New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1912-12-30
A MIGHTY TASK.

HOW DSlA, uOuDJltSS, MdSlSl -hOANt ~
speak truly as my mind giveth me,
wheresoever possessions be private,
where money beareth all the stroke,
it IS hard and almost impossible that
there The veal public may justly be
governed and pr0sperously hourlsh.
For when every man under
certain titles and pretences draWeth
and plucketh 10 himself as much as
he can, and So q few divide among
themselves all the riches that there is,
be there never so much abundance
and store, then 10 the residue is left
lack and poverty
So thought Master Raphael after his
visit TO Utopia. and 50 thought Plato.
Neither could plan Il Just distribution
of wealth except as all property was
held i'm common. Governor Wilson,
however, goes them one better. Hav-
ing caught new glimpse OF that
heaven that lies about us in our in
fancy. he sends from his birthplace
the message: II want to proclaim for
my fellow citizens this gospel for the
future, fiat the men who serve VIII
"be the men who profit He tells the
business men Of the United States that
''they are not going TO be allowed to
make any money except for qua
PRO QuO"; that they must render
service or get nothing, and that III the
regulation of business ''the govern
"ment-that is. the moral judgments
"of the ma iority-must determine
whether what they are doing IL
Service or is not q service, and that
everything in business and politics Is
"going TO be reduced to this standard:
care you giving anything to society
"'when you want to take anything out
- of society,""
1t is q high ideal. If Governor VIII
son can achieve it he will have solved
the problem Of the ages. Not In recent
years only, as he suggests, have men
been getting something for nothing, or
which amounts to the same thing, get
ting double what any particular ser
vice earned. No lawgiver yet has ever
been able to prevent 1t. and philoso-
piers in despair have turned TO the
abolition of private gain as the only
road to the abolition Of unearned gain.
We would not scoff at the vision. 1t
is what every honest man would Ike
to see realized. If Governor Wilson
can do what Plato could not, If he can
so wisely regulate the acquisition and
distribution of wealth that every man
may take in property just as much ana
only as much as he gives in labor OF
hand or brain without erecting an
omniscient machine for the minute and
deadeninG control Of every human ac-
ton. nc will have made a millennium
indeed. He is to make the promoter
cease from stock watering, the grocer
gauge his profits strictly by the value
of his service i'm distribution, the
planter sell his cotton. not according
70 tbe price he can exact from the
simmer in time Of shortage, but ac-
cording to the actual cost Of pr0duc-
ton. And he Is TO devise some human
authority so wise that 1t can determine
the value Of each mans contribution
as planter, grocer or banker to the
public veal, and enable 1t to enforce
its sumptuary rules on all enterprise.
Then the union laborer will no longer
he open to his complaint Of being an
servant" and the money
trust will have no reason for being
The ideal is a high one. Governor Will
son has set for his administration the
most tremendous transformation OF So
ciety undertaken since mans acquisi-
tive instinct obtained the sanction OF
law