The Savannah morning news., 1903-08-16
RoCKEFELLER's POWER.

RoCkEFELLER'S POWER.
The biggest and most interesting
figure in the financial world is John
D. Rockefeller. If Pierpont Morgan
is a giant, Rockefeller is a Colossus.
His activity in the stock market late
ly has renewed speculation as to his
plans and discussion as to the power
that he Yields in the affairs of the
country. The late Mr.. Gladstone once
said of William Henry Vanderbilt:
THE government ought to sieze his
property and take it away from him.
as 1t is too dangerous a power for
one man to have. Supposing he should
convert his property into money and
lock it up, it would make a panic in
America which would extend to this
country and every other part of the
world"
Yet William Henry Vanderbilt's
wealth was small as compared with
that of John D. Rockefeller. The
Standard Oil magnate is credited with
owning from seven hundred and fifty
millions to one thousand millions of
dollars, and controlling much more
His share of the dividends of the
Standard Oil Company during the last
few years has been at the rate Of forty
million dollars a year, and his income
from other sources have given him.
a total income of about one million
dollars a week for each of the fifty
two weeks of the year. Surprising, as
Mr.. Gladstone said of the less wealthy
and more sensitive Vanderbilt, that
Rockefeller should use his vast wealth
to squeeze the markets, what would
be the consequence? AS a matter of
fact the ugly charge has been made
in Wall street that Rockefeller ma
nipulated the recent slump in stocks
for purposes of his own. OF course
no such thing can be proved and it
would be impolitic to say it is true;
yet, so far as the public knows, there
is nothing in the career of John D.
Rockefeller that indicates him to be
incapable of using his giant power
like a giant if he deemed il to his adj
vantage to do so. His genius here
tofore has been in the line of crushing
opposition and amassing money from
the ruins, and of squeezing his en-
ployes and patrons, and amassing
more money from their necessities.
Such things, however, he, a pillar of
the church. regards as business" and
strictly legitimate. Would he regard
any use of his money that promised
profits to himself as other than bust
ness matter?
While it cannot be shown that
Rockefeller brought about the slump
in the stock market, it is known that
he has bought largely at the bottom
figures reached. Walter Wellman
writes to the Chicago Record
from New York that not less than
one hundred millions of dollars from
the Golfers of Rockefeller and his con-
tingent have recently been put
into standard stocks at what
looked like cheap figures. Well
man says further. on author
ity of a Wall street man in a po-
sition to know, that Rockefeller has
already virtually obtained control of
the New York Central Railroad and
that he is to become the dominating
influence in it, that he is the power
behind George Gould in Missouri-Pa-
cific and Wabash affairs, that he has
a voice in the control of the Baltimore
and Ohio and will shortly have a voice
in the management of the Pennsyl-
vania. With these mighty systems in
his grasp, says Wellman, "he soon will
be, if he is not already. the most pow
erful man in American railways and
finance; greater than any Vanderbilt
ever was, or Jay Gould, or Morgan,
or any of the men of the golden era
of American industrialism."
What does Rockefeller want of all
these roads and systems and of his
hundreds of millions2 Why, he wants
more power, to make more money, and
more money to make more power 1t
would not be surprising if, within the
course of the next few years, Rookie
Teller should become a leading con-
sideration in politics.