Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-05-31
"YoUR OWN RIGHT HAND"

In the triumph Of honest Individual
ism against graft and paternallsm lies
the Significance of James y. Hin. His
success was the best kind of Ameri-
canism.
"UoU win find, in the long run, that II
i is mdn's own right hand that
teaches him terrible things" a college
president once said when he welcomed a
new class He could hardly have found
in the men of our immediate time a more
striking example than James ]. Hill. His
death has in way restored his life. for
every event and moment of his career has
become public. Remarkable in every
feature, his career is most inspiring in Its
independence. He bad neither Aaron nor
Hur to uphold his hands, but his hands
were strong and clean and they taught
him the mastery of men, which is ter.
rible thing.
The personal inspiration which comes
from his life, which started in such hum
BILE simplicity and ended in such simple
magnifcence is not comparable to the
national inspiration evoked by the meth
DDS of his success. Many men have been
SUCCESSFUL anu lltiNt btSll NoioiiAiSN' = ="
have had in their success such enduring
qualities. Foreign critics insist that sue
cess itself is an American quality, but
they refer to the unscrupulous and i'm
moral ventures which have made the
very name of millionaire suspect. The
success of James ]. Hill was not of that
order. 1t was honest and was won single
handed. There was never a scandal con-
nected with his name, never political
steal to forward his fortunes, never sus'
picion of stock jobbing, of made panics,
Of coalitions and comolnes While others
cried for subsidy or protection, he went
alone, firm in the belief that the hand or
man could conquer the world.
The whole tradition of our American
life is that human ingenuity can circum-
vent and triumph over the forces of ma
ture. To Jim" Hill nature in the North
west showed her most forbidding face.
Before he controlled mile of road or
single wheel of rolling stock the plague
of locusts fell upon the country with de-
vastating regularity. There was but one
crop on which the farmers of the North
west could depend. The totals of their
shipping could not keep a railroad alive.
The district was not populated, the in
centives We're lacking. Further south
railroad had been built with all the eff
forts of the Government added to indi-
vidual enterprise. The railroads already
built or building in the Northwest were
bankrupt That was forty years ago,
and it is hard to throw ourselves back
into the barren chaos of those days.
But "TIill's Folly" was destined to be-
come the Great Northern. The wind and
the waves are proverbially on the side of
the bravest mariners, and for Jim" Hill
the plague of grasshoppers ended sud-
denly. But he. through the driving force
of his enthusiasm and the persuasive
power of his calm, reasoning mind, en-
rolled under him men whom he could
direct in the work of crushing nature. He
built his road and he puilt new crops
and new industries, and finally he built
character. He gave the country served
by his roads a new income in live stock.
and the country rewarded him by return
ing forty million dollars in four years
on an investment of a quarter of mil
lion. But gain of 10000 per cent. could
What the Northwest saw in the work of
Jim" Hill grew in Importance when the
West remembered. 1t remembered that
Tweed was the type of American poll
tician and the Credit Mobilier the type
of American financial methods. The peo.
pie had come to believe the Senate and
House were guilty of low fraud and cum
ming deceit, and the game of political job
berry was only second in their minds to
Government subsidies as the condition of
success. Before Tweed was dead, before
the scandal of the Credit Mobilier had
died down, the West saw Jim" Hill rise
to confute their power. They saw him.
like Antaeus, grow in strength as rail
after rail touched the rich earth of his
empire. His power was of the soil, his
riches We're the fruitfulness of the land.
Before his life ended he was engaged in
the most intricate financial ventures OF
his time, but he never lost that serene
connection with simple things which was
his fundamental resource.
His life is an answer and a rebuke to
more modern cowardice. He did not in
woke the power of politics in his business.
He did not believe in the necessity of
Government aids 10 industry or com
merce. He stood rooted against Govern
ment interference and Government own
ership He fought, as against Hartman,
with the ferocity of a wild animal pro-
tecting its young, to save his system. be-
cause it was so much his personal prop
erty, his work and his achievement. The
passion of creation famed in him as in
any other artist. Like every artist he
scorned the aid OF the world in working
out his fortune. He was great individ-
ualist and a great man. If the country
is not to see his like again, it has, in more
senses than one, lost its most striking
character.