People's party paper. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1891-1898, 1898-06-17

1870 u
with the labor of the factory hand be-
came more and more productive. He
produced more wealth but proportion.
ately to the wealth produced got less.
So there was a country peopled by an
industrious and wealthy people, PEG.
pie of unequaled productive power, yet
country where the few reaped the
benefits of the increased productive
ness of labor, whece the many sowed
but did not reap, where the few gath
cred the wealth, the industrious, pow
erty. Naturally there should have been
happiness there was discomfort, where
there should have been universal abun.
dance and comfort there was general
scarcity and suffering. Thus a people
blessed by nature found themselves
under curse. They saw that as their
efforts were cursed and as they were
not cursed by nature they must be
cursed by man. And this curse they
found in the shape of toll exacted on
all interchanges of the surplus products
of labor and by those who rendered
nothing in return, by those who did
not facilitate such interchanges but re-
tarded them.
These arbitrary tolls being dexter
ously mixed up with tolls charged for
services actually rendered had long
passed unnoticed. Thus had certain
persons been granted the right to
build and operate the steam highways
OF the nation. For the transportation
of freight and passengers over these
they were freely given the
right to charge tolls and thus recon-
pense themselves for the costs Of build
ing, keeping up and operating such
highways. That they should be so
paid for services rendered in the trans
portation of goods and passengers was
right and just. No one complained.
But it happened that they charged tolls
that were more than ample to recon-
pense them for their outlay, charges
that were more than fair consideration
for services rendered.
In brief, they added to their charges
simply because they had monopoly,
charged the people for the use of priv
ileges that the people had given them.
Part of their charges were for services
rendered, part were toll exscted by
monopoly. But mixed up together it
was hard to pick out what were just
charges, what monopoly charges. This
WAS made increasingly difficult by the
way in which the railroads kept their
capital accounts. For example, they
universally issued stocks and bonds
purporting to represent greater in
yestment of money than ever went into
the construction OF the roads. In a
word, they unscrupulously, not to say
fraudulently, watered their capital ac-
counts so that it was made to appear
that the roads cost two times or more
what they actually did. And so what
wab an exorbitant return on the veal
cost of road was often made to appear
quite inadequate.
OF course, those men to whom this
watered stock was issued grew rich
while the industrious classes, having to
pay toll to monopoly on the inter-
change of the products of their labor
for the products of others, were depciv-
- 4 90 +l,o TN ,DroB4. ~ ;r1us+-1- Tpt,orA
persons to whom this watered capital
WAS issued by the railroads We're those
who did what was called Financing
the roads," and to the railroad mana
gers. Thus the railroad managers is
sued watered stocks and other repre-
sentatives of capital TO themselves and
to those promoters and bankers who
helped them in the operation,
But this was far from the worst side
of railroad management The worst
was management SO as to stine some
and enrich others, so as to
bring prosperity to some localities,
and destruction to others
This was done Systematically. To one
in which the railroad cliques
had g. part owaership interest. or to
one IN which railroad managers were
given an indirect interest in return for
special privileges, certain favors in
rates and services were
granted while all other competitive
were Disseminated against.
That is, to the favored enterprises,
lower freight rates were given, both in
the gathering OF raw materials and in
the marketing OF the products, than
were charged their competitors, OF
course the favored enterprises could
produce cheaper and distribute cheap
err than their competitors, SO undersell
ana bankrupt them, This they did for
It was to their interest. The favored
cliques then stepped in and bought up
the bani1rupted properties. So doing
they gathered the savings Of Others
industry and st the same time gained d
monopoly.
Possessed of the properties that once
belonged to competitors thoy removed
the determinations against such pro-
perties and that had made them IN
profitable, while all the clique enter
prises, thus possessed of monopoly
through railroad aid, built up their
profits higher and higher by the charge
OF monopoly prices. Thus fortunes
gathered rapidly on this turn of the
wheel but they were gathered by cut,
ting down transportation rates, and so
at the cost Of the rAilroads. If the