Kansas Agitator

Red Cross.

Terence V. Powderly, in his late address, made three good points on the economics of total abstinence: "If workingmen can build palaces in which liquor is sold, why can they not build respectable homes for themselves? If they can afford time to ruin body, intellect and family in the saloon, why can they not devote a part of that time to studying the great question of industrial emancipation? Why can they not study how to become a power in the land which their labor makes great and wonderful? If the workman cannot purchase a home because the taxes are too high, because land is too dear, because politicians rule, why does he contribute his mite toward an institution which raises taxes to maintain police? Why devote his pennies to that which blinds him to the iniquitous land system which robs him and makes him the slave of the corrupt politician, who would have to walk in an upright path if all were sober citizens? If $85,000,000 can be handed over by the toilers of one country in one year to those who erect saloons and gin-palaces, why can they not devote at least a fourth of that sum, proportionately, in every country to the erection of industrial institutes where the rights, duties and privileges of all men may be discussed, and where a higher education may be had on all subjects which relate to man's stay upon and interest in the earth?"