The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1891-12-16
WALL STREET AND THE FINANCES.

Inc alleged squeeze" Of the GouLDs in
the New York stock market tends
to remind the country of the bondage it is
under to Wall street The upward and
downward tendency of railroad or other
securities may at certain periods affect
only few corporations or brokers, and not
create particular alarm among the people
at large; but the speculation spirit is so
nervous and sensitive that there is never
any telling at what hour in the day panic
may break out and do incalculable injury.
Ia this way the public has come to note
with apprehension any extraordinary or
unusual commolion in the prices of bonds
and stocks.
New York is one of the richest cities in
the world, and it probably contains more
millionaires than any other city. 1t counts
IT'S bank deposits by the thousand millions,
anc its dividend and Understanding secur-
tiles, in the shape of bonds, stock and trust
certificates, by the billions. The semi-an-
nual payments on these securities in Janu-
airy and July amount to nearly $3.50, 900, 900
year, representing railroads, mines, mills,
factories. water-works, gas-works and
SsA-NA oA4'oA OutC1p IlSSb oil OVER the
country. Therefore the money to make
these payments must be drawn from the
country at large. The city is the center
OF money manipulation, and its
banks and moneyed institutions have
managed, under the Republican regime, to
establish relations with the treasury de-
partment at Washington which they never
fail to use to their advantage. Twenty -odd
years ago, during the suspension of specie
one Of the profitable avocations of the me-
tropolis, when New Workers wanted the gov
ernmenr sales of gold stopped for time to
assist them in cornering the market, they
oere stopped. When New Workers wanted
the sales of gold to be large and frequent,
they were made large and frequent The
moneyed men of the metropolis were rec
ognlzed as the supreme authority in finance,
and their suggestions and wishes accepted
as the law OF the treasury department. On
the least furry in Wall street either the in
cumoent secretary or his representative
bundled off to New York, and the next
heard was some action of the department
calculated ito relieve the market"
When the BLAND silver bill was pending
in Congress the New York banks attempted
to defeat 1t, and though they failed in this,
they succeeded in persuadlng the secretary
OF the treasury, who was then Mr. JOHN
SHERMAN, to degrade silver by paying the
interest on government bonds in gold alone,
at tremendous cost to the country A
lew years later they attempted to defeat
another bill in Congress by contracting
their circulation, to the serious injury
of the debtor classes, whose interests they
have played with all the time.
The frequent stringencies in the money
market which the treasury department sup
poses to be It's duty to relieve by extra
purchases of funds at high rates, are con-
ditions of artificial scarcity brought about
by stock gambling, or speculation, or
schemes for making profits by forcing com
mission merchants to pay exorbitant rates
OF interest on purchases of western grain
and southern cotton.
The New York money pewer is sordid,
rapacious and oppressive and its control
over the treasury at Washington is
malign and unwarrantable. No wonder
the Farmers Alliance platforms are all
leveled at Wall street. for Wall street is
the center of the money power, and the
west and south will never be independent
SO long as it exercises influence over the
legislation of congress or the action of the
secretary of the treasury.