Nature has been lavish to her children.
She has placed in this earth all the material of wealth
that is necessary to make men and women happy…
There is just one thing we lack, and we have only ourselves
to blame if we do not become free. We simply lack
the intelligence to take possession
of that which we have produced.
-Lucy Parsons
Hellraisers Journal, Sunday April 10, 1898
Fort Scott, Kansas – Socialist Education Society Acts
From the Appeal to Reason of April 9, 1898:
OBJECT TO BEING BONDED.
At a regular meeting of the socialist educational society of Fort Scott, Kan., by unanimous vote, the following resolutions were adopted and ordered signed by the President and Secretary in behalf of the society.
RESOLVED, That inasmuch as there is now a scheme on foot to bond ourselves and children to a private corporation for a large sum to pipe natural gas to Ft. Scott, that it is the pledge of this society that we will work to defeat these bonds, and in case these schemers succeed in hoodwinking the people, we pledge ourselves to devise a means to repudiate these bonds; and if we fail we will teach our children the infamy of such schemes that they may repudiate all such bonds.
RESOLVED, That these schemes, after they have been consummated have been laid at the door of the wage worker as “his folly.” We denounce any such accusations as false and defy the capitalistic class to point to a single scheme gotten up by the laboring class to vote any such private bonds.
RESOLVED, That we fully realize that all wealth is created by the laborer, and that all bonds are paid from this creation. Hence, the wealth producer ultimately pays both principal and interest, and the only reward is a false accusation and a little sop called “wage” while they are producing the wealth and giving it to the capitalist.
C. LIPSCOMB, Pres.
M. M. JONES
Secretary.
[Poem inset is from page 3.]
From The Fort Scott Weekly Monitor of March 30, 1898:
Note: much the same article, but with more informative introduction-
SOCIALISTS WILL ACT.
—–
Pass Resolutions Denouncing Proposition to Vote Gas Bonds.In view of the fact that a proposition is about to be made by Mr. Jas. Murdock to pipe natural gas to this city and also that that enterprise is well under way to success and thought favorable of by the people, the Bourbon county socialistic educational society, at a regular meeting held last night, by a unanimous vote passed the following resolution, which was signed by President C. Lipscomb and Secretary M. M. Jones:
[There then follows the Resolutions passed-see above.]
———-
From the Duluth Labor World of April 9, 1898:
PUBLIC OWNERSHIP.
—–
It Grows with Gigantic Strides
in Many of our States.
—–
In the Recent Elections Public Ownership
is Victorious in Many Instances.
—–
Only a few years ago it was eccentricity or foolishness, if not red handed anarchy to propose municipal, ownership of franchises. It was proved over and over that cities could not manage their corporate business and that it would be an unwarranted invasion of vested rights and democratic institutions for cities to attempt it. Little by little,—and trades unions have not been the least factor in bringing it about—our cities are beginning to see that they must control their franchises and many of them will not be satisfied with anything less than out-and-out management and operation.
In Milwaukee this week the question turned largely on the municipal ownership of public utilities. The people won on that issue. What Pingree has done in Detroit in the last five years is too well known to need further comment. In Chicago when it was proposed to give the streets to the franchise robbers men offered to crucify any politicians who would consent to it.
* * *
In St. Louis a new charter is pending in which a clause has been introduced making it practically impossible for the city to abandon its duty in the water works. It says that before the city can sell, lease, farm out or rent out the franchise or plant, the proposition must be recommended unanimously by the board of public works, must be passed by a majority of all the members of the council, must be approved by the mayor, and must finally be ratified by a five-sixths majority of the vote cast at a special election. All the other precautions might be in vain but you can trust the people. St. Louis will not be betrayed while that charter stands.
In fact the provision with regard to the popular vote need not have been so carefully restricted. It is well that the principle of the referendum is recognized. It might have been more fully adopted by allowing people to sell their birthright at pleasure by a bare majority. And you may be confident that the corporation beggars would much sooner get the unanimous recommendation of the board of works and the consent of the council and the approval of the mayor than a majority of the people.
* * *
However the plain fact from these and a hundred other illustrations is that the municipal idea is growing. It is not yet half grown. London, that overvast city which was until a few years ago formless and frameless, is far ahead of any American city in its provision for civic needs. There is not one of our cities that has begun to realize what it might do. Parks and playgrounds, music and schools are provided in more or less measure; baths sometimes and free classes in special instruction. But there are a hundred things that might be done and ought to be done that have not come anywhere within the municipal scope. And there are a hundred sources of revenue which ought to belong to the cities and are yet allowed to go to private tax collectors. If they were half utilized our cities might be run for the benefit of the people who live in them, as a city should be, and still have less taxes than now, or no taxes at all.
* * *
In Duluth we have learned much. We have learned that Duluth has no more franchises to give away. Those bestowals from the public estate which were once viewed complacently as though they developed our resources, would not be tolerated now. It is agreed that outstanding franchises should be recalled as fast as possible. Much progress has been made. The gas and water company almost belongs to the city after the tedious struggle of seven years. Most of all the people have been accustomed to look beneath the surface and see the real relation of things in certain cases. They can’t be fooled about municipal franchises. But that is only a beginning. Thought must go further. The same principles are capable of far wider application. The municipal idea is growing and Duluth must be alert to grow with it.
[Ad inset is from page 4.]
And from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch of April 7, 1898:
MILWAUKEE’S ELECTION.
Every party that put a ticket into the field in the campaign just ended in Milwaukee advocated municipal ownership.
There were four tickets. The Republicans had a “municipal ownership of all public utilities” plank. The Democrats had the same, but a little more radical. The Social Democrats, a new party founded by Eugene V. Debs, of course wanted municipal ownership and great deal more. And the Social Labor party has for years advocated municipal ownership.
The Democrats won this strange fight because the Populists, who also want municipal ownership, fused with them.
It appears, therefore, that municipal ownership has come to stay in Milwaukee. The peculiar phenomenon presented by this fight also indicates that, other things being favorable, a municipal ownership plank is a winning card in a city campaign.
———-
SOURCES
Appeal to Reason
(Girard, Kansas)
-Apr 9, 1898
https://www.newspapers.com/image/66970403
https://www.newspapers.com/image/66970408
The Fort Scott Weekly Monitor
(Fort Scott, Kansas)
-Mar 30, 1898
https://www.newspapers.com/image/67705768/
The Labor World
(Duluth, Minnesota)
-Apr 9, 1898
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn78000395/1898-04-09/ed-1/seq-1/
St Louis Post-Dispatch
(St Louis, Missouri)
-Apr 7, 1898
https://www.newspapers.com/image/138125649/
IMAGE
AD, St Paul Duluth RR, LW p4, Apr 9, 1898
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn78000395/1898-04-09/ed-1/seq-4/
See also:
Hazen S. Pingree
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazen_S._Pingree
“Hazen S. Pingree and the Detroit Model of Urban Reform”
-by Alexandra W. Lough
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/ajes.12135
Social Democracy of America
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Democracy_of_America
https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/eam/spa/spadownloads-1895-1905.html
The American Socialist Movement 1897-1912
-by Ira Kipnis
Haymarket Books, Apr 3, 2005
(search: “public ownership”)
https://books.google.com/books?id=ili0huEKAk0C
We Only Want the Earth
Lyrics by James Connolly
https://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly/1907/xx/wewnerth.htm