Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1872-12-27
TIE SOURCE OF THE sPRCTL.T-
TORS POsy'RR.

We trust no community calling itself in
teligent can look on with entire indiffer-
ence to the great scandal offered by the re-
cent operations Of Jay Gould and the Erie
Company. 1t is certainly enough 10 COM
mand attention that a man may take ten
| millions of other peoples money and pay
ii back in such way as to make more
than he restores. All our moralists have
taught us that stolen property curses the
thief, and our children are brought up in
the belief, or at least, under the teaching,
that the way of the transgressor is hard.
But there is a small band of powerful men
in this community, who, by any code of
accepted morals, must be called great tran
gressors, whose way can not be called hard.
They have an enormous amount of money,
and they are constantly accumulating more;
they live in such luxury as they choose /;
they command such society as seems most
attractive TO them they have great polti-
cal influence, and some Of them political
positions in a word, they have in abund-
ance nearly all those objects which are pur-
sued, in more or less degree, by the gener-
al business world. Yet they are men whom
every decent standard of honesty and hon
or must condemn. They acknowledge no
mans rights but their own they betray
faith at will they take the property OF
others directly or indirectly they pervert
or corrupt justice they bride legislatures
and electors they defy the restrictions of
ordinary business morals they do every
thing they can to prove that high charac-
ter and success have no connection with
each other. All fair-minded men believe
them to be social nuisances, and yet they
constantly carry out the most gigantic
schemes, not only without the approval OF
the community, but in the face of its con-
demnation.
What is the source Of their power? Ger
tainly not in great talent. There have al
ways been men with the same ability, the
same want Of conscience, but without the
same wide success. Nor are they in reali-
ty so very much worse than their fellow
men. They are selfish, reck less, deceitiul,
inscriptions; but any merchant can say
of his own experience that many Of his
acquaintance are equally so, and differ
rather in the extent than the nature oil
their wrongdolng. With the great specu-
| lators, it Is human nature, acting under pc
culiar conditions, but certainly human ma
| ture still, and in the familiar forms. What
are the conditions which have led TO such
| notable results?
Ofcourse they are complex but one very
powerful one is the fact that our currency
is one of irredeemablo paper, peculiar tC
our own country, and not exchangeable fol
| gold the currency of the world. 1t is thl,
fact which has made rapid, frequent, anC
| great changes in values possible, and such
changes make possible the spectators
Control, more or less complete, of the golG
| Market Is proportonate control of the
| general market. Fluctuations in gold are
accompanied by fluctuations, more or les,
immediate, in other things. Tho contro
of the greenback currency produces the
same results, sometimes in less, sometime,
in nearly equal degree. Now, If our cur
rency were redeemable in gold, II would
be nearly impossible for any combination
to control 1t, or to control the gold in the
country long enough to effect violent chan,
ges in the values. Such changes woult
Immediately attract or repel gold from 9th
er countries, and no Spectator could max,
his calculations for a sufficient period il
advance to accomplish anything.
AS ii is, the condition of our currenc,
gives the field to the spectators with al
most absolute assurance that they will no
ba intefered with from outside. Knowing
that great fluctuations arc possible, they
have only TO set about effecting them. Tit
fact that at certain seasons the currency
and al certain seasons the supply of gold
can be manipulated so as TO affect stocks
multiples enormously tho power OF grea
stockholders. 1t is not merely that 1t give
them opportunities 10 make great profit
by the rise or fall OF shares, but It enable.