The Winslow mail., 1900-07-12
MARKETS HAVE BEEN ABUSED.
On the Naked Plea of fOverproduction
Disaster Has Been Forced
Upon the PeOple.s

Ihe alarmist has a poor %ocatlon.
Men, generally speaking, who are en-
gagged IN active industries, are much
given to discounting the prosperity
which seems apparent to almost every
one who is not profoundly tho4Sil 7
ful on the conditions necessary 70
and the interruptions which aTe
constant source to the necessary Gon-
dltions. Therefore it is that the hon
est masters of trade are constantly on
the lookout for an interruption of th5~
essential conditions which insure
prosperity. Were these dependent On
supply and demand it would net be
difficult to gauge the relations be-
tween the producer apd the consum-
er, and if honest principles were in
control between the 5wo forces, pro-
duction and consumption, the crisis
would in most instances be averted, OF
certainly controlled within the small
est space of the business affected.
A large, intelligent lesson has beeu
taught in the last few weeks to thosa
controlling the productive market. 1t
it notable fact that prices of stock
in all the actives had sailed into the
skies, and insatiate greed was doing
it's full part to keep them to their
fight. The conservative buyers fully
appreciated the situation. They felt
that the spectators had taken a fear
full hold on the manufacturing indus
tries, and the result could not be any
thing but disastrous. They would not
be losers. They could hold their hold
ings. They could give warnings and
thus prepare the public for the slump.
They could go still further. They
could punish the vicious element
which had assaulted prices without
Just cause, and who, it was claimed,
were amenable under the law. With
in a day the slump came. Thousands
of people were ruined. A great enter
prise which had involved 100000, 900
to perform service which only re-
quired so per cent of that amount
($5O, O,OOO,0OO) was struggling with bank
ruptcy.
There were other means of disor-
der which could have assailed the
''Steel and Wire trust other than the
one which did. Either of them would
have been as effective in destroying
the prosperity of the concern. A
strike or a lockout would have beer
highly injurious. Or a combination
of the controlling interest in the stock
and other securities of the trust
would have worked deplorable dam
age. On the naked plea of overpro
duction this disaster was forced or
the people. 1t could not have been sc
done had not it's principal officers
countenanoed the movement, and thu:
gave the strength of their names tt
the reduction of values. 1t seem:
strange that no legislation can be en-
acted which will insure punishment
to those commercial outlaws. That i
is not reflects severely on the class o
people whom the public selects TO
the discharge of legislative life. TIL
lesson taught in the above describe'
illustration is one which it is wisdom
to heed. The labor, the wage-earners
are less given to the destruction
of established industries than ar
the men who are in possession of tn
securities, and who speculate to lille
gitimate returns on the capital the,
have invested, even though it be of
liauid racter.-Cincinnati Ell
| ouirer.