Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1906-04-30
The GOLDEN CALF
WALL STREET and The House
OF DOLLARS.
Ernest Crosby, in the Cosmopolitan
r1agazinc, on the Corruption of the
United States Senate. Election of
Senator's by Popular Vote a SOlu.
tiOn of fhe Problem.

tiOn of the Problem.
Great lie Wall Street and the Senate is
its prophet! That is the confession of
faith OF The prevailing political religion
OF Washington. People must have faith
in something, and they will spend their
lives in seeking something stable on
which to place their feet, and in this the
politician is like other people. He must
find the source Of real political power and
put himself into connection with it, and
today this power exists in the senate as
in no other part of the ,tional govern
ment. The discerning man who wan
ders about Washington in search of the
real source of authority looks in vain
until he reaches the senate chamber, and
then he begins TO feel "hot." There is
something there that means business. 1t
may not be the holy OF holies itself, but
it is at any rate its an Groom, and the in.
etfabe atmosphere OF dynamic force is
there. Behind these respectabl looking
gentlemen who sit SO nonchaIantly at
Il cir desks, the Real Thing must be
somewhere concealed. -
And this is true, for we are in the
House OF Dollars, and the solid thing
behind it is gold. 1t is indeed temple,
and the hidden deity is the Golden Calf,
and these are its high priests who are
sent up by all the tribes to serve at it's
altar and Garry out its behests. And it
is no heather idol, either, that has eyes
and sees not and ears and hears not; but
it sees and hears everything, and behind
the veil (and we may suppose with
wink in its aureate eye) it governs the
country for people who think that they
govern themselves.
For whatever we may say against w all
Street, il has-sthis one fundamentatss
merit: it is the Real Thing. Whatever
it's vices. it has the supreme virtue OF
VITALITY, and this Washington has not
got. The condemnation OF our beautiful
capital on the Potomac is, that, like the
church of Sardis, it has name that it
lives and is dead. Our national political
organization is an admirably devised
system Of wires and machinery intended
to receive its motive power from the peo.
pie, but somehow they fail to connect.
The site of Washington was carefully
selected as near as possible to the center
OF population OF century ago, SO that
the popular will might most readily ex
press itself there. But Immediately the
center of population began to move away
in one direction, and the center of power
in another. Our center OF population is
pretty near the Mississippi now, and our
center OF power is on the Hudson. Who
shall explain this curious phenomenon?
The reason is simple enough. Our cen.
ter OF gravity ls determined not by men,
but by dollars; not by flesh and blood,
but by gold. This precious metal has
power of generating political power that
the mere animal magnetism of masses OF
men has failed to supply. Wall Street
has tapped the national wire, and it's big
gold dynamo is making the machine 60,
while the people look on in impotence
and the connection is made in the sen.
ate chamber. That explains the domi-
mating influence of that house, and the
Snug, superior self.satsfaction OF its
members. They are in touch with the
;c all
the Senate is its prophet.
1t is fine to be the Real Thing. Wheth-
er you are good or bad, it is great to be
real. Heaven is real and hell is real,
and in between are all the shams and
makeshifts OF make believe civiliza.
ton. Wall Street is real and Washing.
ton is not. Dig in Pennsylvania Avenue
and you will find Wall Street under the
surface. That narrow defle OF a street,
tianked by its banks and deposit vaults,
with the forgotten church at its end over
shadowed by the sky-scraping temples
OF finance, is the center OF Amerca today,
and Washington is a mere simulacrum,
like the gilt pipes OF an organ, only for
show, while the real tunes are played
out Of sight underneath. And the fault
lies with the senate. whose treason CON
sists in the fact that it takes its orders
from dollars and not from the people, and
has chosen the dynamo of wealth and
not that OF its human constituents.
This is the situation. Here we are. a
great and vigorous people, generating
power enough to run a dozen govern
ments, and our government has got away
from US, and switched us off, and our
nominal representatives are getting their
motive power elsewhere. There in the
senate chamber is the center of the con.
epiracy which has defrauded US OF our