Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1900-01-06

nenoous and extraordinary invention
ana Improvements OF machinery; the
almost miraculous discoveries of prac-
sicai science. and the consequent revo-
luton in industrial methods; the COM
parative humiliation Of time and space
n the means of communication through
0icctiTity and steam; the possibilities
q INJURY and power incident to the
possesslo of wealth exceeding accurate
computation-all these are the mater
lai characteristics of the age, and have
IN no other section Of the world been
SO phenomenal as in America. Mr..
Frederick Harrison, in describing the
rome of eighteen hundred years ago.
says that power SO colossal, central
Natlon so ruthless, luxury so frantic"
as those of the Imperial City, the world
had never witnessed. Yet in the Amer
ran Republic of to-day these things
exist on scale and with a radius that
Rome itself never knew.
An expert, discussing in 1895 the
extent Of commercial values and the
volume of business in the United States,
says: with the tenfold increase in
populated area of the country, our pop
ulation is fifteen times as large as it
was at the close of the last century,
while the increasing completely of gov
ernmental administration has increased
total receipts from customs and inter-
nal revenue
Thirty-Five Times
what they were in 1895. 1t may be no
more than a coincidence, but it is GER
tainly noteworthy that an increase of
fifteen hundred per cent in population
has brought with it almost the same
increase in the total annual volume of
exports and imports. The fact that
total gross railway earnings have dou-
bled in seventeen years is far less sig
nificant than that they are in excess
OF the total volume of our exports of
merchandise, produce, coin and bullion.
But of even greater interest is the fact
that the annual volume of bank clear
ings at about eithy cities throughout
the United States, indicates a grand
total OF domestic and foreign trade
probably forty times greater than the
total value of exports and of imports.
There remains only to be recalled the
increase of our interior commerce to
thirty-eight times the volume of our
business with foreign countries, over
and above which is the picture of the
total wealth of the country-nearly
seventy-five time what it was at the
beginning of the century"
These sguses are startling in their
significance. Expenses incidental to
governmental administration, growing
with the growth of that great wealth,
point to a Capitalization of power in
government undreamed of by the MAX
ers of the Federal Constitution; while
the corresponding Capitalization of
business is illustrated by the portentous
fact that the earnings of the railroads
exceed the value of our exports. The
banks of eighty great cities, CONSOLE
dated in each into a formidable con-
federacy known as Clearing House."
have gathered into their capacious con-
troll a volume of business forty times
larger than the total value of our ex-
ports and imports combined; while our
interior commerce Is thirty-eight times
greater than that which we have with
the world
Everywhere the consolidation of pow
err in business is reflected in similar
and apparently irresistible tendency in
government. The era of the railway
pool. the manufacturing trust, the COM
mercial combination is also the era of
exaggerated legislative, executive and
judicial influence. In every direction
the individual is confronted by the ag-
gregation; everywhere the citizen is
touched by the government. There are
trusts and monopolies in manufacture
ing industries, monopolies of mineral
wealth, monopolies in trade, monopolies
in the labor. market; monopolies of
Transportation and of communication,
municipal monopolies, and monopolies
entirely dependent upon government.
Al distinguished French economist has
said that
The Task of Socialism
has been prepared by the great con-
centration of industries which is one
of the most marked characteristics of
| our age, and which renders the pro-
cess of confiscation or appropriation
comparatively easy.
Hand in hand with industrial con-
sblidation goes legislation, statute-mad.
Ihere is no evil that cannot be cured by
enactment The police power of the
Slate is exaggerated in all directions.
Shmptuary legislation, labor laws, pro-