The San Francisco call., 1899-04-21
GOVERNMENT IN BUSINESS.

| slrabe, Will recognize JumDe OF thoSe IleOileS III
! the Examiner plan for Government ownership oy
Government thrift. Collectivism, nationalizlng OF
property, Gronlunds cooperative commonwealth
and all of the schemes for social state reduced to the
level OF the least energetic members OF that state are
reflected or reiracted in this plan.
Civilization has come about through the desire OF
man to own property as his individual possession. 1t
was this desire in the plain people that finally over
came the feudal SYSTEM with its brilliant panorama OF
knights and ladies' its pomp and circumstance It's al
Turing pageantry. This desire destroyed feudal
tenure struck the iron collar from mems necks made
them the owners of their own persons, and intro
duced the wage system the necessary privilege OF
freemen, who, owning their own capacity to labor,
must have the right to take pay for its This en-
franchsement of man and his rise out of the feudal
system was the leaven which has finally worked out
the destruction of chattel slavery applied generally
to the black race. individuality, the exutation OF
man in owning himself, and the exaltaton of his
faculties in the effort to become the of prop
erty real and personal enjoy life and liberty and
the pursuit of happiness moved the nations to brand
the slave trade piracy and slavery denial of
the rights of man.
In modern nations, starting at the strongest and
most important Governments, as we approach those
that govern less and interfere in the business and
personal matters of the people to the minimum we
find rising in the scale with the widening of his
opportunities AS he governs himself more, and be-
comes every year richer and important, and is
governed externally less his opportunity rise and
advance by the power Of personal character is ex-
hbited in a general gain in the scale OF living, the
enrichment of life, the conversion of the rare uxuries
of one generation into the common comforts of the
next.
The best and broadest opportunities of man have
hee0 rded in IFS and
tried constitution and the social that has been
founded on the civil state which that constitution
creates.
The great Individual fortunes of which the Ex-
aminer complains merely the result OF the oppor
tunities furnished to in this republic. During
the last thirty years peasant immigrants have come to
us from Europe in the steerage and by immigrant
train, and applying their individual qualities and per-
sistence to the better opportunities they find here,
have found themselves before middle age is reached,
able revisit their European birthplace, travelling in
a Pullman and the first cabin OF an ocean steamer.
1t is not matter OF surprise that country which
has given to many the experience of this advance
in fortune and rise in condition should present the
spectacle of numerous immense fortunes, every one
founded originally in the self-denal, economy and
thrift of whose qualities inspired to high
action by the invitation of opportunity Nor is it
surprising that in the midst of these opportunities of
which the vast maj ory have taken advantage to their
own betterment, there are some who lack the char
acter and quality to do These the failures the
dsinherited OF fortune in whose name the social
state is impeached. The Examiner proposes such
change in the civil and social shall bring both
down to the plane of energy OF these failures AS
they cannot compete with the energetic cannot make
Gays march with the strong, cannot equal in thrift
and accumulation the enterprsing sober and indus
trious, all incitement and nducement to individual
energy, strength industry sobriety and thrift must
be taken away and substituted by Government
ship OF all productive property and enterprises and the
transaction of all business by the Government
1t is admitted that this plan will make the ndi-
vidual ownership OF property impossible and will
eradicate the energy foresight and other qualities in
which have been actuated by the desire of such
ownership. The vast majority of active men in the
country who have thrived by individual energy and
character will be reduced the level of the minority
who have failed to thrive through the lack OF char
acter and energy The new civil and social state will
be founded upon the moral, industrial and physical
diseases and disorders and failures OF the present state
and no prophecy is needed to foretell the result.
Man having risen in the struggle for existence
against the resistance Of nature and environment if
reievedsof the necessity of such struggle by being
cosseted in the of wealthy and important Gov
ernment, will lose what he has gained by eKertion
and with the loss of opportunity will lose all those
high capacities which it invited into exercise.
Life is a great advantage 1t is through life that
we enjoy all OF the physical world around us. The
beauties OF the morning and the evening" the gores
OF high noon and the soothing mysteries of the night
are ours because we alive. But to many these
exquisite pleasures that enjoy because alive
are not available by reason of Illness the period of
their endowment is shortened by death Shall it be
said therefore, that shall enjoy the opportuni-
ties of the physical world to any greater degree than
those who are i'll, and that the period of their
oynent by all shall be shortened to the length of the
briefest lives?
Such policy would be the precise analogue of the
proposition to take away all material opportunity
from every individual because have used it to
gather much and others have failed to gather any.
SPEAKER REEDS RETIREMENT