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Chicago
—By Walt Whitman.I have looked thee over and taken thy meas-
ure thou Golgotha of the west. Thou callest
thyself the garden city!
You claim to be the centre of the new dem-
ocracy, of the great free west, of the land of
plenty.
But with all thy democracy doth a man earn
a living easier within thy borders, or have a
happier time because thereof?
Does he not toil harder, have coarser fare,
longer hours and a lower margin of subsist-
ence? For a city of democracy must be judged
by the status of its toilers and by the fine
houses of her pork-packing princes.
Are not your workers being supplanted by
Chinaman, by Polack and by Italian, who
live on a much lower plane?
And does not the great blot of slavery show
in thy streets more pointedly almost than
anywhere else in a lot of diseased niggers?
Blood is the bans of the hustling prosperity
that now attends you and an adept pig-sticker
is the embodiment of thy manhood!
Copy-text
Our transcription is based on a digital image of a microfilm copy of an original issue.
Publication Information
"Chicago."
Toronto World 8 December 1884:
[1].
Whitman Archive ID
per.00016