The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-08-23
Comparing Trusts With
War and Famine.
Continued from Ninth Page.)


put out of sight, these social problems and aid
will be. in some way. The present arrangement
can not, and vii not abide. Henry George we'll
said, ITO educate men who must be condemned
to poverty, is but to make them FESTIVE; To baSe
ON a state of most glaring social inequality po
litiaal institutions under which men are theore-
ticay equal is to stand pyramid on its apex
million bayonets can not support such pyramid
upon their points.
s'Ill fares the land to fastening ills a prey
Where wealth accumulates and men decay.
But it has never been the accumulation OF wealth
that has brought ills to any people, nor caused
men TO decay. The increase OF wealth should
bring progress and development, better fed,
better housed a better educated, more lesured
and nobler race. But the unequal distribution
of that wealth, its accumulation in a few hands,
leaving the mass of wealth producers IN poverty
and neglect-it is this that has always brought
down great empires and destroyed great ma
tions.
The Persians a noble mountain race, increas-
ed in wealth and developed the great conquered
territories When by the law making power that
wealth was permitted to accumulate In the hands
of a few noblenen 80 900 Greeks under Alexander
doubled up the vast empire like paper bag.
When the Roman Peace brooded over the
countries around the Mediterranean, population
and wealth multiplied being no longer destroyed
in tribal wars. But property passing Afterwards
into a few hands. the number of the people de
creased till the barbarians of the frozen North
burst through the depleted Roman legions, and
sweeping over vast tracts where the people had
ceased to breed laid the civilization of a thou
sand years in the dust. The historian tersely
tells us ''Iatifunda peTdidere Italian Great
estates destroyed Italy.
out of the wreck rose new kingdoms, duke
doms, countships The leaders took the lands as
hereditary mobiles, placed their followers thereon
as tenants, the conquered inhabitants as seits
and called in the aid of religion to strengthen
by its influence the minds of men the
terror which carnal weapons had for their
bodies. Again and again the subject masses
moved uneasiy beneath burden of king, knight
and priest. In one binding flash OF light there
came the French Revolution. 1t was the retri-
button for a thousand years of oppression and
wrongs uncounted. As Carlyle said it was
Truth clad in hel-fre' 1t was revolution
led and controlled by the upper middle class.
The working class had slight hand IN 1t, except
to a small extent in the year 1893. A few thou
sand heads fell beneath the gulotine. OF this
crime aristocratic writers have made the most,
writing for aristocratic readers. but the SOBER
truth is that all the executions by the guil4ouhe
in the revolution added together dld not eqiai
half the number put to death unjustly. or starved
TO death. by oppression in any one year oil the
two preceding centuries. The permanent re-
forms brought about by that great upheaNai nave
affected the whole world. Mankind would still
De on a far lower level If the French Revolution
had not occurred.
The greatest soldier of the modern world
climbed to power the shoulders OF the armies
cratic France acuuiesced. But when forgetting
the source of his power he took daughter OF
the IIapsbuTgs to wife thus announcing ms al
heson to the past, the French people Withdrew
their support and when banded kings again
pressed him, he fell The army restored him in
1915 but the people no longer with nm
and he fell again. never to rise. In 1880, IN 1870
and in 1879 the French people again and again
returned to their Republican faith till now
neither army nor banded soyereigns dispute the
popular will.
In England in 1915 the mobiles won from the
sovereign the right to share in the product OF the
tolin" masses. Near the close of the reign OF
Elizabeth the middle classes. FESTIVE under the
exactions of monopolies granted by the crown,
demanded their abolition. The wise Old queen
knew when to yield She yielded and died with
her crown on her head. \ struggle between the
upper middle classes one side and the crown
ard nobility ON the other broke out half
century later and Charles the First not knowing
how to WELD lost his head. Twelve years later
his son making the concessions his father should
have made was restored but his brother James
. not keping faith, again lost the kingdom
which was henceforth ruled by the upper class,
Jointly with the nobility and the king. That
was the purport of the GLORIOUS Revolution OF
16ss.' In 1776. resolved to abolish all spe-
cial privileges and all government in the inter
est of the few, to do away with KING, MOBILES.
privileged classes and put the government in the
hands of the whole people Our example moved
the French leaders of thought and accelerated
the French Revolution The excuses and afro
cities of that Revolution, aided by centuries OF
national hostility 20 the French kept back the
popular feeling which had been created in
England by success. In lS32. the form OF
the English monarchy saved by the mon
archy, the nobilitT and the gentry abdlcatlng
their rule in favor of government by the peo-
pie Since then England has been, in all but
name a Republic. Its government is by a com
mittee Of the majority party in the lower House
Ct Parliament. The King Is name only, with a
Zig salary, and the House of Lords is mere
tI.pr limos wit
mower Throughout the civilized world all kings
now hold their positions only by suferance, save
in Russia where the government IS machine
a bureaucracy held in place by the army, with
a .overess Gar and restless people
This brief recital Of facts, known to YOU all,
will serve to show that history has been long
economic struggle by the wealth producers ana
that civilization has been exactly measured by
the successive rise of the different strata OF
society to power First the king was absolute,
then the nobility forced him to admit them to
a share in the enjoyment of the ::ealth created
by the toilers, then the upper middle class ana
then the lower middle class forced admission,
and then nomnally the whole people were ad-
mitted to a partnership in government say
nominally. for nowhere have the real wealth-pro-
ducers the toilers. actually asserted their tull
weight for had they done they would have
been the government being more numerous than
all other classes. The labor unions the Doy-
colts, the strikes in this country, the casting
by the Socialists in Germany at the June elec-
more than third of the whole vote cast demon
state that the creators of wealth are deter
mined now to have larger share of the wealth
created b. their labor.
simultaneously with this movement we see the
reactionary movement to aggregate all wealth
into the hands of a few multi-millionaires. These
of old give themselves aliases. Formerly their
aliases Duke of and so, Marquis, Earl
ViscouBt Baron, Count Prince. That old world
mummery is PLAYED out. Now one takes the
alias of STANDARD Oil Company another 1.-The
American Steel and Iron Company the "Pa-
cifc Railway The American Tobacco Com
pany' and
Which force viii win? These 'old foes with
faces" these claimants to appropriate
the wealth OF the nation to their own uses;
these successors of those who have been repu-
dated by every nation in turn-or will the new
forces of organized labor win? The conflict is
on and is irrepressibe. The vast mass Of the
nation outside of the two opposing lines look
with doubt and distrust upon the labor organiza-
lions for they do not know yet how far they
will CO. This intermediate mass of the nation
is opposed to the Trusts and to all rule by cor
porations. II convinced that organized labor
medtates attack upon the rights of private
property and control of government in their
own special interests but that each shall
be free to and enjoy that which he has
honestly earned then labor and the great bulk
OF the people, the farmers the merchants, the