Greatest And Meanest Of Thieves

Indirect taxation is the greatest and the meanest thief on earth. This thief takes liitle at a time, but he takes that little from each person 365 days out of every year. No civilized being on this globe is exempt from his ravages. He has the authority of the government to plunder its citizens. The government knows that the thief is cautious, judicious and sly, and that he has had experience in the art of extracting money from the poekets of the people for revenue and "other purposes," as the McKinley bill puts it. The thief turnB over to the government about one-third of his swag and gives the other twothirds to bis real employers - the manufacturers and nionopolists. Thus this thief pilfers from us each year over $300, 000, 000 for our government, and probably $600,000,000 more for the monopolist and trusts - an average of nearly $75 a year from each farnily, $50 of which goes to a íavored few. With such a magnificent thief abroad in our land, it is no wonder that wc lave produced over 4,000 niillionaires since 18tiO, who, according to the census 3f 1890, owu one-fifthof all our m-ulth. [t is no wonder that 9 per cent of om population own over 70 per cent of omwealth, leaving 91 per cent practically paupers living from hand to inouth. This condition of affairs is a reversal of the condition in 1860, when 90 per cent of our population owned over 70 per cent of our wealth. A thief that has n 30 years transferred nearly $50,000,000, 000 from the pockets of the masses ;o the pockets of the classes is certainly the greatest of all thieves. He is also the meanest, for, unlike most thieves, who opérate mainly upon the rich, his victims are the hardworking people. He stealthily lays hold of every fifth dollar of the poor and carries it exultingly to the vaults of the rich. Shame on the senator who is such a traitor to the people or who is so grossly ignorant of the nature of indirect taxation that he will riso in his place in the senate to champion the interests of the ereatest and meanest of thieves I