Free Trade, &c.

FREE TRADE, FREE SOIL, FREE MEN.

Ho! for free trade, ye sons of toil,
A commerce from oppression free,
The land ye till, in truth free soil,
Yourselves the sons of Liberty.

Throw out the banner to the wind!
Write on its folds the words so brave:
“Freedom to Trade, to Soil, to Mind!”
And thus our Nation’s honor save.

No more should selfish millionaires
Control our nation’s weal or woe,
But every one by goods and wares,
Have equal chance in wealth to grow.

The evils of the older world
Already thunder at our door,
And soon their bolts, in fury hurled,
May seal our fate forevermore—

Unless aroused with might and main
To meet the common foe of all,
Tho tocsin ring from hill to plain,
Through every village, farm and hall.

Not chartered right, but human right!
The right of every honest man
To reap the fruit of labor’s might—
The right to think, to work, or plan.

A currency upheld by gold—
A paper dollar good at par—
A hundred cents, as was of old—
No discount base its worth to mar.

‘T is agriculture, first and best;
‘T is commerce from her chains set free,
Mechanic arts by freedom blest,
That shall maintain our liberty.

Let not our land become the seat

Of prisons for the exiled poor,
But seeking souls a welcome meet,
And room within the open door.

No land monopolies should here
E’er exercise their base control;
Nor corporations, far and near,
Wreak on the poor their want of soul:

But ever worthy of his hire
Let every honest laborer be,
And all whom higher aims inspire,
Have equal rights on land or sea.

The wrong that to the poor is done
Will not alone upon them rest,
But surely as the constant sun,
Oppressor suffer with oppressed.

For He who orders all above,
Hath so ordained the life of man,
That other than the law of Love
Must ever find His sovereign ban.

‘T is equal justice through the laud
That can alone insure success,
All else will prove a rope of sand,
And fall before almightiness.

Repeal the laws that man hath made!
Which now too oft protect the knave,
And give once more to toil and trade
The rights that nature kindly gave.