﻿CONGRESS AND BUMS 
 
Yes, we have a depression — three of ‘em. One amidship, one on top (?) and one surrounds up. 
By the way. Remember that depression we had in ‘steen? Yes. down in Springfield, Illinois. You DO! I thought you would. When the bums all carried hatchets like George Wash, and Catharine Nation? Remember It? How they used to win subsistence with their hatchets—they would go along the side of a stock train, pull the pigs’ tails out between the slats and chop them [uncleaer] and make a muligan of them. Remember It? Rather crude and cruel— that was in the days before it was discovered that pigtail makes wonderful canned tongue—in fact. I believe that famous depression gave the packers an idea. . . . Sh, sh, shush. The bums saw that it was a waste of power to haul tails so they Intercepted the trains and abbreviated the hogs. There should be a constitutional amendment against this. For these men take it that their sole dependent is their stomach and, in the absence of clear law specifying a closed season on pig tails they may “unbury” their axes during this present deppression. . . . 
It is said that “Congressmen cannot live on $7,500 a year.” I believe it. You wouldn’t expect congress to drink the same stuff that we drink — lemon-phosphate, ginger ale and water.— $7,500 is $600 a month, $20 a day. — I admit that it can’t be done . . . and I hope they will refuse to do it . . . there is no good reason why they should . . . I cannot recall a single extenuating circumstance why they should continue to live on $7,500. — Of course we would hate to see them expire — we’re tenderhearted — we never could gaze on death with equanimity — but if they, will let us know in advance— as the critical moment approaches — we will “lay” over a day between towns. 

Labor, too, threatens to expire. He says he cannot live an hour on four-bits (that’s four bucks a day — and that’s $104 a month —that’s $1,248 a year —one thousand two hundred and forty-eight dollars a year or twelve hundred and four dozen bucks a year . . . It becomes ‘clear: If congress can’t survive on seventy-five hundred dollars, how in the name of sweet Peggy Joyce (my ideal) are we to survive on twelve hundred? We can’t— and what’s more, we won’t. We’ll start work on our will right away: We. T-Bone Slim, being of flexible mind and unsound body, do hereby bequeath and will all our interest in pigtails, before mentioned, to the $7,500 congressmen, in the hope that they may eke out a livelihood until such a time when they are able to look after the people’s interest, and, to do our bit in driving the spectre of want from the porch of our lawgivers. Note: Whether we die or not this will holds good, for, in the meantime we impose to live on roots (not roosts). Note II: Work is scarce. Let congressmen hang onto their jobs at least till work opens up a little— enough bums already. 
Robbers and Robins Organize. We’ll discuss robins first; robbers can wait: 
Before robins start north from the sunny south, they gather themselves into large flocks (industrial unions), then they undertake the trip. Days and days they wait patiently until all are ready. None start out alone. 
Now the moral to this. We may not be as smart as the robbers, but surely we ought to have the guts of a robin. Let’s go. 

Unemployment, the great irrespector of persons, is paying our Indiana K. K. Klan a hundred per cent visit. Wages are shyn an’ getting shyer. Lot of time now to flit around in a night shirt. 

My outstanding and outspoken impression of the Land of Wabash is: Everybody is trying to get everybody else to say something against our glorious traditions and wonderful regime of thievery in high places—a fine state of affairs. Let us patiently wait till this comes to a head — it spells assassination. If they are not at each other’s throats in a very short time I miss my guess. Really, we should interfere, to save their lives.— DAYLIGHT slaving time commences June 15th in OKLAHOMA.