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Where Shall Oar Workmen Go?

Where Shall Oar Workmen Go? image
Parent Issue
Day
10
Month
August
Year
1877
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

We are not inclined to disouss reme' dies for the social diseases whinh have produced these scandalous strikes until the strikes have come to an ond. Hut we see that soine of onr coteuiporaries are flattering themsolves with the belief that everything can be made comfortable by the simple expedient of inducing all the laborers who fail of work in the East to go West and settlo on Government land, and it is jast as well perhaps, therefore, to observe that this resource is no longer open to us. Mr. Wells has shown in the North American Review for July, 1877, that " the quanti" ty of fertile public land suitable for " farming purposes which can now be " obtained by preëmption or at nominal " prices is comparatively limited, if not " nearly exhausted." According to Major Powell's authoritative researcb.es into this moet interesting subject " there " is not left unsold in the whole United " States (excopt perhops in Texas or the " Indian Territory;, of land which a " poor man could turn into a farm, " enough to make one average county " in Wisconsin." Attempts have baan made to break the force of these startling ruvt'lations, but with not much success. It is just as well to look the facts of our position in the face and to make up our miiiiis that we are not likely to 1)h allowed to make up our uiinda that we are not likely to be allowed to escape the necessity of dealing with the ■ocial problems with which we are now confronted, as coinfortably as our fathers did. We must better the conditions of life in the North and West, as they have been bettered in England, by sensible legislation ; and to that end we must make up our mind to put better men into public life. In the legislatiou of the coming era brains will teil as well as numbers, and those sections of the country which send the ablest men to Congress will be aided by the stern pressure of public necessities to secure an indisputable preëminence and control in our publio affairs. The publio press will be compelled to deal with other themes than the twaddle of partisan criminations and recriminations. It is altogether probable than the drift of power in the immediate future of this country will be deflected from the oourse into which it was uunaturally forced, first by the existen ce of sla ver jr and theu by the war which grew out of the existence of slavery, and will tend Southward and South west ward. The exceptions which Major Powell makes in favor of Texas and the Indian Territory are undoubtedly well made. Tyejr sted, in the best and most thoughtful book ever published on the South and Soutb west, clearly pointed out that the abolition of slavery must inevitably be followed by a great displacement of the centers of population in this country, and a new inoveinent of wealth and industry. Even in the older States of the South this prophecy bas silently begun to work iteelf out under all the discouraging circumstances of misgoverninent and social confusión inflicted upon that región by the iguorant and malevolent legislation of the last decade. The census of 1880 will be extremely apt to make the people of the Northern and Western sections of the Union open their eyes very wide indeed ; and the proliabilitiua are that before that time the disoontented classes of the North and West will have begun to find their way out of the desert by a sort ot blind instinct. The people of the Seaboard and Central South are awakening to a practical perception of the immense resources, and especially of the immense manufacturing resources, whioh they possesss, and the people of Texas are iully consoious of the faot that they enjoy, in both point of climote and in soil, such advantages over the north wostorn part of tho Mississippi Yalley as must loave no sort of doubt in the minds of rofluotiu" men oonoerning the futuro of the two rogions respectively. It is a curious faot tbat the war, which did so inuch to develop the population and wealth of Texas, should have left the present active generation of men at the North in a more complete igorance about it thun existod here even under the régime of slavery. Mr. Olmsted's descríptiún ot this commonwealth, " greater in area "tban Kentucky, Virginia, Maryland. " Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York " and all New England unitod," would astonish Mr. Blaine, we suspect, quite as much as any other casual citizen of Maine. But it is simply true, and it is equally true, as he eloquently says, that " since an English plough ñrst broko " the virgin sward of the sea-slope of " Virginia A nglo-Saxons have not en" tered on so inagnifioent a domain." The sooner we emerge from the stif ling atmcsphere of the snmll sectional and party squabbling in which wo have wasted so many years and go muoh of our national vigor, and addross ourelves to the imperial questions of naional policy in an imperial spirit, the ess trouble we shall have. with the social spectres that have started up to-day n our path, partly as a chastisement and partly as a warning. - It. Y. World, The Hastings Banntr carriel the flag on snake torios. The following is what ;ook the prize : " It is Btated thac a 'oung man reoently left Hastings to reoeive medical aid for souie mysterioug lisease. While on the cara he fainted, and while in that oondition a fair siud nake was seen to come partly out of lis mouth. Homo brave passenger oapurod it and relieved the young man, ut the snake afterward escaped." Dwight Hurlburt, of Grand Rupirts, old two cara of fine oom hing wooí toa hiladelphia firm, and shipped it by he Qrand Bapids & Indiana Kailroad uut before the railroad strikes. After he riot be reaeived notice that the wool eached Pittaburgh in time to be burnod by the mob Charles B. Peck has been appointod uperintendent of the Chicago and Port iluron Railway, in place of E. B. Tayor, who will assist Mr. Bancroft as roeiver. The new superiutendent has orered pay incrcusud to the ram paid uly 16 for locomotivo service and June 6 for train service. Miss Crocker, last wopk, while fUhing t Mullut Lake, near Cheboygan, caught muskallonge three feet eleven and ne half inches long, und weighiug wenty-four pounds.

Article

Subjects
Old News
Michigan Argus