’s Speech.

I am sure it is not necessary for me to say very much to introduce Mr. Henry George to a Liverpool audience. (Applause.) Mr. George is known as an eloquent expounder of the principles of land nationalization. (Hear, hear.) “But,” I have been asked, “what has the Financial reform association to do with land nationalization?” and I found it very easy to answer. (Hear, hear.) The answer is, Mr. George and the Financial reform association have been working on converging lines for a great number of years. Mr. George was first known in this country by his wonderful and stirring and eloquent book, “Progress and Poverty.” (Applause.) In that book he showed, and I think conclusively showed, that the monopolization of the land by a comparatively few individuals was the cause—at any rate a very large cause—of the misery amongst a large portion of the population. (Applause.) But he also, in his economical studies, found that the want of freedom of exchange was also another cause of the misery of the people, and therefore, Mr. George has become the expounder not only of land nationalization but also of freedom of trade. (Hear, hear.) Well, the Financial reform association started with these principles—economical government, just taxation and perfect freedom of trade; and they very soon found out that without direct taxation you could not have perfect freedom of trade, and that in order that taxation should be just it must be direct. Their further studies led them to look to the history of taxation in this country, and what do you think they found? They found that it had been the policy of some 250 years to take off the taxation from the land and put it on the industry and labor of the community. (Hear, hear.) They were therefore driven to this conclusion, that in order to obtain perfect freedom of trade and just taxation it was absolutely necessary that we should revert to a land tax. (Hear, hear.) Therefore you see that the Financial reform association and Mr. George have, as I said, been working on converging lines; because, after all, what is a land tax? A land tax is simply the reservation of a portion of the rent derived from the land, which rent is produced by the labor and industry of the people. (Hear, hear.) Therefore, what can be more just, what can be more right, what can be more equitable than a land tax? Because if you tax the land you thereby practically get from the labor and industry of every individual a portion of the cost of government. (Hear, hear.)

We have also found in our studies as to what constitutes freedom of trade, that it is not only necessary that you should have freedom of exchange, but that you should have freedom to produce. But how can you have freedom of production when the first result of the labor of the people has to go into the pockets of the landlords in the shape of mining rents and royalties, and in the shape of rent for all the land in the immediate neighborhood of large towns? Do you suppose that the rent of the land at Bootle and the neighborhood of Liverpool is caused by any exertion of the lords of Derby? (Laughter.) Why, the whole value of the land has been produced by the industry of the laboring population of this town! Therefore it is one of the principles of the Financial reform association, in order to have perfect freedom of trade, that we should have direct taxation, and a great portion of the direct taxation must take the form of a land tax. (Applause.)

I will not occupy time any further, because I know you have come here, not to listen to me, and not to listen even to the expounding of the principles of the Financial reform association, but to hear Mr. George; but before calling upon him I would like to ask the secretary to read the address which the Financial reform association propose to present to him.

Mr. Callie, the secretary, then read the following address:

The Address.

Henry George, Esq.: Sir—As members of the Council of the Financial reform association we take this opportunity to express our appreciation of your efforts on behalf of free trade in America, and our congratulations upon the marked success with which those efforts have been attended. We fully recognize the self denial and statesmanlike forethought which prompted you to sink your personal aims and devote your energy to endeavoring to secure the election of Mr. Cleveland, in whose programme you perceived an effort, however weak and timorous, to break down those fiscal chains which hamper the prosperity of your country.

So long as the presidential election was pending, this association deemed it inadvisable to in any way attempt to interfere. But we do not hold the opinion that the adoption of free trade principles by America would be fraught with the disasters to that country some of your protectionist writers have anticipated. There would be an increase in trade between America and this country, but that would be a mutual benefit, and there are some of us who hold that when America, with her vast resources, adopts free trade then, and not till then, shall we know what serious foreign competition means.

In regard to the land question, although there may be some difference as to the means there is no difference as to the object we both seek to attain, viz.: that the land be used for the benefit of the whole people, and we feel that the subject is so important and so pressing that it is our duty to look for the points of agreement, not of difference, between all engaged in land law reforms. We have been driven to the study of the land question. Our objects are economical government, just taxation, perfect freedom of trade. We have found that these objects are intertwined and inseparable; unless you have perfect freedom of trade you cannot have just taxation or economical government. and, further^sic, that to attain these objects a radical reform of our land laws is necessary. When we study our question from the historical point of view, we can trace a slow but constant transfer of taxation from land on to labor, and coincident with that the practical enslavement of an ever-increasing portion of the community. On the economic side we find that a few landholders have monopolized that which is intended for all, and that it is to this contravention of political economy that the terrible destitution of a great portion of the community can be traced.

For forty years we, as an association, have p. 3, col. 2 been endeavoring to educate public opinion on these questions, and we would gladly acknowledge the great assistance we have received from the dissemination of your thoughtful writings. At our annual meeting held in February last a resolution was unanimously carried calling for the repeal of the duties upon tea, coffee, chicory, dried fruits, gold and silver plate, and the tax upon carriages, and the substitution of a tax upon land values.

A tax upon land values will be a great step towards just taxation. By the repeal of what John Bright termed the breakfast table duties the cost of living will be reduced, and thus a great boon be conferred upon the laboring classes, and a further step be taken in the policy of giving to man freedom to exchange the products of his labor for the products of the labor of others. But above all, by a tax upon land values, based upon the use value of the land and levied, whether the land be put to use or not, the laborer will be allowed access to the land to produce for himself those things necessary to his existence, for the landlord cannot afford to pay taxation upon that which brings him in no rent. You also advocate a tax upon land values, and when we consider the appalling misery and destitution which exist in our land, and which we claim a tax upon land would go far to relieve, we feel it our duty to sink all differences as to what the amount of that tax should be, and do our best to co-operate, as far as possible, with you in your work.

Wishing you success in your efforts, we are on behalf of the council of the financial reform association

EDMUND K. MUSPRATT, President, J. W. S. CALLIE, Secretary.

The Chairman: I have very much pleasure, Mr. George, in presenting you with that address. (Applause.)

Henry George’s Reply.

Mr. Henry George, who on rising was received with loud cheers, said: Mr. Chairman, members of the council of the Financial Reform association, and Englishmen (applause): I am both gratified and honored by this address. There is in all the three kingdoms no body of men from whom it would give me greater pleasure to receive the right hand of fellowship than from the Financial Reform association of Liverpool. (Applause.) For years before you did me the honor of permitting me to become one of your number I had known you through your work. I recognized in that work the extension, the pushing forward of the great principle for which Richard Cobden fought—(applause)—the great principle, that if carried forward to its full conclusion will not merely unify this great English speaking race all over the world, but will lead to that time the seers have foretold and the poets have sung of, when wars shall be no more and national quarrels shall be hushed in the fraternization of mankind. (Loud applause.) I am glad, as an American, to receive your greeting. To the man who really appreciates what free trade means; to the man who really sees that the true interests of mankind are concurrent and not diverse; that we can only truly advance by the advance of others; that we can only truly profit when others have their just due—to him all the prejudices of nationality and race and religion, all the hates, strifes and old bitternesses sink into contempt and are buried out of sight, and no matter where may be his birthplace he becomes in fullness and in truth a citizen of the world. (Loud applause.)

I am an American free trader—(applause)—in the full and true sense of the term, and as an American free trader I welcome and am grateful for the assistance of the free traders of England. This is no mere national question. It is a world wide question. It concerns us all. And as one nation pushes forward it but lights a beacon for the advance of others. (Applause.) Especially significant to me to-night is this meeting. I recognize, Mr. President, in the welcome you give to me something deeper than a congratulation or a compliment to a man. I recognize something more even than the union of those on both sides of the Atlantic, who would strive for the freedom of trade. I recognize in it the beginning of a union of forces that will carry out free trade to its full and complete realization, that will bring about that time of which Richard Cobden dreamt, in which there shall be no degrading poverty, no aggregations of wealth made monstrous by the want with which they are surrounded; but in which labor getting its full free earnings, capital getting its just dues; all the elements that, working together, aid in the production of wealth, having each their own full share, the fundamental cause of all our social difficulties shall be gone, and mankind released from the strain that now embrutes and degrades so many, shall have the leisure that I believe the Creator intended, for the cultivation and development of their highest powers. (Loud applause.)

THE FREE TRADE MOVEMENT IN THE UNITED STATES.

Let me say to you, from my side of the water, that the great struggle for free trade has commenced in the United States—has commenced in a way that makes it absolutely certain that it never can go back, but must go on to complete realization. Our last campaign, in which Mr. Cleveland was defeated, was only the preliminary struggle. Our whole national development has been aborted^sic by the great slavery struggle. Under stress of that question economic questions had hardly been discussed in the United States. When the war came, when a pressing need was felt for enormous revenues, our protectionists sprang to the front, and, seizing the opportunity, induced congress to levy tax after tax upon a people so earnest and so patriotic that they were ready to give everything for the cause of the Union and ask hardly what tax was imposed. Time has gone on. Neither of the great parties dared to set against themselves the powerful interests that had been enlisted in that system of taxing the whole people for the benefit of a few, until last December Mr. Cleveland sent to oongress^sic his tariff message. Judged from the standpoint of a free trader, it was a poor, weak and timid thing. It asked only for some reductions in protection. Nevertheless it was enough to bring up the question, and the democrats in the house, following his lead, formulated a bill—weak again and timid—proposing only something like five per cent reduction in the average rate of duty and the putting of some articles on the free list. Nevertheless it was a challenge to protection. The men who were interested in maintaining those taxes upon the body of their fellow citizens for their own selfish benefit saw in it a menace to the whole system, and the battle was set. The attack, I am sorry to say, was weak and timid. Yet I don’t know that I need say that, for it is natural. When a great wrong is first attacked, it is always timidly. (Hear, hear.) To a very great degree the fight was faint and half hearted. Nevertheless, it did bring on a discussion, and the campaign, taken as a whole, has done a work of education in economic matters such as has been never before done in the history of the republic. Mr. Cleveland was defeated, but that, to the war that has commenced, is like the defeat of Bull Run was to our civil war. (Applause.)

FREE TRADE AND THE LAND QUESTION.

Your address compliments me for throwing myself into that fight on the side of tariff reform. I deserve no compliment for that. Had I failed to do so I would have been false to my deepest convictions. For years and years, ever since from a protectionist I became a free trader; for years and years, ever since the time when I first realized that p. 3, col. 3 poverty and want—that festering poverty that grows up in the midst of wealth in your great cities, and of which we may see the beginnings in our remotest states—was not due to natural laws—(hear, hear, and applause)—was not caused by the niggardliness of the Creator, but was simply due to our selfishness; to the wrong in which we, by our human enactments, have denied to the masses of men rights which the Creator has intended them to enjoy. (Applause.) Ever since I fully realized the relations between land and labor, ever since I fully understood what the land question meant, I have looked to the beginning of the tariff controversy in the United States, to the struggle between protection and free trade, as the beginning of a struggle that could not rest until industrial slavery was fully abolished and the natural and equal rights of men set forth in our Declaration of Independence were at last fully secured. (Applause.)

I am a free trader. If I were asked what phrase would best define my position it would not be that of a land nationalizer. That is a term I have never used for myself. It would be rather a free trader. But by free trade I mean a good deal more than a mere tariff for revenue. By free trade I mean the carrying of the principle of freedom to its fullest extension in industrial and economic affairs. By free trade I mean, as your president has said, the sweeping away of all restrictions upon freedom. (Hear, hear.) The fight that Richard Cobden and John Bright began in this country over a generation ago has begun in the United States, and I believe that it will not pause as it has paused for some time in this country. That our protectionists are so strong that they will fight bitterly and fight long, makes it only more certain that our victory, when it comes, will be more decided, and that we will carry the movement to greater lengths. (Applause.) I want them to resist, I want them to win some victories, and at first beat back the advancing wave—I want this, that the wave may mount higher. (Applause.)

REAL ADVANCE IN NOMINAL DEFEAT.

Our campaign in the United States demonstrated the advance that has been going forward for some years. I knew when it began that the people who were counting so confidently upon the vote of the workingmen in the manufacturing centres and in the great cities were mistaken in their calculations. I had addressed many audiences in different parts of the United States—audiences of men employed in the protected industries—and I had never [hesitated?] to announce myself as an absolute [free?] trader, and I knew that in the new ideas that had been permeating the masses, in the recognition of equal rights to the use of the materials of the universe, there had been growing up a spirit, there had been spreading abroad a light, that swept away from men’s minds the fallacies of protection. And I was right. Among the very classes in the United States that the protectionists counted on most confidently Mr. Cleveland has gone ahead. In the manufacturing cities, in the great centres of industry, there has been an advance. There the protection delusion has shown its weakness. It is among the communities that were more difficult to reach, among the farmers, among those who had never heard the question discussed, that the protectionists appealed with most force, and to that class is their victory due. But what the towns think to-day^sic the country will think to-morrow (hear, hear), and the workingmen of the towns are certain in a little while to be reinforced by the farmers of the country. During that campaign, while our democratic friends were for the most part half-hearted, while for the most part they took the illogical position of saying that protection was a bad thing, and therefore they wanted a five per cent reduction on the tariff, there were some of us—aye, many of us, for we have been growing in the United States—who stood upon the platform of absolute free trade, who did not call ourselves tariff reformers, but tariff abolishers. (Applause.) We want to sweep away the whole accursed thing. (Hear, hear.) And that cry has gone forth in the United States. (Applause.) We are the men who have been making converts, and who have been advancing—we are the men from whom in the future in the United States you will hear. Often and often the question has been put to me: “Why, if free trade is a good thing; if, as you say, free trade is in the interests of the working classes, why is it there is so much pauperism in Great Britain? Why is it that English wages are so low?” My reply has always been that free trade has not yet triumphed in Great Britain—that free trade has yet to win its victory in Great Britain (hear, hear and applause), and I am gratified by this reception to-night because your association, Mr. President, has been the representative of those Englishmen who recognized that truth, those Englishmen who knew that the task that Mr. Cobden began has not yet been completed, and who wanted to carry forward England to true free trade, and in carrying forward England to carry forward the world. (Applause.)

THE ROOT OF POVERTY.

You say, Mr. Chairman, our lines have been converging. If we have aimed at truth they needs must converge. (Hear, hear.) Truth is one, and no matter how you approach it, if you go on and on, you will see clearer and clearer all other truths as you go. One line that leads to justice must meet all other lines. It is told of Richard Cobden that, being with John Bright at a time when the latter had suffered the most grievous domestic affliction—when he had laid a loved one in the earth—Cobden said to him: “Come away with me. There are women and children in England to-day dying of starvation, of starvation made by the laws. Come with me, and we will not rest until we have abolished those laws.” (Loud applause.) Cobden is dead and his work only begun. John Bright’s life work is probably over. Many people call England a free trade country. Yet in England women and children still die of starvation. (Hear, hear and “Shame.”) Is it not, must it not be, of starvation made by the law? (Cries of “Yes.”) Either by human law or by Divine law that is certain, and to my mind the man who says that it is the result of causes that are beyond control, that this dire poverty and misery are the result of natural laws, is worse—a thousand fold worse—than any Atheist. (Loud applause.) The cause of that poverty, the cause of that starvation, the cause of monstrous want in the very centers of wealth, of ignorance in the midst of enlightenment, of the direst abasement and embrutement in the midst of the highest civilization, comes from the single fundamental fact that the masses of our people have been disinherited. (Loud applause.) Charity may contribute its thousands and tens of thousands, philanthropists may confer, may establish schools and found institutions, legislatures may appoint commissions and enact sanitary regulations, ministers of the gospel may go into the slums and try and preach the light and the glory of Christ’s message, but all in vain. (Hear, hear.) It is baling the sea, so long as you do not go to the root of the evil. So long as the human being is a land animal, so long as man can only live on land and work on land, so long as all wealth is simply the raw material of the land worked up by human labor—then it is inevitable that if the land of any country be treated as the property of one class of that country, no matter how you advance, no matter what inventions may be made, what improvements may be carried p. 3, col. 4 out, there must be at the bottom of the social scale brutishness and vice and ignorance and want and starvation. (Applause.) Nothing is clearer.

PROGRESS OF ENGLISH THOUGHT.

So rapidly has thought advanced in England that I don’t think it is to-day necessary for me to stand here and attempt to prove the equal rights of man to land, to insist upon the obvious fact that every child that is born in this England of yours is at the moment of its birth seized with a right to the use of the land of England equal to that of the eldest son of your proudest duke. (Applause.) That truth has been forcing its way among the masses of your people. To-day, over a century after they were uttered, the truth of these words of the American Declaration of Independence is beginning to be recognized: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” (Applause.) If I rightly judge English opinion to day, that perception has taken a hold upon the masses of your people that can never be lost. Now a great question arises and is pressing to the front, How shall we recognize those rights? (Hear, hear.)

THE QUESTION OF METHOD.

It is perfectly obvious, it needs no discussion, that all men have by right of birth an equal right to the use of the land of their country. That is clear. And yet there is another truth that is equally clear. For the best use of land there must be an individual right of possession that must be oertain^sic. We cannot leave land a common. We cannot treat land as we treat the air, and let any man take at any time what he wants of it. Men will not sow a field unless they be assured that they will be able to reap the crop. No one will put a great building upon a lot to which his title can be questioned at any time. No one will open a mine unless he be assured that he will be able afterwards to profit by his labor. These are the two great principles—that the rights of all men to the use of the land of their country are equal, and that there needs must be individual possession. But they are easily reconciled. Individual possession need not necessarily mean individual ownership. It is perfectly clear that equality could be secured if the community were to treat the land as common property and let it out to the individuals who wished to use it, taking for common use the rents paid by the individuals who had obtained a benefit greater than fell to the mass of their countrymen. That mode of solving the land question is, I think, that which is proposed by those who generally speak of themselves as land nationalizers in the narrow meaning of the term. Such a plan, if carried out, would secure perfect equality; and, as Herbert Spencer well says, an individual could pay his rent quite as well to the state as he could to Sir John or My Lord Duke. (Hear, hear, and laughter.) Nevertheless, there is a complexity attached to that method which is repellant to a man who has perceived the full beauty of economic laws. It is repellant to free traders who believe that in leaving matters as far as possible to individual impulse you will secure the best interests of the whole. There is too much interference about it, and it raises in the beginning the idea of compensation. You are going to take this land from the present owners; therefore you ought to compensate them. (Loud cries of “No,” and a voice “Yes.”) Well, I really think there has been some advance since I was here last. (Applause.)

It is unnecessary for me to say that I don’t believe in compensation. It is not necessary for me to say that, to my notion, if anybody is to be compensated it should be those who have suffered from the system, not those who have gained by it. (Hear, hear.) Nevertheless, there is a practical difficulty. Nevertheless, compensation has strength to many men’s minds.

But there is an easier way still than I have described—a way in which this difficulty can be avoided. It accords with all our customs and habits of thought that, when private property is taken for public uses the holders shall be compensated (hear, hear), but it does not accord with our habits of thought and our practice that when a tax is levied anybody should be compensated for having the tax levied upon him. (Hear, hear and applause.) If you will think of it, it is perfectly clear that to take tho simple^sic and easy way of taxing land values would ultimately lead to the same point as taking land and letting it out. People are used to paying taxes to the state; they are not used to paying rent to the state. Call your rent taxes, and the thing is done. (Applause.) There is everything in a name; I learned that lesson when I was a boy in the city of Philadelphia. I was educated in a very strict faith. My people and the people whom I knew in my childhood, the people who went to our church and other churches of the same kind, had a notion that the theater was a very bad place, and they would not go to the theater on any account. (Laughter.) There is a celebrated fellow citizen of mine of the name of Barnum (laughter), the man who came over here and bought Jumbo. (Laughter.) Barnum came to Philadelphia and he recognized that prejudice, and he saw that, although there were a number of theaters running for the ungodly, a theater he could get the godly to go to would pay extremely well. But he did not start a theater. Oh, no! He started a lecture room, and ran in that lecture room theatrical representations. It was crowded every night in the week, with two matinees in the afternoons. (Laughter.) Now it seems to me, and it has seemed to me from the beginning, that the easy way, the gentle way, the kindly way, the pleasant way of getting rid of the landlord was not by violently dispossessing him, but by simply taxing him out. (Applause.)

THE GOOD, OLD ENGLISH WAY.

And this method has enormous advantage to conservative thought, as pointed out by your president. This is no Yankee notion, as some people said it was when I came over here a few years ago. It is a going back to the good old English custom. (Hear, hear.) It is a matter of fact, as your president has pointed out, that absolute property in land— that treatment of land which accords to it the same full right of ownership that by natural law attaches to things produced by labor—came by a gradual series of usurpations. Theoretically, in Great Britain to-day there is but one owner of land, that is the crown, the representative of the whole people; and all those people who rent land and sell land are merely tenants of the crown—that is to say, of the English people. (Hear, hear.) They got that land originally with the understanding that they should pay rent, and for many years they did pay rent, sometimes in money, sometimes in services. (Hear, hear.) In this is the explanation of the otherwise astounding fact asserted by such men as Hallam the historian and Thorold Rogers, who has made a study of the history of social conditions during the earlier centuries—the astounding fact that six centuries ago, when all the arts of production were but in their infancy; in that rude, dark time, as we are accustomed to call it, the condition of the man who had nothing but the power to labor, the condition of the mere laborer in Great Britain, was far better than is the condition of millions now. In those rude times one portion of the land maintained the expense of the sovereign and the civil list, Another^sic p. 3, col. 5 portion of the land maintained the expense of public worship, of charities, of the care of the sick and of education. And a third portion of the land—the military tenures—bore the cost of the fighting. The people who held these lands had to fight themselves and to bring other men to fight. (Hear, hear.) There was no taxation on tea, no putting on of an income tax when war was declared. (Hear, hear.) There was no monstrous debt. Those obligations were gradually thrown off whilst the appropriation of the commons went on, ending finally, after the restoration, in the entire abolition of what was left of the military dues, the feudal tenures proper, and the substitution of indirect taxes, falling on the masses of the people. Now, to secure the rights of every Englishman in English soil, all you have got to do is to go back the way you came and re-impose on landlordism the taxes that landlord parliaments have shifted off on labor. (Applause.)

THE FREE TRADE PRINCIPLE.

In doing that you would carry out the principle of free trade to its legitimate conclusion. When England adopted a revenue tariff it was thought by enthusiastic free traders of the day that the world would soon follow its example. The world has not. The real truth is this, that you have never yet shown the world the full advantages of free trade. You have never carried it out to that point where its influence in the elevation of the working classes would begin to be strikingly apparent. (Applause.)

Now see what the argument is. In our country we have a monstrous protective tariff, a system of taxation that is imposed simply for the purpose of making prices high, so that the people who have certain things to sell can force the rest of their fellow countrymen to pay higher prices. Our whole system aims at keeping goods out of the country. That is the only way in which it can protect. Now what are goods? Why, they are good things, as their name implies. (Hear, hear.) They are the things we all want, we all desire to get. We call that man rich who has or can command many of them. We call that man poor who wants them. And when we say that a nation is increasing in prosperity, we mean what? Simply that its wealth is increasing—not its land, not its population; but that it is increasing in goods, in commodities—that there are more of them in the country. And that is the wealthiest country that has the most of such commodities. It is very stupid to put on a tariff to keep those things out. We ought to welcome men who bring them into the country, instead of fining them. (Hear, hear.) There would be a good deal more sense in our imposing a tariff on those who are going to carry goods out of the country than on those who bring them in. Therefore we ought to sweep away that tariff. And therefore, going further, we ought to sweep away even a tariff levied for revenue, because a tariff levied for revenue necessarily operates in that way, and necessarily it operates unjustly. It is not worth my while going into the argument before you to-night, but whoever goes into it will see that a revenue tax is the most unjust way of raising a revenue. Here, for instance, you raise a great part of your revenue by a tax on tea. Now the poorest work girl drinks as much tea as the finest lady—more I think. There are lots of your population, a great part of whose living consists of bread and tea. Yet you make the poor working girl, the man who has a large family to support, and has hard work to do it, pay as much in that tax as your greatest millionaire or richest duke. (A voice: A hundred per cent more.) And so on through all your indirect taxes. (Hear, hear.)

Free trade, in its narrow sense means that there ought to be perfect freedom to exchange. And why? Because exchange is a mode of production. Production is not completed until the man who is going to use the thing gets it, and trade is that mode of production which enables all the other economies. If each man had to make himself everything he wanted, he would have to want mighty little. (Laughter.) If every man had to be his own tailor, his own clock maker, his own house builder, his own farmer, his own butcher, his own doctor, his own dentist, and so on, the result would be absolute savagery. Trade permits the division of labor, the cultivation of skill, the development of ingenuity, the acquirement of knowledge. It enables us to avail ourselves, though we remain in one place, of the advantages nature has given to other places, of the special adaptibilities^sic of other people. Thus trade aids production. Now then, if it is stupid to keep things out of the country by taxes and fines, it is clearly as stupid to prevent their production in the country by taxes and fines. (Hear, hear.) If you tax houses you necessarily restrict the building of houses, and there will be fewer houses built. If you tax vans and wheels—(groans)—you will certainly have fewer vans and fewer wheels. (Laughter.) Therefore the principle of free trade condemns all such taxes. (Hear, hear.)

THE MORAL SIDE OF THE ARGUMENT.

Free trade means free production, and it is essential to free production that no man shall be taxed for having produced a thing. The spirit of free trade condemns all such taxes. It condemns not merely indirect taxes, but from that most important side—the moral side of the question, all direct taxes that fall upon articles of wealth are just as clearly condemned^sic. The question between free trade and protection is a moral question. This whole question of taxation is a moral question. The right to freely trade is just as essential as tho right^sic to freely speak. (Applause.) A man cannot be a free man when his trade is taxed. We in America are not yet free. Free! Why if I buy my wife a dress over here, as I get to the other side of the Atlantic, and the statue of liberty enlightening the world looms up before me, a customs officer comes up to me and makes me hold up my right hand and call upon the Mighty Father, Creator of heaven and earth, to witness that I have nothing dutiable about me. Well, if I do as most Americans do who are protectionists, and swear that I have not (laughter) I will still have to give the customs officer my keys. and^sic he will open my bag or box and look through it, and in all probability he will see that dress for my wife unless I have put a “greenback” on the top. (Laughter and applause.) So I am fined or blackmailed for having done what I have a perfect natural right to do. Through all its stages, from the rich men who spend, as they have spent in this last American election, millions to debauch and corrupt their fellow citizens, and to prevent the abolition of taxes which are filling our treasury with a worse than useless surplus—down through all its gradations the whole system is corrupt and demoralizing. (Applause.) And if you realize the harmony of the natural laws you must know that it must be so, from the fact that it is a violation of justice. It is my right as a man to freely exchange my labor with any other man. (Applause.) It is my natural right, and it ought to be my right as an American citizen, to freely bring into the port of the great republic anything I choose that won’t hurt anybody else. (Applause.) It is perfectly right to enact laws to keep out plagues, to keep out vermin, to keep out bad things; but the enactment of a law to keep out good things, to violate my natural right, must end in corruption. (Hear, hear.) So it is with the taxes that we levy, and that you levy upon things that are the product of labor. A man builds a house p. 3, col. 6 here, and under your system, as under ours, your rate assessor comes round and says, “How much is that house worth?” and the better the house the man has built the more he is fined for it. (Laughter.) Think of the absurdity of it! (Hear, hear.) Have you houses enough? Why, look at the 40,000 people living in Glasgow in one room homes; look at the crowded population of London and the slums of Liverpool. The man who builds a house ought to be considered a public benefactor, but by the system of taxation, which prevails on both sides of the Atlantic, he is considered a malefactor, and the bigger and the better house he builds, and the more houses he builds, the more he is fined. (Applause.)

Men like me have been taunted by foolish men with not respecting the Eighth Commandment. We are the men who do respect it. (Applause.) We are the men who do stand for the rights of property. We are the men who believe “Thou shalt not steal” to be the enactment by a power superior to that of any human legislature. There is in our view a sacred right of property, and the existence and the progress of civilization depend upon the respect for that right. Whatever a man brings into being, whatever human exertion produces from the raw materials of nature—that belongs to the man who has produced it. It belongs to him as against all the world. No other individual has a right to take it from him under any normal circumstances, nor has any government. If a majority of votes do not mark the distinction between right and wrong, no government has the moral right to take from him or to impair his right in it. But this exclusive right of property in things produced by labor is impaired by taxes upon the products of labor. (Applause.)

FREE TRADE TAXES.

All these taxes, it is perfectly clear, both as a matter of expediency and of justice, should be abolished. The principle of free trade requires that. Where are you going to get your taxes, then? Easily. There is a fund which grows with the progress of society, a fund which increases with every increase in population and with every public improvement, a fund which no individual can justly claim, but which belongs to the whole community, a fund which can be taken by the community for public uses without putting any burden upon labor, without hampering enterprise, without depriving capital of its just reward. That fund is the value which social progress attaches to land. (Applause.) For instance, the value of a house in a place like this is a value created by human labor. It represents human exertion. Some individual or individuals built this house, compensating other individuals for their labor upon the materials which have been brought together in the shape and form of this house. And its value—a value which, be it remarked, decreases, not increases, as time passes—depends on the amount of labor which would be necessary to re-produce it. But the value of the site—what does that depend upon? The site was not produced by human labor. If this site has a great value it is not because any few individuals have produced that value, it is because the whole population of Liverpool is about it. Every child that is born, every emigrant that comes, every public improvement that is made, adds not to the value of the house, but does add to the value of the ground. (Applause.) Take that for public uses and then you could easily abolish all these other taxes that hamper and restrict production, that punish men for enterprise and industry and thrift. (Applause.) When you have done that then the principle of free trade is carried out to its full conclusion. (Hear, hear and great applause.) When you have done that you have not only removed all the restrictions upon production that come from taxes levied on production or on wealth, and destroyed the monopolies they create, but you have broken up the most important and fundamental of all monopolies. When you tax the vacant plot just as fully as the plot beside it, with the fine house erected thereon; when you take the full value that the growth of the community attaches to bare land, then the incentive for holding land without using it is gone. (Hear, hear.) Then, not only will the community get that fund that to my mind is clearly the natural basis and source of taxation, intended by the Creator for the social needs of civilization, but you put all men on an equal level with regard to the use of land. The man who is then using land will only pay to his fellows a fair rate for using it, and the man who is not using land will have to give it up when anyone else wants to use it. There is the easy solution of this land question. (Applause.) It is a solution we cannot reach all at once. I, for one, would like to reach it to-morrow morning, but I know it is necessarily a series of steps. We must press forward as hard as we can. The other people will do the resisting. (Laughter.) But on this line every step that is gained makes easier the next step; on this line there is no point at which men can come in and claim compensation; on this line you get immediate relief with every step, and every step makes it easier to resume the nominal control, if you want to. If you do intend sometime to buy the landlord out, the more you tax land values before that bargain the cheaper to the people it will be. (Laughter and applause.)

THE WORK THAT OF EDUCATION^sic.

And let me tell you why it is a matter of such deep significance to me that the Liverpool financial reform association is setting forward on this line. I recognize in this body the pioneers of English economical thought. They have been doing a most important and telling work. Your politicians are not thinkers. (Laughter.) It is the same all over the world, and I believe your greatest English statesman, Mr. Gladstone—(applause)—has said it is the business of the politician to do what the people want, not to lead. The portrait of Mr. Gladstone on the first cover of the Financial reform almanac, or, rather, the body of facts and statistics the almanac contains, does far more for the leadership of the people than Mr. Gladstone himself. (A voice: “Of the masses.”) Aye, and it is the public opinion of the masses that ultimately controls. Now while there seems to be, on the part at least of the great liberal party, a determination to take up this land question, a recognition of the fact that it must be dealt with, there is a considerable doubt about the way. The way in which you lead is the true way and the easy way—the way that must commend itself to all thoughtful men if they will but consider it. (Applause.)

“THE LANDLORD’S RELIEF BILL.”

Let me ask you—if you will allow me to speak of it—to think of the purchase bill. (Groans and a voice: “Landlords’ relief bill.”) Yes, the landlords’ relief bill, as Michael Davitt calls it, and the tenants’ relief bill, as the gentlemen of the government call it. But, mark you, whether it be a landlords’ relief bill or a tenants’ relief bill, it involves the essential principle of protection: it involves a principle that you never ought to submit to—the principle of using the power of government and the public funds for the benefit of one class. (Applause.) I don’t care whether that class be the small class of the landlords—the agricultural landlords—of Ireland, or the larger class of the agricultural tenants. What reason is there that the working people of Great Britain should be taxed for the benefit either of the Irish landlords or of the Irish tenants? (Hear, hear.) If you begin the continued on p. 8 →

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Mr. Cushman, of Oxford, Presents Some Facts and Figures About Them For the Springfield “Republican” to Digest.

OXFORD, Mass., Dec. 10.—The Springfield Republican has attempted a reply to my article in THE STANDARD of September 29, on “Little Homes and Little Farms.” Although not expressly mentioning THE STANDARD article, I have reason to know that the editorial author had a copy of the same before him as he wrote. It is therefore noteworthy that the Republican entirely abandons the claim it carelessly put forth, that homesteads would be confiscated by the imposition of the single tax. When its eyes were opened it could doubtless look about in Springfield and behold manifold proofs to the contrary.

Let us in this “quiet New England farming town” of Oxford begin on the main road at the old common in the Center, and proceed south as far as the Congregational church. It is a distance of about a mile, and along here are thirty-eight places with dwelling houses. Take into account, not only the homesteads, but also all the land assessed to their owners in this town, enough in several instances to constitute a large farm, and we shall find that a tax on land values of five per cent would lower the tax on thirty of these places and increase it on only eight. Of these latter four would have their taxes raised only a small amount, from $1 to $6 each, and only two above $25. In his late article in Scribner’s, ex-Secretary of the Treasury McCullough says: “Of all property the homestead should be subject to the lightest taxation. . . . Humble homes ought everywhere to be protected against the tax collector.” The ex-secretary is looking for the single tax. That is the way it would work. To secure this result, upon which he declares the permanency of our free institutions depends more than anything else, he ought to spend his remaining years in working for our reform with head and heart and both hands.

But let us return to the Republican. It takes advantage of my figures showing that the taxes on many large farms would be increased to say this: “One man’s gain in that case means another’s loss. Who are the losers? Manifestly the farmers whose buildings and other property have less value proportionately than their land.” But I also said that if these owners of large farms were putting their land to its best use, the single tax would benefit them. I am ready to prove this, even when the direct taxation is alone considered. Let us take up again the case of the first large farm mentioned in my previous article, whose circumstances are singularly unfavorable. It is described and appraised in our valuation book as follows: “House $375, barn $600, farm, 180 acres, $2,700.” Now, instead of a $375 house, such a one as our assessors would put at $1,800 is as poor as the prosperous and enterprising farmer of 180 acres of land ought to live in. Instead of a $600 barn he would have to have a much larger one or else separate shelters for his stock, whose aggregate value would be at the very least $1,000. His stock and personal property would be at the lowest limit probably $800. Then the improvements on the land when ready to be worked for all it is worth, would make its value mount up to $30 an acre or $5,400 for the whole farm. The Republican might perhaps like to object that this last item is too high, and to estop this I can show that a 98 acre farm on the same road only a half mile distant from this one, with land originally of the same general character but which is better improved, is valued by our assessors at over [$37?] an acre without the buildings. Accordingly with a house at $1,800, barns at $1,000, stock and personal property at $800, and land at $5,400, the farmer would be worth $9,000, and like others in this town would doubtless be assessed for what he is worth. At the rate of $14.50 per thousand, which was paid without discount, the tax on this improved place would have been under our present system over $130. It could not have been so much under the George system, for our assessors now value the land at only $2,700, and if we allow only $200—and we would better allow $500—for the present improvements on the land, consisting of some fruit trees, some smooth and clear grass land and several miles of somewhat defective fencing, it will bring the original land value down to $2,500, on which the George tax at five per cent would be but $125. What the gain would be to the farmer if he lived in a $2,500 house, or put up a couple of additional houses for his help, since the place is two miles from the village, let our opponents conjecture.

I have endeavored to estimate what amount a tax on land values of five per cent would produce in this town, and my figures indicate that it would be just about sufficient to pay our state and county tax and all town charges as they are at present. It might be that in some towns less developed than Oxford the amount realized would be so small as to impose strict economy upon them. I am ready to follow demonstrations when conclusive wherever they lead, but I am not ready to follow Professor Harris, the “Concord philosopher,” long ago quoted approvingly by the Republican as showing that the whole annual value of the land of the country would not equal present taxation, and especially that Mr. George’s proposition to “abolish all taxation save that upon land values” might amount to 150 per cent on the total value in this way:

If the present national and local taxes were all assessed upon land, land could not avoid the taxes by becoming cheap. If the value of land sank to five per cent of its present value the government would simply be obliged, on Mr. George’s plan, to raise the rate of taxation to twenty times the rate before assessed, and thus make it pay every year 150 per cent of its total value in order to get the requisite amount of revenue that it collects at present.

TheRepublican once said that Henry George was followed by many “kind hearted persons with more sentiment than common sense.” And opposed, I would say, by some philosophers with more prejudice than common sense. Neither Henry George nor any of his followers, I am sure, ever thought of taxing land values beyond what they would bear, but would even make the rate a little less than they would bear to avoid dispossessing present holders not keeping their land out of use. And if necessary to supplement the single tax, Mr. George, in a note to chapter 29 of “Protection or Free Trade?” mentions several taxes capable of producing large amounts, which, though not economically perfect, are yet vastly less objectionable than any we have at present, and would injuriously affect production and trade very little if at all.

The Republican’s claim in its late article, after supposing a “humble home of a workingman on a lot beside a costly mansion,” that “the George scheme would lift the burden from the wealthy owner and add to that of the poor man” is refuted by Mr. Post in THE STANDARD of December 8. I do not wish to enter into any discussion of general principles—that I will leave to THE STANDARD’S editors. I only wish to testify as an eye witness to facts visible everywhere here to everyone with eyes.

I assert that these conclusions are irresistable^sic:

1. That the adoption of the single tax would bring a considerable abatement of the present taxes upon almost all “little homes.”

2. That the amount abated from homesteads would fall upon the owners of our run down large farms; but when we take into account

p. 4, col. 6 the relief granted them from indirect taxation through the tariff, they would as a class be at least as well off as they are now.

3. That the owners of large farms reasonably well equipped and in shape to be run for something like what they are worth, pay more direct taxes under our system to-day than they would have to pay under the George system.

4. That our savings banks and insurance companies ought to be as solid after the adoption of the single tax as they are now, for the mortgageor^sic would be better able to pay back the money loaned on his homestead.

As a long time reader, friendly to the Republican and an admirer of its general course, I ask that paper to remember these things when it writes of Henry George again. It would be too much to expect it to expressly advocate our principles for some time yet, but when the real day of conflict comes and the fight grows hot I feel sure from what I know of it that we shall have the Republican with us.

ALBERT S. CUSHMAN.

Over Two Hundred More Shares Taken—The Outlook for the Plan Very Encouraging.

Subscriptions for the purchase of a single tax house are still coming slowly in. The following subscriptions are acknowledged by the secretary:

J. R. Abarbanell, 140 Nassau street, city………. $10 Wm. H. Hillier, 341 West Forty-eighth street, city. 10 George Marsh, 91 Fulton street, city (second subscription)…….. 5 Fritz Meyer, 26[2?] West Forty-seventh street, city… 2 J. H. Scully, 349 East Eighty-fourth street, city….. 5 A. Silverman, 69 Bayard street, city………. 5 W. J. Terwilliger, Columbia college, city………. 5 H. F. Wood, 249 East Twenty-first street, city….. 2 J. P. Cranford, 16 Court street, Brooklyn………. 50 Joshua L. Atwood, 153 Rutledge street, Brooklyn, E. D………. 5 George H. Harnwell, Whitestone, L. I………. 5 Samuel E. Clarkson, Blue Bell, Pa………. 2 C. S. Walker, 14 Gest street, Cincinnati, O………. 2 J. A. Horagen, 206 Division street, Chicago, Ill….. 5 R. S. McMahon, Chacahoula, La………. 5 J. B. Wallace, [Marathon?]. Texas………. 5 $123 Previously acknowledged………. 397 Total to date………. $520

The secretary has been notified that subscriptions for about 100 shares besides are in the hands of friends, who will turn them in during the latter part of this week.

The following circular is issued by the subcommittee having in charge the receiving of subscriptions for the single tax club house:

THE SINGLE TAX HOME.

Those who have simply made a solitary subscription in this matter have not accomplished everything needed. To raise $10,000 steady, continued and persistent work is wanted. If, however, each man who has subscribed will consider himself a committee of one to gather in subscriptions in his especial vicinity, and to send them in at once to the secretary, William McCabe, 256 East Fourteenth street, very little time will elapse before we have $1,000 subscribed; when a meeting of the subscribers will be called and the committee on permanent organization and subscription appointed. The present temporary committee would therefore appeal to all who believe that the “Home” is a need and would aid in its procurement to send in their own and obtain as many outside subscriptions as possible, to do so now and forward them as above.

WILLIAM J. GORSUCH, A. J. STEERS, WM. MCCABE, JEROME O’NEILL, W. H. FAULHABER, Committee.

Most of the friends subscribing merely send in their names, addresses and the amounts they will subscribe; but some accompany their subscriptions with a few words of encouragement.

George H. Harnwell, Whitestone, Long Island, hopes that the requisite number of shares will soon be got and says:

If things go all right (my work, I mean) I will try to put another “V” in it; but this is all I can do at present. I wish you success.

Samuel E. Clarkson, Blue Bell, Pa., unhesitatingly indorses Mr. Steers’s plan for the club house, and then goes on to say:

Words cannot express the feeling that links me with you all, though entire strangers in the ordinary sense of the term. My field of propaganda is a small one and most trying. In an agricultural section given over to the use of small farms and truck patches, they are wofully ignorant of the ills that beset the industrial masses in densely populated sections. But through the agency of a democratic society which I have been instrumental in founding, I hope to bring them to a clear conception of the beauties of the freedom of exchange in the hope that then they will be able to see the same truths in the freedom of production.

Those who desire to subscribe to the stock for the purchase of the single tax club house, will find the blank on the eighth page of THE STANDARD, which they can fill in and forward as directed.

And One Member After Another Got Up and Reeled Off Interesting Yarns.

The third lecture of the Manhattan single tax club in the Ninth congressional district was held last Sunday evening at 105 Second avenue. The attendance was even larger than on the previous Sunday. The speaker billed for the evening failed to appear, but one of the members took up a copy of “Protection or Free Trade?” and read the fourteenth chapter—“Do High Wages Necessitate Protection.” One member after another took the floor and told interesting stories. One speaker, who had been brought up in a ship yard, related how thirty years ago the east side was lined with ship yards where thousands of men were employed at good wages. The ships built there had the reputation of being the best built in the world; but a tariff was laid on necessary materials entering into ship building with the result that that industry was destroyed.

Another member, who had sailed the salt seas on Yankee ships with Yankee crews, said that while the Yankee sailor thirty years ago got the best wages of any sailor, still our ships were sailed the cheapest, sailed the fastest and sailed the best of any ships on the eastern or western oceans. Even in British ports the American ships were preferred. The protective tariff came, and the Yankee ships with Yankee crews were all but swept from the face of the salt water. Where twenty-five or thirty years^sic the stars and stripes floated in every port of the world, now such a thing in a foreign port is a curiosity.

Another member, who had spent some years in Australia spoke of the effect of protection and free trade in the colonies of New South Wales and Victoria, which has heretofore^sic been alluded to in the columns of THE STANDARD.

A man who lived in England during the emergence of that country from protection to such free trade as exists there to-day, spoke of the effect the change had made on the working people. The change, he said, had been a benefit not only to labor but to capital productively used. The condition of the English workman was at least 100 per cent better than forty years ago; and the nearer the English people approached to absolute free trade the more improved would be the laborers’ condition.

“If,” said the speaker, “the average workman here or in England would examine the question for himself, in his own interests, the protection doctrine would then and there be doomed.”

Mr. Steers came into the club room during the last speaker’s remarks. He was called on for a speech, but instead of making one, he stated that he had just left Henry George’s house, where a large party of friends were gathered to welcome him home. A member of the club thereupon arose and said that here were over a hundred of Mr. George’s friends assembled, and though the hour was late (10:15) he moved that the club go up in a body to congratulate Mr. George on his safe return to us. The motion was carried unan-

p. 5, col. 5 imously, and the members marched up the wet pavements of Second avenue to Nineteenth street and to Mr. George’s house, where they were cordially greeted.

Everything is Ripe for a Brilliant Dash for Electoral Reform in Ohio—A Draft of a Petition to the Legislature.

The sketch of the Australian system given by Louis F. Post in THE STANDARD for December 1 is full of stirring suggestions. What he says, however, in the closing paragraph as to the policy of delaying this reform until the fullness of time, rather than endanger its complete success by premature action, seems to leave out of sight another view of the matter which, to my mind, shows delay to be dangerous. In Ohio politics the charge of bribery (and the practice, too), has become so common already that a very large number of respectable citizens have come to look on the matter with despair, or, worse yet, with indifference, as an evil that cannot be cured but can be endured. True, there has not yet come to light in this state any widely organized plot, like that in Indiana, to “divide the floaters into blocks of five and put a trusted man with the necessary funds in charge of these five,” etc., but there has certainly been as shameless buying and selling of votes here in times past as any we have heard of this year in Indiana. And this shamelessness is unquestionably due in a great degree to the prevalent belief that nobody cares much about it.

The newspaper history of election frauds in Cincinnati and Columbus is too fresh in the minds of the public to need more than mention here. But let me illustrate the spirit of the times by experiences taken from the under current of private life. In the largest government office in the northern part of this state was an employe eight years ago whom I knew personally. This man had a notoriety among the politicians of the city as a “worker.” His boasting of having bribed so many Bohemians in the lumber yards at so much a head was so open that it was generally talked of among the sixty or seventy men in the office, and for a while it was a standing joke against him that he had himself admitted that he had “saved” money enough out of what had been “placed” with him to buy himself a suit of clothes. No one seemed to think very poorly of him for this bribery work. On the contrary, in election times he was treated by his chief in office with marked consideration.

Another example from this end of the state. A wealthy gentleman born in Cincinnati assured me a few days after the recent election that beyond a doubt there was really no help for this bribery; it was a common practice everywhere, and well known to be so. To corroborate this statement he cited the case of a young friend of his whom he named, the son of a prominent politician now holding a high state office in Columbus. This young man had confessed, laughingly, to him that he had spent all the money he could rake and scrape to buy votes for his father. “Of course,” he added, “it is a shame, but everybody does it—you’ve got to do it.” And the manner in which this was told to me showed clearly enough that it was really considered no shame at all.

This indifference is not surprising when one considers the general tone of the press on this point. The Cincinnati Commercial Gazette repeatedly and urgently solicited contributions of money in the last campaign to be sent into Indiana. In one of its editorials in the last days of the campaign this paper warned its readers that the democrats were pouring a flood of money into Indiana, especially from Kentucky, and were devoting it to unscrupulous debauchery of Indiana politics, that if republicans would defeat this bribery they must contribute promptly and liberally; and then, with cool effrontery, added that no republican need entertain the slightest fear that this money would be put to bad use.

Indeed, the foul history of Ohio elections for the last twelve years would satisty^sic any one, I think, that if it was only fulness of time we had to wait for, this carbuncle of bribery was ready to prick long ago.

I do not think, therefore, it is too early to suggest to the single tax men of Ohio that as soon as possible they start a petition for this purpose. The petition below is framed after the suggestions of Mr. Post’s article. If single tax men throughout the state will publish in their local papers some petition like this and invite all citizens, irrespective of party, to assist in circulating it, they will be fully as likely to secure a large list of names now as they would, if they waited for a stronger feeling on the subject. Interest in these outrages fades with the remembrance of them. And the bribers themselves have not yet anticiticipated^sic the movement and plotted to defeat it.

For my own use I have drawn up the following (thanks to Mr. Post).

To the Honorable the Legislature of the State of Ohio:

The undersigned, citizens of the state of Ohio, believing that unless freedom and honesty in elections are carefully preserved, government of the people, by the people, for the people is impossible, and believing therefore that intimidation and bribery in elections are not only disgraceful but calamitous, degrading those who can be frightened, corrupting those who can be bought, humiliating every American who takes pride in his country, tending swiftly to the overthrow of all faith in representative government and by these disasters constituting every briber and intimidater an assassin of American liberty, therefore, we desire and petition your honorable body that the election laws now in force in this state be so amended as to provide safeguards for the freedom and purity of our elections, similar to those provided by what is known as the Australian system, and that this amendment shall provide especially as follows:

1. That ballots for any office shall contain the names of all candidates for that office.

2. That all ballots be printed at public expense.

3. That these ballots be so marked on the back, or stamped, that when folded the indorsement will show the ballot to be official.

4. That only one of these ballots, or set of ballots, be delivered by sworn officers to each voter as he presents himself to vote.

5. That the voter deliver his ballot to the inspectors so folded as to conceal its face and expose the official indorsement.

6. That there be no communication with him, except by election officers for official purposes, from the time he receives his ballot until he votes.

7. That no voter be allowed to cast any ballot but such as he receives from the election officers.

8. That immediately after voting he withdraw from the secluded part of the polling place.

If the single tax men of Ohio will circulate and gather in these petitions it will be an easy matter to secure the presentation of them to the state legislature. And if this reform is carried out it is scarcely necessary to add that when the question of a single tax is put to popular vote, as before long it may be, the selfish interests and timid prejudices arrayed against us cannot employ bribery for their ally. The battle we fight then can be more certainly fought on the merits of the issue.

WALTER H. BEECHER.

Cincinnati, Ohio.

p. 5, col. 6

A Farmer Who Sees Where the Trouble Lies.

ELLICOTTVILLE, N. Y.—I have a farm of 150 acres, and a few years ago I could save five or six hundred dollars per year. But that time has gone by, and will not return until we make some change in our system of taxation, the farmer is now about at a standstill in regard to making any money over his expenses.

I find that a great many people have an idea that the single tax system would take their land from them. Well, if a man did not pay his taxes under our present system he would not hold his property long; but under a land value tax it would only be the dogs in the marger^sic who were holding land idle who would have to drop it—the improver would have plenty of money for taxes as long as he wasn’t fined for improving his place.

A. L. VALLILY.

The Rhode Island Association on its Feet.

PROVIDENCE, R. I., Dec. 17.—At the fourth meeting of the Single Tax association of Rhode Island, held Friday evening December 7, a constitution was adopted. It provides that any resident of Rhode Island of either sex, not less than eighteen years of age may become a member of the association by assenting to the constitution. Meetings are to be held regularly on the first and third Friday of each month. It is also proposed to supplement the regular work of the association by forming a class which shall meet weekly for the purpose of reading and discussing “Progress and Poverty” and other literature treating the science of government.

GEO. D. LIDDELL, Sec’y^sic:

Launched at Southboro.

SOUTHBORO, Mass.—The single tax craft was launched here a few nights ago. Prof. Hamlin Garland of Boston delivered a lecture on “The Missing Wealth of the Farmer” to an audience of about one hundred, one-third ladies and the rest legal voters. Many remained after the lecture to inquire into the subject. A few signed the shipping list and will go with us to the end of the voyage. Others will read our books and promise to attend future meetings, and we expect to have them soon. We shall at once form a club and carry on the good work in this and the neighboring villages. Our Marlboro friends propose to have a meeting there soon.

F. H. HOWES.

Leave Them in Your Barber Shops.

NEW YORK CITY.—Desiring to do what we can to advance the cause of free trade and tax reform, a friend of mine and myself conclude that a practicable way of attaining th[illegible] object is to circulate THE STANDARD. W[illegible] this view we will send out copies of [illegible] STANDARD after we have read them, to [illegible] party or parties in the west for judicio[illegible] tribution. You can assist us through t[illegible] respondence column of THE STANDAR[illegible] forming us to whom we can send our [illegible]

[signature partly lost: “V[illegible]”]

And What Music Do They Hear That We Cannot Conceive?

“It has been shown that animals hear sounds which are beyond the range of our hearing,” says Sir John Lubbock, “and that they can perceive the ultra violet rays, which are invisible to our eyes.”

“Now, as every ray of light which we can perceive at all appears to us as a distinct color, it becomes probable that these ultra violet rays must make themselves apparent to the ants as a distinct and separate color (of which we can form no idea), but as different from the rest as red is from yellow or green from violet. The question also arises whether white light to these insects would differ from our white light, in containing this additional color. At any rate, as few of the colors in nature are pure, but almost all arise from the combination of rays of different wave lengths, and as in such cases the visible resultant would be composed not only of the rays we see, but of these and the ultra violet, it would appear that the color of objects and the general aspect of nature must present to animals a very different appearance from what it does to us.”

“These considerations cannot but raise the reflection how different the world may—I was going to say must—appear to other animals from what it does to us. Sound is the sensation produced on us when the vibrations of the air strike on the drum of our ear. When they are few the sound is deep; as they increase in number it becomes shriller and shriller; but when they reach 40,000 in a second they cease to be audible. Light is the effect produced on us when waves of light strike on the eye. When four hundred millions of millions of vibrations strike the retina in a second, they produce red, and as the number increases, the color passes into orange, then yellow, green, blue and violet. But between 40,000 vibrations in a second and four hundred millions of millions we have no organ of sense capable of receiving the impression. Yet between these limits any number of sensations may exist. We have five senses, and sometimes fancy that no others are possible. But it is obvious that we cannot measure the infinite by our own narrow limitations.

“Moreover, looking at the question from the other side, we find in animals complex organs of sense richly supplied with nerves, but the functions of which we are as yet powerless to explain. There may be fifty other senses as different from ours as sound is from sight; and even within the boundaries of our own senses there may be endless sounds which we cannot hear, and colors as different as red from green, of which we have no conception. These and a thousand other questions remain for solution. The familiar world which surrounds us may be a totally different place to other animals. To them it may be full of music which we cannot hear, of color which we cannot see, of sensations which we cannot conceive.”

What Can We Manufacture Under Free Trade?

OKOBOJO, Dak.—(1) What manufacturing industries can exist in this country without protection, and what can not?

2. What is the name of Rousseau’s work in which he developed the doctrine of natural rights?

D. F. S.

1. There is no reason why we should not be able to manufacture anything for which the necessary raw materials can be brought here or produced here as cheaply as elsewhere. By raw materials such things as ores, raw cotton, crude chemical substances, lumber, coal, etc., are meant. Our labor is perhaps, in proportion to its productiveness the cheapest in the world, our machinery the lightest and strongest, our inventors the shrewdest. Of course there is no necessity for our manufacturing absolutely everything; we would be richer by making the things we can make best and exchanging them for the other things.

2. In his work “On the Social Contract.”

Air Ships, Smuggling and Gambling.

1. What shall we do with our custom houses if the Campbell air ship proves to be successful?

2. Can the single tax prevent or destroy all kinds of gambling in the markets?

A. P.

1. You had better cool the ardor of some jubilant protection editor with that question. As for the custom houses, they will make admirable seaside sanitariums when we get air ships and the single tax.

2. No. But if it was easy to make a living in productive occupations without much risk, most people would probably prefer to make a living that way and confine their gambling to the sociable poker table and the race track.

The Methods by Which Bills Are Originated, Killed and Passed.

Amos J. Cummings in the New York Sun.

Those who think that a congressman can shove a bill through both houses by simply applying his shoulder to the wheel of legislation are much mistaken. It is a job of infinite difficulty. Not one in two hundred passes both houses and is signed by the president. It requires ripe practical experience to steer a bill through the tortuous channels of congressional legislation. Not one new member in five hundred can do it. The more brilliant he is, the greater his chances of failure. A pilot like Timothy J. Campbell is worth far more than one like George William Curtis. The first is practical; the second theoretical. Campbell knows every hidden rock, each sandbar, and all the varying currents of legislation. He will warp his ship and take in sail when necessary, and never fail to cast anchor at the critical moment. He has driven many a bill through congress when it would have been stranded in committee with Curtis at the wheel. To illustrate the dangers of legislative navigation, you have only to trace the course of a bill from its beginning to its end.

Most bills are drawn up by lawyers. A few constituents, however, write a congressman detailing what they want, and leave the framing of their bills to him. There are blank forms for the work in the stationery room. An economic house taxes the congressman two cents for each blank. Unless unanimous consent is given, and this can be only obtained by the courtesy of the speaker, bills must be introduced on a Monday. The states are called in alphabetical order and members arise in turn and pass up their measures. The call can be suspended at any time by the house.

After its introduction the bill is temporarily at the mercy of the speaker. He refers it to whatever committee he thinks proper. At times the members demur to the reference, and even appeal to the house. Occasionally, however, bills land in strange places. Through accident or design a judiciary bill may land in the committee on acoustics and ventilation or in any other committee. It requires the unanimous consent of the house to shift it to its appropriate place.

Once in a committee a bill enters its first stage in life. Unless one of the committee takes a special interest in it it may lie dormant throughout the session. The chairman can exercise a baleful influence. He may refer it to a sub committee of its enemies, and without more ado it may be strangled. Even if it passes the sub committee its fate in full committee is problematical. Rarely is there a full attendance at its meetings. They are usually held at 10 a. m. and die at noon, when the house is called to order. This fluctuation in attendance frequently gives a chairman power to kill a bill. He may advance or delay it. If he desires to have it pass, and the lines in committee are nearly and securely drawn, he forces it to a vote when its friends are in a majority. If he wants it killed, he waits until they are in a minority. Measures of national importance are frequently squelched in this way. The shipping bounty bill is probably a case in point. Speaker Carlisle has been charged by the editor of the American Shipping Gazette with packing a committee against it. However this may be, certain it is that one member, disgruntled at the speaker’s appointment, has never attended a meeting of the committee. His absence left it a tie on the important question of bounties for American-built ships. More than once, owing to the absence of an opponent, were the friends of the measure in a majority. The bill remained untouched. It was finally throttled in the absence of one of its friends, who went to Wisconsin to look after his fences. At the same time, and by the same vote, the committee launched a free ship bill. This was about six months ago. Mark the sequel. In neither case has the report been made to the house. The effect upon the election was apparently discounted by withholding the reports. It is evident that committees at times are as free to defeat the will of the house as to carry it out. But for the absence of the Wisconsin member no report adverse to the shipping bounty bill would have been ordered, and there would have been no report favoring the free ship bill.

So much for the consideration of bills in committee. The power there is frequently almost arbitrary. Even the action of a committee may virtually be nullified by the member selected to make the report to the house. He may spring it into the house at an untoward moment, or he may delay it until it is too late in the session to secure action. There are other hindrances, unless a committee is privileged. The privileged committees can make a report at any time. They include those on ways and means, on appropriations, on rules, on printing and on enrolled bills. All others report on Tuesdays. The speaker calls them in their ratio of importance. The call can be passed over or suspended at any time by order of the house.

When a bill is reported it takes its place upon the calendar. It has now reached its second stage of existence. If it carries an appropriation or tinkers with the revenues it must be considered in committee of the whole. It may remain upon the calendar to the end of the second session without coming before the house in regular order. Members in the good graces of the speaker may secure recognition and ask unanimous consent to consider it. Some one, however, is sure to object, unless the bill is either of the utmost significance or of vital importance to the country. If it makes an appropriation, half a dozen “watch dogs” stand ready to pounce upon it.

Another chance for its consideration is on what is known as Suspension day. This occurs on the first and third Mondays in each month. The first Monday rests with individuals

p. 7, col. 2 , and the third Monday with committees. The last six days of the short session are also suspension days. On such days the speaker usually recognizes four members, if the time allows, two democrats and two republicans. The member recognized moves to suspend the rules and take up a bill in which he is interested. If the motion is backed by a two-thirds vote, the bill is taken up. The recognitions, however, except on days set apart for committees, are at the will of the speaker. As soon as the house is organized experienced members rush to the desk and put their names on the suspension list. They are taken down by a clerk in the order of application. New members rarely get the tip. If they do get it, it seems that they more rarely get the recognition. The list is supposed to be of some service to those whose names appear upon it. Members periodically murmur and grumble over it. It appears to be an indefinite quantity in legislation. If it confers any special privileges, the old members usually get them and not the new ones.

There is a third chance for a bill. On any day, except Suspension day, if the unfinished business permits, after preliminary business, such as the reference of executive documents received the day before, the speaker calls all committees in order for reports. At the end of an hour or less the committees are again called for an hour’s business. This call passes in regular order from day to day. The called committee can present for consideration any of its bills on the calender^sic. If it passes in an hour, all right. If not, it goes over until the next day. Failing then of passage within an hour it goes over as unfinished business. Its committee cannot again call it up, or indeed call up any other bill, until every other committee has had its turn. Filibustering for the two hours sends it to “kingdom come.” It was thus that General Weaver scotched Wilkins’s bill giving national banks an increase of ten per cent in circulation.

The only remaining chance rests with the chairman of a committee reporting a bill. When the calendar is loaded with measures from his committee he asks that a day or days be set apart for their consideration. The request goes to the committee on rules—a committee which holds the keys to all legislation. Its five members are a sort of close corporation in law making. All are old members, and all are members of privileged committees. They can upset the car of legislation at any time. With their consent and that of the house the chairman gets his time allowance. He then selects the measure for consideration. If any determined opposition is shown, he withdraws it and substitutes another bill. His allotted time may then be exhausted without the passage of any bill whatever. It was thus that the eight-hour relief and the prison contract labor bills were coppered.

Escaping all these dangers and passing the house, a bill is only fairly on the road to success. It has to encounter similar troubles in the senate. In committee and in the senate chamber every senator has a hack at it. It may be so battered out of shape that its sponsor will fail to recognize it and it may afterward be lost in a committee of conference. Shrewd members take advantage of the conference committee. They accept a seeming defeat as a stepping stone to the advancement of the passage of a measure. Thus if an amendment is proposed which aims to kill the bill it may be gracefully accepted. The other house may refuse to accept it, thus throwing the bill into a conference committtee^sic. If this committee agrees to it without the obnoxious amendment the report is privileged and can hold the floor until a vote is taken, whereas pending the amendment the bill could have been sidetracked by a dozen switches.

Even if a bill passes the senate in its original form a blunder in the joint committee on enrolled bills may prove fatal. When it finally reaches the president it is not safe. Enemies may lurk in the White house ready to deal it a deadly blow. With the president’s signature it has no sure lease of life. Its usefulness may be impaired by the action of an overzealous official, and the supreme court may find it unconstitutional.

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Continued from Third Page.

← continued from p. 3 where are you going to end? If you recognize the principle that one class is to be provided for at the expense of the public treasury or the public credit, you will find lots besides the landlords and tenants to provide for—shoemakers, blacksmiths, and others. Why should you not use your public credit to provide your costermongers with larger donkeys and better carts, and so on. (Laughter.) The men who think that the land question can be settled in that way don’t begin to appreciate what the land question is. The only class to look to is the lowest class. Raise any other class in the community, improve their condition, and you but widen the gulf. You cannot make any permanent improvement in social conditions until the lowest man is raised. The man to look to for the settlement of the Irish land question is not the Irish agricultural tenant; it is the Irish laborer. This land question is not a question between agricultural landlords and agricultural tenants. Land has other uses than the growing of potatoes or the fattening of sheep. How can a city exist without land? Can the manufacturer, can the operative, can the miner, can any human being live save on land and from land? Even the ships that go down to the sea—what would become of them if, while they were gone, the land were to disappear? (Laughter.) The land question is simply the labor question in another phase. (Applause.)

THE TRUE LINE.

It is not to be settled by buying out one class and selling to another class, by compensating landlords for something that they don’t really own, and then dividing that among their tenants, and creating a still larger class of landlords and one more difficult to deal with. It is not by benevolence that these questions are to be settled. You don’t want charity; you don’t want complex adjustments. What you want, and the only thing, is simple justice. (Applause.) Do that. Recognize, not merely in the land of Ireland, but in the land of Great Britain as well, the public property of the whole people. Leave its [nominal?] possession to the landlords. I would not bother about that. I don’t want to take any man’s land away from him. He can keep it, and all his title deeds, if he chooses. Simply tax its value. And as you advance in that tax so will you find everywhere opportunities open to labor, so you will find everywhere an increased demand in all branches of trade; so you will find everywhere times improving and it becoming easier for men to make a living. (Applause.) As the tax gets higher and higher, so it will become impossible for men to hold land that they cannot use, in the expectation of compelling other human beings to pay them a larger tribute, or to gratify their mere ostentation or pride. As you advance no man will want any land unless he wants to use it, and landlords will cease to be. That is what I think the true line—what we call in our country the line of the single tax. We hold that there is only one tax that ought to be levied, and that is the tax on land values. And that is not in its nature a tax: it is simply in the nature of a taking by the community of the value created by the growth of the community. And see how that fund increases. Sweep away these taxes, give liberty, do justice—and wealth will grow and augment as we hardly dream. It is to me only a sober deduction from the most obvious facts that if we were but to trust freedom, but to hold fast to justice, but to give natural laws free play, but to strike away every barrier that prevents men producing wealth or exchanging wealth, the very poorest among us might enjoy not merely all the comforts of life, but all the luxuries as well, that we might all be millionaires, not in the sense of having more than others, but in the sense of all having enough and to spare of all the comforts and advantages and opportunities that the highest civilization can bring. (Applause.)

And, make no mistake, justice is the only rock on which a nation can build. No civilization that has palaces on one hand and slums on the other, no civilization with monstrous fortunes on one side and embruted men and degraded women on the other side, can continue. It is not in the order of the universe. Somehow, some time, it must fall. In our centers of civilization to-day we are breeding those who some time or other, if they are permitted to increase, must destroy civilization. Therefore it is, Mr. President, that, in the name of the single tax men of the United States, the true free traders, as well as on my own part, I thank you for this greeting. Let us together go forward in the work of the future. We are advancing on our side of the water fast and steadily, and I believe that the time has now come when you are to lead a similar advance on this. (Applause.) If you pass us, so much the better. And you, my old friend, Mr. Briggs, first of the real free traders on this side of the Atlantic to greet me—I congratulate you, as a follower of Richard Cobden, that the time has come when the truth that he stood for is passing into full expression. I believe that this movement must go forward. No one, I care not what his power, can stop it. No one of us, do what he may, can help it much. But there is a pleasure and a glory, and a satisfaction, and a consciousness of duty done, to the man who does what he can to help forward the triumph of the good—to the man who does what he can to break down these barriers that set the band^sic of man against man, and nation against nation—who does all he can to bring about that time when the deep philosophy of the golden rule shall at last be recognized, and men shall see in peace and not in war the way to gain happiness—when we shall look on our fellows not as wolves who would tear from us what we might get of the goods provided by the Father of us, but as helpers in all good things—when we shall unite to urge forward this glorious civilization of ours to a higher and higher plane. And for us of the English speaking race it is my dream that that time will reunite what a crazy king and his brutal ministers separated, and that from the principles of absolute free trade and local self-government there may grow a league of the English speaking people that shall give to the world of the twentieth [continues at top of column 2]

Brief Address of Rev. Mr. Rylett.

The Rev. Harold Rylett (Dudley): Before I propose a vote of thanks to Mr. George, which I think everyone in this room knows he deserves and will give him (hear, hear), I should like to mention that from the Black country there have gone across the Atlantic many extraordinary stories about the condition of the people there, and I have no doubt that those stories have had a very considerble^sic influence in determining the presidential contest. Mr. George told you about the habit of the protectionist when he came over here, of buying a coat for himself and a dress for his wife, and not paying the tax. I shall not mention names, but [will?] simply tell you that one of the gentlemen who engaged in the work of coming over to this country and exploring the Black country, with the view of influencing the presidential campaign in America, by the extraordinary stories he could carry over there, was my guest, stayed at my house with his wife, and one day he said: “I am not only over on this business, but I want to take a few dresses home, and I want to take a few suits of clothes home.” I said: “You have come to the very place. You see this coat. I gave three guineas for it. You have come to the very neighborhood for cheap clothes. We will go to Birmingham to-morrow morning.” And we went to Birmingham, and that gentleman, whom I dare say Mr. George knows very well, ardent and strong protectionist as he was, purchased in Birmingham several suits of clothes for himself and several dresses for his wife, and before they went over the water they wore them once or twice, so that, without putting a greenback on them, but by simply describing them as having been worn, they managed to pass the custom house. (Laughter.) Now it is my duty, and my great pleasure and privilege, to move a vote of thanks to Mr. George. (Applause.) He has been a spiritual father to me as well as an economic teacher, for I never realized what the glory of Christ’s gospel was untii^sic Henry George taught me what the “brotherhood of men” meant. (Applause.) In the old days, when we fought shoulder to shoulder for the poor down trodden laborer and pounder of iron, and in the present day when we are fighting for the poor down trodden nail makers of Cradley Heath, and of the Black country, whom it is your duty to help, and whom I appeal to you to help—aye, from that day to this it has been my privilege and my pleasure to enjoy Mr. George’s friendship and his good will, and I am sure there is not a man in this room but would desire to pass this vote of thanks, not as a mere compliment, but as something flowing out of the affection of the heart. (Applause.)

Mr. Crosfield’s Remarks.

Mr. Thomas Crosfield, vice-president of the financial reform association, in seconding the motion, said: I am sure that the address this evening has been equal to any sermon that you will hear on Sunday morning. (Hear, hear, and applause.) Mr. George has epitomized the mandate that went forth—“He that loveth God should love his brother also.” We cannot love our brethren if we see them remain in destitution, want, misery and woe. It is the duty of every Christian man to help his brother out of the Slough of Despond. And, if we know that these iniquitous laws prevent our brethren having the full enjoyment of those rights and liberties to which they are born, we ought not to relax any effort to redeem them from this bondage and make them free to the enjoyment of all these things. (Hear, hear.) I remember reading, after the death of Alexander II. of Russia, that in one of his edicts, when he fought for the freedom of the slave from the cruel bondage that had oppressed the millions of Russia, one stipulation he made was that they must not only have freedom but that they must have some soil on which to live. (Hear, hear.) He knew that there was no perfect freedom unless they had the soil on which they had been laboring, from which to obtain a livelihood. And we know that if we have large magnates in possession of large tracts of the country, they not only enslave our bodies but they enslave our souls also. (Hear, hear.) It was told us by Harriet Beecher Stowe, in her inimitable “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” that Uncle Tom said, “They may enslave my body, but they can never enslave my soul.” But the lord of Hatfield, when a respectable body of Wesleyans went to him one day and said, “Will you allow us to purchase—not bestow on us, but allow us to purchase—a small piece of land upon which to build our tabernacle?” he said “No!” Because, I suppose he thought that that particular branch of religion which he professed, as it was sufficient for him, was quite sufficient for them. And one of our neighbors, Mr. John Ireland Blackburne, when a very respectable body went to him to ask if they might have an old barn in which to hold a religious meeting, replied, “No, my clergyman tells me that the religion that is professed here is quite sufficient for all of us, and therefore we don’t want anything else.” (Laughter.) One regret I have this evening is that there have not been present on this platform, or in the body of the hall, twenty, fifty, or a hundred clergymen to listen to the sentiments and to the address that fell from the lips of Mr. Henry George. At any rate, they cannot refuse to read it, and I should advise all of them to cogitate well upon the great truths that have been enunciated this evening, and see if they cannot work them into a good sermon. It will be the best sermon they have preached for many a long day. (Hear, bear^sic, and applause.)

The vote of thanks having been carried by acclamation, the chairman said he had not the slightest doubt that if any gentleman wanted to ask Mr. George any questions he would be glad to answer them before responding to the vote of thanks.

Questions and Answers.

The following questions were then asked and promptly answered:

Q.—Would the views Mr. George has so clearly expounded in regard to freedom of trade be applied to freedom in the liquor traffic?

A.—That is perhaps a question. My own opinion is this. I believe in freedom, and I think the solution of the difficulties even of the liquor trade and of intemperance are to be found in freedom, and not in restriction. (Applause.)

Q.—How would the ship owning millionaire be taxed by a tax only on land?

A.—Why should you tax the ship owning millionaire? Ships are good things, and the more you have the better. (Applause.) We have tried the taxing of ships and of materials that enter into the construction of ships, and we have taxed the American flag off the high seas. (Applause.)

Q.—Your tax on land would only tax land owners. How would you tax capitalists who are not land owners?

A.—We don’t propose a tax on land; it is a tax on land values. All land would not be taxed, but only valuable land, and that in proportion to its value. A great many misapprehensions arise on that point. How would I tax capitalists who are not land owners? I would not tax them at all. Capital is a good thing, and the more capital we have the better. Don’t be afraid of capital. There is really no quarrel between labor and capital. The enemy of labor is monopoly.

p. 8, col. 3

Break down this fundamental monopoly; take for the benefit of the state this enormous sum that now goes to make a few rich without labor; sweep away all other taxes; and you will break up these vast aggregations of capital, you will increase the power of labor, and you will unite labor and capital.

Q.—Would not an income tax, as well as a land tax, tax the landlord?

A.—I don’t believe in an income tax.

Q.—In the nationalization of American land, how about the American Indian, the rightful heir, according to your theory?

A.—The American Indian should have just as much right as any other man, and no more. He is entitled to no more. William Penn gets great credit for having bought the land from the Indians. What right had the Indians to sell the land? Supposing they had sold William Penn the sun. (Laughter.)

Q.—We know that landlords have a happy knack of shirking all their responsibilities. What is to prevent the landlord, in the event of the land being taxed on its value, imposing the tax on the occupant?

A.—There is everything to prevent him. He could not do it. The landlord now, it is fair to say, gets all the rent that the occupier, or any other occupier, is willing to pay. There is nothing in the tax on land values to give him power to get more. If you tax houses, the landlord can get more; if you tax cigars, the seller can get more; if you tax clothing, the clothier and tailor can get more. Why? For this reason. Taxes on articles of human production tend to check the supply, and therefore to raise the price, and prices must rise until you can go on at the ordinary level of profit. That is the reason why a tax on a house adds to the rent, why a tax on cigars adds to the price of cigars, why the duty on tea adds to the price of tea. But land is not a thing of human production. The tax upon land values, so far from giving the owner any power of getting a larger price, in fact diminishes that power; for this reason—that it prevents other people holding land idle. For instance, I am told the value of the land in the city of London to-day is over £400,000,000 sterling, and the value of the houses and other improvements amounts to little over £200,000,000 sterling. Under the present system the ground values bear a tax of only £500,000; the houses and other improvements, valued at not half as much, bear a tax of £7,000,000. (“Shame!”) If you were to abolish that tax on houses and improvements and put it on the value of land, irrespective of its use, don’t you think that those people who are holding land vacant for a higher price would be in more of a hurry than they are at present? (Laughter and applause.) No, no! The one tax, the one great tax that cannot be shifted, is the tax on land values, and that is why the landlords kick against it so heavily. Taxes that can be imposed on others you generally find the people who first pay them perfectly willing to pay, but the tax on land values the landowner always fights against.

Q.—Is Mr. George in favor of abolishing the tax on liquor?

A.—You have got a man here much more capable of meeting that argument than I am, and that is Mr. Briggs. I don’t see that it has any bearing on what we are discussing here to-night. (Hear, hear.) You can keep your tax on liquor if you want to, but don’t let that step^sic you from putting a tax on ground value. My own personal opinion is that the production of liquor ought to be free of tax—that a tax upon liquor is a tax in favor of adulteration. (Hear, hear.) Mr. Briggs, for instance, holds that the sale of liquor ought be^sic perfectly free, and that that would destroy the gin palaces. (Hear, hear.) For my part, whilst I am quite clear that the production ought to be perfectly free, I think that either its sale ought to be free or it ought to be a government monopoly—one or the other. But I will not discuss that question now. (Hear, hear.)

The Chairman—I don’t think the question of Sunday opening has anything to do with the subject. I have another question here, but it is so ambiguous that I think it is a mere quibble. (A voice: “Don’t put it if it is,” and “Hear, hear.”) If there is any pertinent question I shall be very glad to put it; but we cannot go into the discussion of the question of teetotalism. (Hear, hear, and applause.)

Reply to the Vote of Thanks.

Mr. George, in responding to the vote of thanks, said:

Mr. Crosfield has said what is nearest to my heart. There is work in this great cause for every man and woman. It needs no special ability, and I believe that if a man will address himself to it he will find his power increasing and opportunities extending. There is before us to-day the noblest work in which men can engage. It is something more that a mere^sic fiscal reform. It is something more than merely increasing wealth. What we propose to do is to liberate bodies, to liberate minds, to destroy what our friend has said is a soul debasing serfdom. This is a work in which there is but one power that can be successfully appealed to, and that is the power of thought—of public opinion. If every man who feels in his heart the stir of this cause, if every man to whom that appeal which Richard Cobden made to John [Bright?], comes home, will go forth from this [hall to?] do what he can to clear his own mind, and to clear the minds of those he comes in contact with, it will not be long before he will see his influence extending. It will not be long before public opinion will be gathering in a resistless wave that will sweep everything before it. (Applause.) I want to see something in my time. (Hear, hear.) What is the use of going on year after year working and slaving as men do now, when there is no earthly reason for it? There is a great movement beginning in England. Start in and help it. Urge this reform on your leaders. Give such men as Mr. Gladstone the assurance that you are behind them, that they cannot go forward too rapidly for you, and that if they do want you to follow they must go forward, else you will be ahead of them, and asking for new leaders. (Great applause.) And now I want to perform the pleasant duty that, according to your English custom, devolves upon me of moving a vote of thanks to our chairman, the president of the Financial reform association of Liverpool. In doing that I wish to express my sense of the good work which that association has done and has yet to do, and my cordial good wishes for its prosperity and strength. (Hear, hear.) Let us do all we can to strengthen this association, to push its publications, and make its work tell. It is telling in this country; it is telling all over the world. It indeed has lifted the standard of true free trade. Let us follow it. (Loud applause.)

Speech of Thomas Briggs.

Mr. Briggs: Ladies and gentlemen, it would be futile on my part to attempt to add anything to what Mr. George has said this night. I only rise just to second most cordially the vote of thanks to our chairman. I may, perhaps, relate an incident that occurred to me to day. I met with a gentleman in my hotel and presented him with a small handbill inviting him to come to this meeting. He looked at it, and he read it, and he said: “Well, there is not a workingman in this country but what might, if he would be temperate and exercise caution about his expenditures, raise himself to be a millionaire.” I may tell you I found out this gentleman was a brewer.

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“Well,” I said, “that is not desirable. I don’t see why he should. Why should there not be a state of things wherein every man can make himself happy in doing a fair day’s work for a fair day’s wages, seeing clearly from the laws of the land which he has to obey that he is safe from poverty?” That is what we want in this country. (Applause.)

The proposition having been put to the meeting by Mr. George, was carried with a loud “Aye.”

PRESIDENT MUSPRATT’S REPLY.

The chairman said: I am extremely obliged to you for your vote of thanks. All I can say is that it has been an extremely great pleasure to me this evening to listen to the admirable address of Mr. George. I am sure that what he has said will make an impression on the workingmen of Liverpool, and I hope that they will now see that the work of the Financial Reform association has been in their interest, and that they ought to support it. (Applause.)