LITTLE YORK LAKE ICE FISHING REPORT

The Cortland Democrat, Friday, January 20, 1888.

LITTLE YORK.

   B. J. Salisbury & Co. have now on hand about two hundred and fifty bushels of flax seed, which they will furnish to farmers, taking seed again next fall, and engaging to buy the straw at a remunerative price. They propose to manufacture all the grades of tow and buy all the seed that may be raised. With the reaper for cutting flax we think it will not hurt land any more than any other grain crop. A crop of potatoes and one of flax will pay for an acre on any of our hill farms.

   The fishing through the ice has been brisk for the past week, and some fine strings have been taken. The "two Wills" lead the list with thirty-eight pickerel and perch, weighing twenty three pounds. E. C. Taylor, of Homer, got seventeen pickerel one day. A party from South Cortland had a fine string.

   A scarcity of wood prevails on account of the hard crust and difficulty of getting into the woods. One farmer is burning up his fence.

   When there does come a pleasant day farmers rush in their potatoes—a car load a day—at 60 cts. per bushel; also barley enough to fill two cars within the week at 70 cts.

   Our old friend Goodwin writes that he slipped on the ice and severely hurt the bones of his elbow. We extend our sympathy.

   Giles Corl is much improved in health and enjoying life under the watchful care of Dr R. A. Goodell.

   The spring term of our school commenced Monday with the same teacher, Miss Jennie Wells.

   ULI SLICK [Little York correspondent for the Cortland Democrat—CC editor.]

WORKINGMEN’S RIGHTS.

Let Them Now Insist on What the Tariff has Tried to Give Them.

(From the New York Evening Post.)

   Now is the time for the laboring man to get what belongs to him under the tariff. For a quarter of a century he has been fooled by the pretense that Congress was enacting tariffs in his interest and for his benefit. The process by which his wages were to be raised was false on its face. It amounted to this: That Congress would give the employer a lot of money, or fix things so that he could get it from other people, and that he would then, of his own volition and benevolence, hand it over to his workmen

   What a roundabout process. No accounting was ever stipulated for. No books were kept. Nobody could ever tell whether any of this surplus ever reached its true destination, the laboring man's pocket. The laboring man has always been in a fight with the employer on this question, insisting that his share was withheld from him. Just now the glassblowers are making a new fight on this issue. They have seldom been without such a fight these twenty years. Why not embrace the opportunity to ask Congress to give the laboring man his share of the proceeds of the tariff directly, instead of handing it over to the employers to be distributed according to their ideas of the eternal fitness of things?

   Either this should be done or a law should be passed compelling every protected employer to keep a set of books to be inspected by Government officers and by the workingmen themselves. These books should show in all cases that the employers pay the workingmen that proportion of the tariff money which is levied for their benefit. If 25 per cent, for example, is imposed for extra wages, and if it is not paid in cash weekly or monthly, the recusant employer should be liable to the employees in an action for debt. Perhaps, however, a more direct and satisfactory way would be for Congress to ascertain exactly the amount that the workingmen in protected trades are entitled to, and then appropriate it to them directly, repealing at the same time the duties on the protected articles.

    In one of these ways, and in no other, so far as human kin may discern, the good intention of Congress towards wage earners may be realized. Surely the present plan has been a failure.

HOW PROTECTION PROTECTS.

   Two current items of news show very clearly whom protection protects.

   The will of the late W. C. DePauw, of Indiana, is contested by his eldest daughter. The estate inventoried over $6,000,000 and the will gave $1,500,000 to DePauw University and about as much more to the Methodist Conference.

   How was this great fortune amassed? In the manufacture of glass, protected under our tariff from 45 to 147 per cent. How has "American Labor" fared under the law that enabled DePauw to heap up $6,000,000? In 1860 the average daily wages of glass-workers was $2.98; in 1880 it was $1.79. All the glass-workers in the country have not been able to save as much money under twenty five years of "Protection" as this one manufacturer devotes to perpetuating his name in a mushroom "University."

   Example number two: A. Pardee, the coal baron of Hazleton, who has devoted a portion of the great fortune which the bounty system has enabled him to heap up to connecting his name with a college, began evicting his "striking miners" on Tuesday. How these miners have slaved and starved, the World’s unchallenged reports have told the country. And now the philanthropic patron of education is evicting them from the miserable hovels that have been their shelter.

   And this is how Protection protects.—New York World.

Thomas Platt

PAGE TWO/EDITORIALS.

   The jury in the case of the People against Tom Platt—tried last week in Albany— very properly found a verdict against him and the court thereupon ordered judgment of ouster to be recorded against him. For several years past Platt has held the office of Quarantine Commissioner at the port of New York. According to law the person holding this office must be a citizen of that city. Although Platt's term of office expired some time ago, he held on to the office and the [Republican] Senate refused to confirm the nomination of his successor, who was appointed by [Democrat] Gov. Hill.

   The Attorney General of the State brought an action against him in the name of the People, to oust him from the office which he wrongfully held, on the ground that he was a citizen of Owego, and was therefore "usurping, intruding into and unlawfully holding and exercising a public office within this State."

   On the trial it was shown by several witnesses that he had voted in Owego every year but two since he had held the office, and that at least upon one occasion he had sworn in his vote. When he swore in his vote he had to swear that he was a resident and citizen of Owego. It was also shown that when he moved for a change of venue in this same case a few months ago, he made the motion on affidavits made by himself, wherein he stated as a reason why the venue should be changed, the fact that he was a resident and citizen of Owego.

   Platt’s counsel, it is said, will appeal, but upon what ground they expect to obtain a new trial has not transpired. Probably the only object they have in taking an appeal is to keep Platt in the place a few months longer.

   The recent investigation shows that the office has been very badly managed under Platt, and that reform is highly necessary. Platt's idea of office is that it should be used entirely in the interest of the person holding it, and of the party to which he belongs. The idea that "public office is a public trust," never has and never will enter that astute politician’s head. As we understand the judgment, he is out of office until the courts put him back, and that time will probably never come.

   Platt must go.