Evening star., 1936-06-29
Mitsuis Yield
Position as
Richest
Baron Sumitomos Placed
at Top of Japan's In.
come Tax List.
BY LEMUEL F. PARTON.

TOR the last century or two IL
r. has been rare occurrence for
any one In Japan TO earn more
money or make more profits
in single year than the Mitsuis. To-
days news that young Baron Kichi.
zaemon Sumitono tops the list of in
come taxpayers apparently gives the
baron the world lead in the money
race.
Baron Takskimi Mitsui who runs
second, has been generally regarded
as the richest man In the world. stu
dents of Far Eastern finance rating
him higher than Ford or Rockefe Ter.
The Sumitomo clan is a retiring sort
Of dynasty. not given to hauntirg its
wealth, but now. possibly reluctantly.
1t Is out in the noon-day glare with
its vast gleanines In Japans trade
outreach of the last few years.
They are related to the venerated
Prince Saionji, who comes down from
his mountain top at times to put the
Parliament to rights. Hichizaemon
Sumitomo, brother of Prince Saionii.
died in 1926. The reigning baron.
titular head of the firm. is like all the
others of his ancient family punctili-
Gus in all the niceties of the Samurai
tradition, accepting its age-old dis
cipline, living without too great osten-
tation. schooled in both chivalry and
percentage.
The young man, like most of the
sons of the great Occidental money
masters is informed and keenly inter-
ested in modern technology, and it is
in iron and steel techniques that the
Sumitomos have been gaining a lap
or two every year on the Mitsuis.
They make the export steel rails, ma
chinery, tools. copper wires, steel
plates and tubes. iron rods and other
such products, landing them abroad
at price which has been disquieting
to the American steel kings and to the
great European steel cartels.
Japan recently cancelled an order
for a string of German blast fur
naces and also killed some big orders
for American scrap iron. Under the
patronage of the Sumitomos, there
has been a dazzling advance in
economical smelling and refining
processes and the fashioning of steel
products out of almost any old kind
Of industrial litter.
The Mitsuis are mere parvenus COM
pared to the Sumitomos. The former
60 back only TO 1900, when one Of
their family, daughter, started selling
sake wine. The Sumitomos we're far
ahead of them in what in this day
would be called finance capitalism"
This year Baron Hisaya Iwasaki is
third on the income tax list and, Of
the five next highest names. there are
three Mltsuis and two IWaSakis. On
the whole there is indicated a mar
rover concentration of wealth than
among the 200 families which run the
Bank of France.
Alfred Duff Cooper, British secre-
tary of war, has been characterized as
"a Baldwinized Tory-cultivated and
earnest" Currently he echoes Bald
wins remark. "Britains frontier Is
the Rhine" as he tells France, your
frontier is our frontier" A few days
ago, he said the duty of those in
authority is to frighten the people OF
this country out of their wits" He
wants the Church of England to make
a pacifsm heresy and ground for
eXcommunication.
One of the younger Conservative
leaders in Parliament, he was made
secretary of war last November. For
a year previously he had been financial
secretary He's somewhat of a gadfy
In England. now writing a huge bioE-
raphy of Earl HaiE, in which he finds
that Lloyd George let Con,dr. Haig
down badly in the war
(Copyright 1851