Freeland tribune. (Freeland, Pa.) 1888-1921, 1890-10-16

| Those of our readers, and we know
! there are quite a number of them, who
have read Edward Bellamy's Looking
Backward" may find something of in
terest in the following favorable com
ment of that author, which is taken from
the Philadelphia Eeeaing Bulletin:
Whatever may be thought of Edward
Bellamy as theorist, it must be confess
| ed that he is a vigorous writer and has
way of putting things that carries con-
viction with it for the time being, even
though subsequent reflection shows in
security in his premises and flaws in his
argument He contributesto the current
number of the FOrUm an article in which
he seizes upon the politico-economic
questions of the day, and deftly turns
them to the support of the theory enun-
ciated in Looking Backward" rd"-govern-
ment control of everything.
Mr.. Bellamy starts in with his argl-
ment at the most accessible point, gov
ernment control of railways and tele-
graphs. He makes no violent assault
upon public opinion here, because this
proposition was made long ago, and is
already supported by pretty large body
of the people. He argues that there is
no real distinction between iron roads
and dirt roads; the authority that con-
trolls one should control the other, and,
as highways have been government
works from time immemorial, so rail-
ways should be owned by the govern
ment and operated in the interests of
the whole people.
Similarly, it has always been the bust
ness of the government to transport
mails. But the primary object of the
mails is to transmit communications from
one persons to another, newspapers and
merchandise being later additions to the
contents of the mail bags. What essen
tial difference, then, asks Mr.. Bellamy,
is there between those sent by post and
those sent by wire? One method is more
expeditions than the other, to be sure,
but if it is the governments business to
forward one, why should it not be the
governments business to forward the
other? Tothe argument that both in this
case and in the case of the railroads vast
amounts of private capital have been
invested, which the government could
scarcely afford to replace, he replies
that the greater part of this capital rep
resents initiation beyond the actual cost of
the works. that it would serve the specu-
lators who "watered" the stocks right
if they were made to sacrifice the adj
ditional amounts, and that the fact that
most of the corporations are able to pay
dividends on their inflated capital is
proof that the government could afford
to buy them up even at these fictitious
valuations.
Furthermore, Mr.. Belamy would have
the government operate the telephones,
the coal mines and the express service
the last in conjunction with the mails
He would have local public services
such as transit, lighting heating and the
water supply, furnished by the munich
pality, and not by corporations. In fact
he has very little regard for corporations
/ of any kind, and would like to see them
all abolished. He calculates that when
the changes alluded to have been accom-
plished there will be body of nearly
two million workers in the public service
He would have these graded and sys
tematized, and make them the nucleus
of body of cooperative national in
dustries, both manufacturing and agri
cultural, together with a system of dis
tribution, which would ultimately be
come universal. His ideas may not b,
practicable, but they are novel, and t.
many minds attractive. AT all events
they will bear thinking over by person
to whom the present unsettled state @
the labor world is a matter of gray
concern.