The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1904-04-04
INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT TRUSTS

INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT TRUSTS
A book that has just been published
is entitled THE Truth About Trusts"
Its author is John Moody, a recognized
authority in financial matters. Those
who take the trouble to read it will
come to the conclusion that, notwith-
standing the fact that they have been
reading about trusts for number of
years and have been hearing them
denounced by both political parties,
they had but faint conception of
the number of them and of the amount
for which they are capitalized.
According to Mr.. Moody there are
AS trusts in this country and they
are divided into six classes. OF the
great industrial trusts there are Z;
of important industrial trusts 2S9; of
important franchise trusts the num-
Der is placed at Ill; of great railroad
groups there are 6; of allied "independ-
ent' steam railroad groups 10, and
trusts in process of reorganization 49,
But it is the amount at which these
trusts are capitalized which appals
the Imagination. 1t is $20379, 162, 511.
The mind can scarcely grasp such an
immense sum. There is no doubt
however, that the figures given by Mr.
Moody are correct. If any one in
| revolutionary days had predicted that
in little more than a century there
would be groups of transportation lines
and Industrial plants having a capt.
talization of over a billion dollars
each in this country he would have
been laughed at
All this vast wealth in trusts has
been collected in them in less than a
generation. Much of the wealth of
course existed before. The steel trust,
for instance, is composed of many
plants that were years in building to
| the point at which they had arrived
at the time they were absorbed in
that trust. The same is true in re-
spect to railroads.
According to Mr.. Moody the three
greatest trusts in the world are the
Morgan group Of railroads, which has
a capitalization of S2,265, 116,S50, the
Pennsylvania group which is capital
lied at $1,S22. 4O2,2S and the United
States Steel Corporation, better known
as the steel trust, which is capitalized
at $780, 900, 900. A glance at these
figures show why Mr.. Morgan exerts
such an extraordinary influence in the
world of finance and why the Emperor
of Germany was glad of an opportunity
to receive and entertain him on his
yacht. The group of railways and the
steel trust which he controls have q
capitalization of $3,635, 116,S5O.
John u. Rockefeller is regarded as
the father of trusts. He began what
is now the Standard Oil Trust in the
early seventies. The lines which he
laid out for it then are being followed
now without any material deviation.
and they are the lines which are fol-
lowed in the building of trusts to-day
The company which he controlled be-
fore the formation of the oil trust
began was of insignificant proportions,
but in the course of time, by many
means not necessary to mention now,
Mr.. Rockefeller got control of ten oil
companies in as many different states.
These he combined into one company.
That company now controls three
fourths of the output of the oil In
this country.
II the government should decide to
prosecute all of these trusts under the