The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1888-03-22
Shylock is not Dead.
rAtlanta Constitution.


in our large cities, and not only de-
mands his pound of flesh, but gets it.
Recently the newspapers ofSt. Louis,
New York and Boston have shown
up the methods Of a certain class of
money-lenders in those cities. Clerks
on small salaries and mechanics work
ing for low wages sometimes find, in
spite of the most rigid economy, that
they must borrow money. They know
very well that it is useless to apply to
the banks as they have no collateral to
offer, and they are driven to the Shy
locks. Here is a typical case. At a
time when money was being loaned in
the large cities to wealthy people at two
and three per cent year, sober, in
dustrious mechanic in Boston was dis
abled by accident. His wife was forced
to seek a loan. She succeeded in bor-
rowing fifty dollars, but she had to give
a mortgage on all her household fur
niture. The lender held back two dol
lars of the money for Expenses" and
five dollars more for months interest
in advance at the rate of ten per cent a
month. This left the woman forty
three dollars. She paid the five dollars
interest month after month until she
could no longer do it, and the kindness
of a generous friend was all that saved
her furniture from being sold.
Commenting upon this case, the st.
Louis Republican says:
"It is amazing, when we think over
it, that in this age ofenormous aggrega-
tons of wealth and high-sounding pre-
lenses Of philanthropy, there should be
no institution at which the thousands
of persons in every large city, who at
times need small sums of money in an
extremity-mechanics disabled by ac-
cident or sickness, and laborers tenn
porarily out Unemployment, can borrow
$50 or S25, or even SIS. At times money
is SO abundant in New York that it is
loaned attwo per cent on call to wealthy
borrowers who have first-rate securities
to put up as collateral but poor man,
who has nothing to give as security
but a chattel mortgage on his house
hold furniture, is charged twenty-five
to one hundred per cent by the usurers
he is compelled to resort to.
If this age possesses half the practical
humanitarianism it SO vauntingly lays
claim to, surely it might devise some
method for relieving the temporary
needs of working people by loans of
money at a reasonable rate Of interest
say one per cent month-and that,
too, without greater proportion of
losses than the business banks suffer
from the failure of their customers"
The suggestion made by our contem-
porary will be approved by all kind
hearted people, but it is doubtful
whether it will ever be carried into effect
by private enterprise. Possibly, some
day, when our government becomes
more socialistic in its tendencies,
strange things will happen. We may
adopt the Bismarckian scheme of pro-
viding pensions and life insurance for
the wage-working classes. We may go
so far as to make every postofice q
government bank, authorized to receive
deposits and to make loans at low in
terest upon all sorts Of chattels, from a
baby's cradle up to set of parlor fur
niture. Of course, this would be ex-
treme paternalism. But are we not
moving in that direction? If the gov
eminent is to take charge of the edu-
cation of the individual, and regulate
his habits, why should it not look after
his finances
All this, however, is in the future,
and perhaps up in the air. In the
meantime, he honest workingman who
gets into financial tight, is wondering
whether it would be better for him to
go to Shylock or to the devil. Wedo
not like to advise him in such matter,
but we cannot tell him to go to Shylock.