The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1895-04-23
MORE THAN NAN CAN COMPUTE.

For years the Standard Oil company
has stood the sole argument for mOnop-
olist 1t is monopoly, and under its
| regime, oil has decreased in price.
| As an argument favoring trusts, the
| Standard OIL company will no longer
serve. 1t is today the supreme and
dictatorial power over the oil pro-
duct and bi-productS Of the world.
The location of underlying oil is I'M
certain. A professor of Morgantown,
w. V, claims that indications Of oil
can be told by certain surface rocks.
beyond a doubt, but his theory is not
| generally accepted. The Standard Oil
| company puts down no wells. 1t allows
private individuals to take the chances
of hitting or missing oil, and if oil is
| found it purchases possession imme-
| diately. The oil regions east Of the
| Mississippi river lie in Pennsylvania,
| West Virginia, Indiana and Ohio. OF
this territory, the company has long
had control. Its oil, low in price TO
discourage all competition, had smoth-
| cred the oil well industry. oil was
| not being produced and as a result the
| reserve of eastern oil fell from 16,600,-
600 barrels in Feb. IS 1892, to 4, 900, 900
! on Feb. %, 1895. 1t devOlved on the
Standard company TO do something.
| On Jan. y last Joseph Seep, chief
purchasing agent of the company, is
sued a circular declaring that here
after the company would disregard
the quotations of oil in the speculative
markets Of Pennsylvania and pay
! whatever the markets of the world
| justified. The price increased soon
| after, inducing most of the individual
holders Of oil to give UP to the STAN
dard. The Standard had cornered the
| oil market Three weeks ago, the
wild speculation which has caused SO
much talk, began. The price of crude
petroleum has reached a point that it
had not touched for years. Thousands
; of men began to put down new wells
If any Of these wells turns out well,
| it is bought in at once by the COM
pany. The excitement is stimulating,
the exercise Of manipulating control
of the company is interesting, but the
people pay for it and pay dearly.
Naphtha jumps up 4 cents 4 gallon;
gasoline 2la cents; kerosine 3 cents i
gallon. The total stocks Of the COM
pany aggregate 25,OO0,OOO barrels.
Five cents a gallon this means $50 a
barrel and SCI, 100000 On the whole
quantity. Other products of the oil
will swell the profits to S115,O0O,OO
after all contingent expenses are de-
Quoted. This comes from the people.
The capital stock of the Stndard Oil
company is S1O0,0OO,O0O. Money ac-
cumulates so rapidly that it is found
to be impossible to invest it all. AS
it is, the Rockefellers own mines, rail
roads, and hundreds Of other enter
priscs outright or by a controlling in
terest of stock. They have 0,O00,OO
invested in the Lake Superior iron ore
mines; S17000,000 in the Chicago Gas
Trust; controlling interest in the
cotton seed oil trust. 1t is said also
| tiidt tuCs dlc idl sc ONucIS VI Wucdt-
All these stocks have recently adj
| vanced, and the profit Of it all is be-
yond any human beings understand
| ing.
Such monopoly is unprecedented.
That it is wrong, no man, of patriotic
impulses and warmth for the popular
masses, will deny. A successful
method of combating it through leg
islation has not been proposed, much
less enacted.
But it must suggest this, and sug-
gest it forcibly to all men who mould
mems thoughts and create his line of
public and civic conduct-that it is
the immediate and humane and safe
necessity to protect the struggling
weakling of the republic from the in
roads of an avarice that has reached
its greediest stage in the torturing
processes of monopoly.