No. 4."] ADDRESS OF GOVERNOR GUILD. 21 



and progressive methods as other business men do, — the 

 farmer must be a business man, — he can make a living, — 

 a handsome living. And it is an interesting fact that the 

 new citizens coming to Massachusetts are not now staying, as 

 they used to stay, in the cities, but are going out to the farms 

 of the State, out to the soil. Twenty years ago I suppose 

 there was not an Italian farmer in the Commonwealth of 

 Massachusetts ; now you find wagons coming in every morn- 

 ing with Italian names, truck farmers, in the vicinity of 

 Boston. A Polish farmer until recently was absolutely un- 

 known ; but those of you who come from that district know 

 there are many of them now in the Connecticut valley. And 

 it seems to me it is an encouraging sign. 



A few days ago it happened to be my duty to preside over 

 a national convention in the city of Columbus, O., with rep- 

 resentatives from all the different States in the Union and 

 most of the Provinces of Canada. The subject was the gen- 

 eral one of taxation, and we considered the needs of the 

 agricultural population ; and I think you will find this com- 

 ing year that in some of the States there will be an attempt 

 made for a better equalization of the burden of taxation; 

 that certain class taxes that are now paid by farmers as real 

 estate and are not paid by most of the inhabitants of the 

 great cities may be lifted from the farmer; that the burden 

 of taxation may press more evenly upon the whole people of 

 the United States, and not upon one particular class. That 

 was the first convention of the kind ever held, — the first 

 convention of the kind where the men, not of one nation, 

 but of two, came together in the cause of justice and equity, 

 and adopted resolutions that whereas equity and justice de- 

 manded that the same property should not be taxed twice, 

 once in one State and once in another, the same interest of 

 equity and justice demanded that two nations should treat 

 each other as two States use each other, — that neither should 

 be allowed to be used as a refuge for tax-dodgers ; and it was 

 equally just and right that property taxed in one country 

 should not be levied with another tax in the other country. 



At that meeting there was one of the old, familiar object- 

 ors to New England, a professor of the college which boasted 



