As if they were not yet satisfied with the oppressions already in
operation, some of those whom you have sent to Washington to conduct
your business, and who have got you into all this difficulty, think that
silver is not good enough money in which to pay interest, because it is
not now worth proportionally quite so much as gold. Where has the wisdom
and prudence of this people fled? Have they no care for what _may_ come
upon their families, that they sit by and see indignity after indignity
piled mountain-high upon the people? The lives, the labour, the all of
the poor may be taken for the public good; but your bonds, your money,
your usury must not be touched. They are considered to be of more
consequence than life and toil and everything else that the poor have
got to be taken!—your revenue must be sacred, and the Shylocks must take
their “pound of flesh” from the daily labourer, let it cost whatever
blood it may in the cutting of it; and no wise Portia comes to stay the
hand already dripping with the life of the toilers, for is not the
interest wrenched from their toil, their life! Look at the poor of the
country; millions of them without work and their families either
starving or else on the verge of starvation. Let me read you extracts
from two articles from the _New York Sun_ of the 20th of July, so that
you may see that I am not overdrawing the picture: “Starvation in New
York. The sufferings among the poor are fearful. The sufferers are
chiefly widows and young children, who, for lack of nourishment, are
unable to withstand the intense heat. Instances of actual starvation are
mentioned. A widow and her young daughter and son, who are unable to
find work, had been for some time living on $2 a week. In a garret,
without any other furniture than an old dry goods box for a table and a
broken chair, live a widow and her five young children. In a closet are
a mattress and a blanket, which at night make a bed for the whole
family. An aged woman, who was once in affluent circumstances, was some
time ago found nearly dead with hunger; it was only by careful nursing
that she was saved. A young man, whose family were gradually starving,
was driven to despair and intent on suicide. The child of another died,
and not only was the father unable to bury it, but he was unable to
provide food for the living.” These are only a few of the cases that
come under the observation of a single church relief society. What shall
we say of the great city? The other was entitled “Widespread Destitution
in Brooklyn. At the meeting of the King’s County Charity Commissioners
yesterday, Mr. Bogan said that there was almost as much destitution in
the city now as at midwinter. The families of unemployed men who up to
this time have never asked for a cent of charity, were daily besieging
his office. The system of outdoor relief had been abandoned, and there
was no way to provide for the needy except out of his private purse. The
heads of families were forced into idleness by the hard times, and,
having exhausted all their means were face to face with starvation.” Is
not this a fearful picture of those who have helped to make the wealth
with which the storehouses of the country are loaded? African slavery
was a blessing compared with the condition of thousands of the poor. Let
its evils have been as great as we know that they were, the negroes
never suffered for food; the women and children never died of
starvation; never suffered from cold or went naked. Oh, that some master
mind, some master spirit, might be sent of God to show you the way out
of this desolation and the necessity of deliverance. But I fear you will
not be wise enough to avoid the penalty for neglecting to keep your
industrial institutions on the same plane with your political
organization, which is the only possible remedy for the present evils.
The people must be made as much one industrially as they are
politically. Then there would be harmony and consequent peace and
prosperity.