Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1907-08-20
POWER OF SOCIALISTS.
Will Soon Rule the World, Says Pro-
fessor Bushnell

Professor Charles J. Bushnell recent
~ delivered lecture at Washington in
which he said that the time was not
far distant when the Socialists will
hold the balance of power in the vari
Gus governments, if, indeed, they do
not now control in several of them.
The Improvement of Industrial
Conditions was the subject of his lee
ture. and he laid particular stress up
on these propositions, says Wash
mgton special TO the New York World:
That since the organization of the trusts
(ot which, out of the 400 largest, all but
ten have been started since 1880 there has
been a wonderful increase OF trust made
products, amounting in many instances to
two. three. four and even six fold.
That the wealth Of the country is in
| crcasing at the rate of $l,Co0.0oo,000 a year.
That its distribution Is becoming IN
crcasingly disproportionate. causing great
injustice. hardship and suffering.
That the control of the nations wealth
| and through it of the nation itself is fast
centerinE in the hands of a few. one
| eighth of the families now owning seven
eiChthS Of its wealth. IT Is said on good
authority that the control Of Orc-twclfth
| of the nations wealth is represented AZ
| the meeting of the tweuty-fOur directors
| of the United States Steel corporation
| alone and that the all important railway
| systems of the country are controlled by
| Just six men. with only one supremacy
| dominant.
| That on the other hand. 10 OO0,000 or one
| eighth of the people of tn" country. are In
constant poverty while 100000 are pau
pers.
! That through poorly co-ordinated and
| selfshly administered industrial enter
| prises nearly 100000 ignorant immigrants
are landed each year and congcstcd in the
| most crowded industrial ccntcrs. In the
| city of New York an average of one i'm
migrant arrives every fOrtN-two seconds
| and an arrest occurs every four minutes.
That under the pressure of these abior'
| NAL conditions drinking, smoking. muir
| der. suicide. insanity. robbery. graft and
social vice are increasing faster than the
population causing financial loss thai
| more than counterbalauces cur aunua
| national gain OF wealth.
There are many people in this couh
try" said Professor Bushnell, "Wht
still do not think that any important
changes have lately occurred or are
about to occur in our industrial ant
political life. To convince such tina
they should be more wide awake to thu
signs of their times let me present, a
an infeXible adherent of no one po
litical party or creed or tenet, few
) evidences that the old order changeth
! yielding place to new
} The modern trust is the respons
under individualistic conditions to tn
inevitable demand for more unitie
and economical business organization
And socialism itself, with all its pas
} faults and failures, is but the turtle
effort to carry the will of the peopl
, effectively into our industrial as we
as our political life. BY its deman
, that we should own and control co
: lectively what we need to use colle'
lively socialism is n protest agains
the theory that all a wOrkingma
needs and wants are roof, a famil
and full dinner pail. 1t is an a