Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1891-06-24
GO TO THE CAUSE OF THE EVIL.

Mr.. Edward J. Phelps, Bishop Pot
ter, Andrew Carnegie and some others
are writing in the North American
Review about ''the gospel of wealth."
The effort is to show what is the duty
of men of great wealth to the pauper-
lied and dependent classes. How shall
they use the immense fortunes at their
command for the betterment of society?
1t appears to be tacitly agreed by each
of the contributors to this symposium,
that there is duty resting upon the
possessors of riches to use a certain
part of their incomes for the relief of
distress, How best to do it, is the
question.
Perhaps it would be difficult to DEM
onstrate, by any logical process, that
there is any sort of obligation resting
upon the rich man to give to the
amelioration of poverty. How shall
we establish q rate of assessment upon
each for that purpose? How rich must
man be before he comes into the
class who are to be required to become
contributors to this relief fund? Must
he be worth 100000, or $1,000, 900, or
$4,000, 900? And shall the man who is
worte s10,000,O00 give ten times
as much as the one-million-
aire? These are questions that
can never be settled, and the an
swers to them are of no weight, because
there is nothing to compel the objects
of them, the very rich, to give more
than they choose to give. Peabody
had not tenth of the money that Van
derbilt had, but he gave away ten times
as much.
A more practical way of dealing with
the question would be to discuss laws
that would in some measure stand in
the way of the accumulation of i'm
mense estates among few. Financial
engagement is worse disease than
mere poverty, because poverty comes
from it. The amassing of great wealth
is at the expense of the many. Ten
million dollars would make thousand
men well-to-do. When one man holds
all of it, the other nine thousand nine
hundred and ninety-nine have none. II
a check could be put upon this wealth.
building among the few, greater wealth
would be diffused among the many, and
there would be less call upon the very
rich to attend to the duty of relieving
poverty, for there would be less poverty
to relieve.
1t is. not to be thought that any laws
can be made that will keep some men
from getting rich or others from re-
naming poor. God made some men
with the genius for money getting and
others without that genius. No human
laws can overcome this greater law of
the Creator. In medieval times, all
the power of absolute monarchs was
bent to prevent the Jews from getting
rich, but the Jews continued to get
rich, because it was their nature to do
so. But is very practicable to make
laws, and to enforce them, too, that
will prevent the use Of great wealth to
build up still greater wealth. And it
would be easy enough to tax large in
comes so that the burden of govern
ment would fall upon those who are
able to bear it, and lightly upon the
men of small means. Then. while We
would have poverty, for ''the poor are
always with u.s. we would not have so
much OF it, and it would be the result |
chilly of misfortune Or imprevidence,
and not of partial and eXacting laws,
which rob the weak and foster the |
strong. This is the kind of reform we
need. Bishop Potter and Andrew
Carnegie will never make a greedy |
generous and charitable to |