The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1894-01-19
An Unsound Argument.

| Capttai is the creature auu the tooi VI
labor. If labor is free there can be no con-
| hict between them. Capital could not be
monopolized if land were free, for labor
would then be free to produce whatever
capital it needed. The single tax will free
the land.-Ihe Courier, ST. Louis.
Substitute money for capital" and the
proposition becomes more Ineligible. "The
single tax will free the land'' from the grasp
of monopoly, but it will not furnish the
tool" which is money, by which land can
be utilized, We cant afford 10 go back to
primitive times and progress through the
ages of barter to create the tool as the
sing e-tax onlies always do when driven
into the money corner. The man with no
taxed possessions and no rentable land must
haye money in the midst of our complex
civilization or he will starve on his free
land. He borrows it from the money lord.
If the mortgage will not grasp the land
sufficiently tight on account OF the govern
ment's first lien on its rental value, the man
blessed with the free land and wanting
everything else must find satisfactory secu-
rity some how. We will suppose he has
accomplished this difficult task-under the
circumstances-and he has equipped him
self with stock, implements and shelter nee
essary to extract from the land by the
application of his labor the longed for
independence and comfort. The interest he
pays to the money lord takes from him all
his products save a bare living. This
proceeds few years, and he has managed
to keep his head above water and perhaps
has accumulated trife of surplus by
niggardly economy. The money lord who
controls this s. capital" this ''tool Of labor"
money, in the mean time has manipulated
the powers that be, the government, and
shrunk the amount of money of the nation
twenty five, thirty or forty per cent. Prices
inevitably fall. The products of the labor
of our protege who has been the beneficiary
of piece of free land cannot be sold for
enough money to pay the interest-which is
the rent-on the money he has borrowed,
and live. The mortgage and interest have
not shrunk with the value of products but
have increased in their purchasing power
so per cent, with the fall in price Of 335 per
cent of the products of industry, To make
long story short. the money lord forecloses
his mortgage, sweeps not only the land, but
the little all in the way of stock and
Improvements the man has managed, by
hard work and skimping, to accumulate.
Now, how in the name of heaven can the
single tax on land rent ameliorate such
conditions while the money of the country
is allowed to remain in private hands and
be manipulated by small class of money
lords as at present? This is not an ideal
picture, as the mIllennial pictures of wha.
would be, of single-tax-onlies. Almost the
entire western country and a large part Of
the east is exactly in this condition now
We who contend that the money lord is
more powerful than the land lord, adduce
stubborn existing facts, while the single
tax -onlies present nothing but theory.
But they deny the money lord has such
supreme power as his fighters claim. We
don't ask our single tax skeptics to take our
word, but we place the monty lord on the
stand We quote from an article, "Money
Of the World" by Fred Lipscomb, pub
lished in New Occasions, January number.
There are many other sources from which
the lnfol nation may be derived but this is
the most convenient at present. Ifquestioned
Mr.. Lipscomb stands ready to defend the
statement with further proof:
"The worlds prices are fixed in the
market of Liverpool by reference to gold.
This is particularly in the interest of the
gold owners, bond holders and money
lenders of England, for they control her
laborers and by her industrial powers the
England. The Manchester Chamber of
it in the following language: 'That its
secret session, without the consent of their
constituents, decide the value of all property,
is one Of the greatest crimes against
civilization
"How do you maintain your supply of
gold?' WIS asked by a Parliamentary COM
mittee in 1847.
"'By contracting the circulating notes,
causing decline of prices and consequently
an influx of gold,' THE gold flows in from
foreign countries to purchase cheap goods
ED. Jour-. was the answer. Again they
remark, There is no means of supplying
the Bank with gold except by diminishing
the bank notes, which Immediately Coz
tracts the currency and lowers prices by
increasing the value of money!
There you have it from headquarters,
And this same power and practice is
possessed and followed to-day by our
national banks, and to them and them alone
is the present panic, bankruptcy, ruin and
distress traeeable, fighting TO make money
scarce and dear by permanently auchoring
il to gold, which the money trust holds and
controls throughout the world by virtue of
the gold debts they hold This pressure is
upon the industry OF the world wherever
gold debt exists, and is not confined TO the
United States.
The single tax may lay the laud lord on
the shelf but the money lord will suck up