The silver messenger. (Challis, Idaho) 1890-1912, 1895-12-10

wealth; the stock is, therefore,
purchased by investors all over
the country, and the price re-
ceived for such investment adds
still further to the fortunes of
the manipulators.
1.-THE road is then launched
into operation with debt-burden
far in excess of what it cost to
build. The public are charged
exorbitant rates for the main
tanning of this debt burden and
the paying of dividends to stock
holders; labor is paid the lowest
wages for the same reason, and
is also turned out of employment
when business is light, it being
well known that applicants will
be plentiful enough when again
needed. Yet, Notwithstanding
these exorbltant charges to the
public, and this oppression of
labor, the debt burden of the
road-bond and stock-cannot be
supported; dividends fall behind
and interest on bonds is not paid.
Here, however, is another great
source of profit to the shrewd
manipulators, whose power of
combination has already done so
much for them. The stockhold-
ers take fright and sell their
stock at any price, and these buy
it in. Or if the stock is not
worth buying, by reason of the
large bonded Indebtedness, then
the road is foreclosed, and these
shrewd heads get it for less than
it is worth, effectually defeating
the claims of stockholders and
other creditors of the road.
"It is by these means-in the
building, the operation, and the
wrecking of roads-that in the
space of a short lifetime the great
railroad magnates can heap up
their hundreds of millions. The
railroad, telegraph, and kindred
interests, by their nature, offer
peculiar facilities for such ap-
preparation; so long as they are
committed to private control.
their very complexity permits
manipulation which, in simpler
affairs, would at once be seer
through and resented. Their
necessity to communities compels
these to contribute .unduly to.
ward the building, and their ma.
ture rs a monopoly compels
the public to pay rates fixed by
no competition, but alone by the
appetite for plumber of then
manipulators; their extensive.
ness, too, prevents all competi
ton between them as employers
of labor, and compels labor tc
contribute more than it's share
toward this plumber"
Another fountain head of gig,
antic fortunes is found to be
monopoly of commodities; mil
lions are reaped through syste
matte plundering of the markets
by spectators and trusts. The
trust is as yet in it's infancy, anc
Though only just beginning tc
exult in it's newly learned power
it already controls many of tht
staples of life"
Society must have sugar
salt, and oil, and other like com
modities at whatever price; anG
when the trust has secured en-
, tire control, it cannot, of course
, get these elsewhere; to the trus
. it must come. There is thus M
limit to what the trust may anC
will charge. These giant cor.
porations, already capitalized in
T to almost the billions, corrupt
| ing legislatures and ~senates, arr
piling up untold wealth from tn
plumber of all society, until b,
their grip around the sources o
? life they must throttle it.
Sheltered as they are unde
: alleged freedom of competition
f and contract, their position to
4 ward industrial society is nom
: other, or different, than that o.
49,