SENATOR STANFORD ON PROGRESS AND POVERTY.

Waikato Times, Volume XXX, Issue 2454, 3 April 1888, Page 3

SENATOR STANFORD ON PROGRESS AND POVERTY.

« It is creditable alike to the head and the heart of the busiest rich man on this continent that he finds time to think out and endeavour to solve the problems that concern the labouring poor. Interviewed the other day by a Washington correspondent, Senator Stanford demonstrated not only his living, active sympathy with tho working masses, but showed that the amelioration of their condition was a subject to which he had d-votcd tho closest thought of his strong mind. " There is only one way," he said, "to reduce beggary to a minimum. Dry up the ■ources —abolish the conditions that make beggars. To try to cure beggary by street charity is like trying to stop a hole in your roof by mopping up the puddles that gather on the floor. It is not millionaries that cause poverty by a good deal. Nobody is the worse off because of the wealth of the A x anderbilts. If they had it not it worild not exist at all." It is only in this community where millionaires are possible, that the average citizen has enough to eat. If there was more accumulated capital in the country with which to develop its resources, there would be more profitable work and less poverty. Now, what causes poverty ? First : ignorance of how to save money. There were beggars in • California in 1850, any man could Co out with a tin pail and earn §5 before breakfast. It is the same now. The soil is wonderfully fruitful. Merely 20,000 workers produce all the wheat of the State, and export a million tons of it every year, and yet thera are thousands who don't know how to save a few dollars to make a start with, and therefore there are beggars. Undoubtedly an important cause of poverty is unthrift. People, whole masses of them, (io not understand economy or practice it, as almost every founder of a fortune had to do once in his life. Second : the sale and use of liquor is prolific of poverty. As long as there arc ten times as many saloons as churches and schools combined, the sources of misery are obrions. Third : a lack of manual training results in labourers without skill. If so many people could be taught trades, that the entire product of this country could lie doubled next year, the wages would be doubled, either in increase of money received, or in the smaller cost of the necessities of life. More capable skilled hands—that is one of our greatest needs. The way to supply that want I hope to illustrate at the University I am building, where the rudiments of every useful trade and occupation may be taught. When everybody knows how to do some difficult and useful thing, poverty will rapidly diminish." There can be no doubt to the reflecting mind that all this is true. Unavoidable poverty is one. thing, and that which is entirely preventable is quite another. The former is the rarest kind, whilst the latter is the commonest. The man who drinks his earnings, and at the same time unfits his body for future efforts, must necessarily in the end become povertystricken. He is the author of the ills that sooner or later overtake him. He must either cease to be an intoxicated animal or remain poor. No extraneous aid, save the Grace of God, can help him. Legislation may do much to remove the temptation, and it doubtless will some day. Meanwhile it is a sad reflection upon human character that men should require the law to do for them what they are abundantly able to do for themselves. Then again, there can be no doubt but that the spending habit, for it is a habit with all too many people, is responsible for much of tho poverty of the world. If a man will not, in the days of his strength, save of his overplus, he must expect to run short when the hour of weakness and failure arrives. He cannot eat his cake and have it. If he . will not, like the busy bee, save his honey in the Spring-time of life when the , flowers are open, his improvidence is sure to find him out when the cold frosts of , AVinter blight the sources of supply, j There are few men who do not, at one time or another, earn enough money to , keep them comfortable to the end if only their earnings were reasonably husbanded. Unthrift is undoubtedly a prolific source of poverty, Again, it is certain that the man who has not learnt how to do some useful thing tint the world has need of is s idly handicapped in the batile of life. The steam engine is rendering unskilled labour less ] and less in demand, and is reducing it'.- •. pay. Training of the baud and eye— \ skill to design, fashion and execute—are what the labour markets of the world are ; demanding and competing for, and the article supplied must be that for which 1 there i 3 only a very moderate demand. ■_ Every youth should be given skill enough to make his way iu the world. It must not be believed, however, that poverty is on the increase iu the world or that the wage-worker is worse off now than in earlier times. The opposite is the truth. It is not the fact that whilst the rich are becoming richer tho poor are becoming poorer. That is the teaching of the Socialists, Anarchists and an ti-poverty men of the period, but it is . refuted by indubitable evidence. The * vast increase of material prosperity all ' round is one of the most remarkable fea- !. tures of this century. The hundreds and hundreds of millions worth of the precious ° metals dug out of the earth during the " past forty years have been widely distri- P buted among a vast number of people. n Natural forces, steam, electricity, fire and water have been adapted to the produc- '. tion of wealth ; improved methods of tilling the soil have greatly increased its , productive power; cheap means of tt transportation and commercial lines to all quarters of the world have . placed the productions of every clime within the reach of all but the poorest, whereas but a century ago they were at A the command of only the wealthiest. Better educational methods, broader . philanthropic agencies, improved sanitary " regulations, and discoveries in medical science, have all contributed to the elevation of tho race. These agencies, operating low down in society, have been of incalculable benefit, and while they have ~ raised one class very high, placing all that the world has at the command of „, the millionaire, it should not be for- .] gotten that they have correspond- Jingly raised the great majority of the poor. There is no doubt that tho !'. labourer is now better paid, better , housed, fed and clothed, his children better educated, and his mental needs . better met than ever before. These | r elevating influences are constantly ex- . tending their operations and going down "' still lower, and while we may not hope m for the abolution of poverty and extinc- P.' tion of suffering, we may surely expect cl that the operation of natural laws will al gradually lessen those evils. Would l )f that more of our rich men would imitate a Stanford by helping along the amoliorat- P l ing process! U1

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