Morning journal and courier., 1891-01-01
ALLoym rHE sTArE.

l An Argument in Defense of the Cole
 teresting Comments About Syndi-
 cates - Consolidation and the Com
 sOlidated Road.
 The ttcollateral inheritance tax' is tax collected on property devised by will to line of inheritance. In defense of this | tax, about which so much is now being | said pro and con, the Norwich Bulletin says: | The tax is based on the theory that such inheritors have not, of right, any claim to | the property except such as is given them | by the descendent's will and is enforced | for them by the state. Therefore they can afford to pay g small percentage of the value of the property devised them, and l still be better off than before It is tax which is not felt. The man who inherits thousand dollars to which he has no shadow of claim except by the terms of some will, can afford to pay 8 tax of fifty dollars and still be nine hundred and fifty dollars better off than he would have been but for the opportunity afforded him to giR. gay 'nS '"A ana 'AAS the '"'An'S 0' 'ns This tax brought into the treasury of this state during the first year of it's appli- cation something over $31 ,000 A similar law is said to have netted the state of Pennsylvania over million and @ quarter last year.
 There has been some criticism of the law, but that criticism of late has settled down into criticism of one or two de- tails, not of the whole law nor of it's principle. All that is now claimed by those who at one time were bitter oppo- nents of the law, is that it's terms tax 8 few relatives who are near enough to make in heritance by them perfectly natural and often necessary. It is said, for instance, that a sister or brother may not inherit without taxation. We have not studied the law, the terms of which are somewhat complicated, but if this be true, and if it be the only objection to the law, then a very slight amendment can easily be adopt ed which shall preserve the most impor- tant portion and all the principles of the tax, and yet shall obviate all just criti- cism.
 WORD OR TWO ABOUT CONSOLIDATION AND sYNDIcATEs.
 The Hartford Times democratic) has the following: Monopoly is an ugly word and an ugly idea, no doubt. It is an ugly thing generally. How does it look, for example, in the management of railroads? Take the existing railroads in Connecticut | to illustrate; would, or would not, the public be as well served if (say) the Con- ! solidated road were to acquire the owner ship and have the management of all the railroads in Connecticut? Does anybody 1 doubt, for one moment, that the trains on
 the New York and New England road, for one case, would be run with great
 CT regularity ond promptitude2 Does
 anybody doubt that the public would
 be better served, and at no in
 crease of rates? If there are those
 who doubt this, their doubts would van
 ish on the actual trial of the monopoly,
 just as the doubts of the expediency of
 the consolidation which has thus far
 gone on have vanished in the light of the
 improved service of the Consolidated
 road. Jay Gould has lately advocated
 the idea of putting all the railroads of
 the country in one general management.
 He thinks it would improve the property
 of all the stockholders, and insure in
 fnitely better management. Jay Gould
 is not the man to trust as leader in mod
 ern reforms; but in this advocacy of a
 giant railway monopoly he may be right,
 so far only as the better public service is , l concerned.
 Doubtless the public would be better , served under such consolidation. There 1 would be more evenness and regularity } ! in the running of trains; rates would not be advanced; there would be fewer acci l l dents; and little of that giant blocking ot freight trains, of which the New England'l big yard at East Hartford, with it's hun dreds on hundreds of laden cars, long wait 8 ing for chance to move, furnishes such {
 striking illustration.
 I ! That ia the monOnO1v via1u IT. dooo po
 deal with the objections to such grea : schemes of consolidation. These nigh : be treated separately; but, meanwhile a l who doubts the improvements which thes f syndicates are actually making? There i
 no question of the solid improvement o a l Florida-an improvement measured no Q by acres, nor by townships, nor by gov 7 ernment sections, but by counties-by en e tire sections, larger than Connecticut O l. Massachusetts; improvements which ar 0 opening better waterways to commerce an, s draining lake and swamp land which ha s been unusable since the dawn of the era o @ solid land rising out of the universal sea- j. tracts now made productive of sugar cane 6 It was all done by some of these wealth l. syndicates. In making money themselve Il they have helped the public. The sam
 thing is true, in different way, of nume1
 ous other things, chiefly private enter prises and corporate undertakings, raj
 ways, mines, tanneries, newspapers, brew 8 cries, etc. Syndicates in New York ar n now buying up some of the largest suga t estates in Cuba and making such improve n ments on them as will insure cheape n methods and more production. We al }; not upholding syndicates, but see whs o they are doing. A dispatch from ParkerE ,, burg, Wa, says:
 |; Morgan, Drexel & Co.,, of Philadelphis ! Huh0 tho i,,+o ), have purchased 50, ,00O acres of coal an F coke lands in Raleigh county, and hay 0 surveyed line of railroad through fror
 the main stems of the Baltimore and Chi
 and Chesapeake and Ohio railroads. Tn
 Chesapeake and Ohio railroad have als
 bought large tracts of mineral and lumbe # lands, and is laying down new railroads # The Baltimore and Ohio railroad peopl r have purchased 75,000 acres of miners s and timber lands from ex-Senator Camdel
 of this city. The syndicate, representa-
 Senator German of Maryland, Secretar
 of State James G. Blaine, ex-Senato s Henry 0. Davis, Stephen Elkins, and oth @ CTS, have purchased within the past fe, @ weeks a number of tracts of timber an o mineral lands, ranging in extent fro1
 10000 to 10000 acres in each tract Rail roads are being laid off or prospecte , through all these lands.
 R Besides all this, engineers have latel
 traced the Pocahontas coke field from tn head of Guyon river across Indian Noun - tain to the Otter and Barker forks of Guy
 an, through Wyoming, across Raleigl f county, following the Peney valley throug j. Fayette county to the New river coal coun
 try.
 ' Across and through this entire stretcl there is an average of four veins of coal
 both bituminous and camel In fev j. places they dip below water level, but as s general thing the veins outcrop along tn
 mountain sides.
 S SENT BACK TO WOODBURY. B 1 The Dead Body of Mrs. Carohn Meramble Sent Back to Her Son il 7, Woodbury by the Hospital Authori
 ties.