The Impending Crisis - Conditions Resulting from the Concentration of Wealth in the United States

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Title: The Impending Crisis - Conditions Resulting from the Concentration of Wealth in the United States
Author: Bouroff, Basil A.
Language: English
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THE IMPENDING CRISIS

Conditions Resulting from the Concentration of Wealth in the United States.

BASIL A. BOUROFF,

Graduate Student of the University of Chicago.

Publishers,
Midway Press Committee,
Chicago.
1900.

PREFACE.

This is not a novel, nor a work of fiction; it is based on the facts of
the Eleventh Census and other statistical reports, and on the most
reliable authorities on these subjects. This book represents the most
essential and fundamental features of the nation’s situation. It shows
the reasons why your cities rapidly become the property of a
comparatively very few persons; why the American farmers lose their
ground, and the urban population lose liberty; and why all become
absolutely dependent upon a few multi-millionaires. It exposes the
conditions in consequence of which the whole nation becomes a nation of
mere tenants of farms and homes, paying rents; and, while the wealth
increases, the greatest majority of the people come into desperate
struggle not for pleasure, but for simple existence.

In order to impart as much knowledge in regard to the situation of the
nation as possible, it was found necessary to supply the readers with a
sufficient comparison of statistical facts, pointing to the differences
of averages made by different authorities on the subject. This
comparison has also been introduced for the purpose of indicating
certain truths of special value, and for finding the true bases of
reasonably dealing with the most vital problem of the national
existence. This problem involving conditions that cause the commonly
recognized social unrest of the present time is a problem which grows in
intensity.

Recognizing the difficulty in solving the problem and the danger of the
situation, we should not wonder, if the very persons who are always
inclined to make discounts in established truths, will be profoundly
surprised to know from the final conclusions here presented, that the
time of discounts has passed away, and that it is now too late to ignore
the facts of so serious significance.

If this work should come to be regarded as a general diagnosis of the
diseased situation, we may rest assured that there are many thousands of
people who will count it their sacred duty to find the proper remedy for
curing the disease of the national organism. For it will be seen that
the situation is rapidly growing worse every year with the increase of
population, and there must be an end to the disease. Surely, if the
increase of the national wealth is becoming less than the continual net
incomes of the private monopolies, trusts and combinations, it is not
difficult to recognize that the situation is already very bad. It is
therefore desirable that every one should carefully learn the situation.

THE AUTHOR.

Chicago, April 1, 1900.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH IN THE UNITED STATES.
Page.

Preliminary: opinions and views 1

Conclusions of Mr. G. K. Holmes, U. S. Census Expert, 5
illustrated by diagrams and Table I

Conclusions of Mr. Thos. G. Shearman 11

Diagrams, Table II, and explanation 12

Conclusions of Dr. C. B. Spahr 18

Diagrams, Table III, and explanation 20

CHAPTER II.
STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS.

Statistics of aggregate wealth 27

Economic classes of families analysed 28

Holders of wealth, tenants and mortgagors 32

Reciprocal comparison of contradictory classes 39

Comparison of the poor and the rich families 42

Right table resulting from comparisons 45

Comparison of families in tables of different authorities: 47
averages of family wealth

Illustrative chart showing worth of individuals 50

CHAPTER III.
THE PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE.

Fundamental difference in number of resources of the propertied 53
and propertyless

Sources of multiple incomes of the wealth owners 54

(Extent of mechanical forces applied to labor in favor of the 57
wealthy)

A propertyless man himself is a source of multiple expenses in 61
favor of the propertied

Primogeniture replaced by dividogenesure, the principle of 70
dividogenesure defined and explained

CHAPTER IV.
ABNORMITY OF THE SOCIAL SITUATION.

Numbers of the people subject to dividogenesure 78

(Percentage of the homeless population in cities and towns and 79
of the landless on farms)

The propertyless a great nation 83

Bread-winners and others in gainful pursuits 89

Productivity of the American people superior 93

The people labor in favor of speculators 95

(Artificial world a witness for justice and rights) 98

Yearly net gains of the natural monopolies 101

Rates of injustice of dividogenesure expressed in daily incomes 103
derived from millions of dependent individuals by the wealthy
few

CHAPTER V.
THE MORTGAGOR FAMILIES.

Loss of rights precedes loss of property 110

Statistics of farm and home families in debt 111

Percentages and numbers of families in debt in the United States 116
after 1890: double table

Increase of mortgages on acre-tracts and lots 119

Amounts of indebtedness and life of mortgage 121

Per capita debt and average rate percent on the debt 122

Annual interest charges on debts combined 126

Public and other debts in force after 1890 stated 126

Significance of mortgages: different views 128

Loss of property by foreclosure of mortgages 135

CHAPTER VI.
CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH IN MONOPOLIES, ETC.

Increase of the national wealth in seven years 139

Wages: the doctrine of; artificially kept up; the fall of 141

Net incomes of the natural and mortgagee monopolies from 1891 to 145
1897 inclusive

Net incomes of monopolizers of rentable houses for the same 146
period

Net incomes of monopolies of rentable farm lands for the same 148
period

Net incomes of some trusts unascertained 151

Net incomes of the owners of offices, hotels and other rentable 152
properties in the centers of cities

Development of trusts in manufacture and mechanical industries; 154
concentration of capital

Net incomes of manufacture and mechanical trades 157

Net incomes of mining monopolies 161

Increase of the propertyless population 164

Grand total of the total-net-incomes of monopolies, trusts, and 169
combinations in seven years

Excess of the net incomes over the total increase of the 170
national wealth in seven years explained

National and local taxes for seven years paid 174

Increase of the propertyless and that of national wealth after 180
1897 up to 1900 stated

Appendix 187

Index 191

CHAPTER I.

DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH IN THE UNITED
STATES.

When a heavy mass of clouds suddenly rises in a clear sky, every one
thinks that a terrific storm is to follow, displaying a great store of
pent up forces. And many people [SN: SIGNS OF THE TIMES.] never make a
single mistake in predicting from so ominous a summer sky what is going
to take place. Some similar forecasting is now going on within the
consciousness of the people. For nearly every one more or less clearly
feels that he is heavily pressed upon by some portent in the national
life. And every one whose mental horizon is clear enough and wide enough
sees, beyond the outward appearance, that something dangerous is stored
in the nation. It may be something so unusually great in its force,
something so explosive, something so combustible, that with the new
century it may terribly shake the world.

It was quite recently when the “North American” of Philadelphia asked
the question, “What has the Nineteenth Century in store for
Philadelphia?” And by its own admission the replies received were
amazing. In summing them up, before spreading them at large before its
readers, it said:

“Substantial business men, whose names are almost household words,
solemnly affirm that with opinions of the new century will come
revolution and bloodshed. Leading lawyers [SN: OPINIONS OF BUSINESS
MEN.] say the tendency will be toward socialism. Bankers join with labor
leaders in forecasting the triumph of the single-tax theory and the
consequent overthrow of existing social conditions. That such a
tremendous undercurrent of dissatisfaction and unrest exists in this
city will undoubtedly come as a shock to thousands of conservative
citizens. The opinions given are not those of labor agitators or
anarchists. They are the careful expressions of men of wealth and of
broad education. The revolutionary suggestions were not shouted upon the
street in time of riot and excitement, but were given deliberately while
the speakers sat in their well furnished offices, surrounded by comforts
and evidences of prosperity.[1]” So then the Nineteenth Century has
stored up in the social organism of the nation enough material to
produce revolution and bloodshed in the Twentieth Century.

And Mr. Louis Post says in “The Public” of Chicago: “Our leisurely
friends of Philadelphia, who are to be envied, by the way, and not
sneered at, for being philosophical enough and sensible enough to keep
so much unwholesome hustle out of their lives—these slow and sober
people must have been ‘startled’ by the above ‘revelations’ of the
Philadelphia North American, that ancient landmark, now in its 128th
year.[2] It was undoubtedly an amazing surprise in view of its age that
the answer of its readers was, as you see, ‘revolution and bloodshed.’

If similar questions were presented to the thinking public of the
various cities of the United States, we might have thousands of like
opinions and all of them would be conditioned by sufficient reasons.

One of the most prominent thinkers of the city of Chicago[3] also quite
recently said that “the Twentieth Century will bring to us the bloodiest
revolution that human [SN: OPINIONS OF LEARNED MEN.] history ever
witnessed.” And his assertion was not less amazing than was the
affirmation of the substantial business men of Philadelphia. If it were
honest and right to expose the names of men whose confidential
conversations led to the same or similar assertions, I alone could make
a long list of these names.

They all admit that the nation, as an organism, has long been diseased;
its nerves have long been abnormally strained. But, like the friends of
Philadelphia, they speak about revolution and bloodshed which is but the
last and most convulsive stage of any nation’s serious disease. And it
is true that, when this stage is reached, it is impossible to avoid the
most intolerable operation.

But the amazing feature of such opinions is that different men agree in
affirming that revolution and bloodshed is almost unavoidable; yet
different men, as I know, [SN: CAUSES OF UNREST.] assign different
causes for such an undesirable event.[4] Some say it must come because
the population increases and the unemployed laborers increase. Others
say that the trusts, combinations, and monopolies must ruin the nation.
Still others say that progress and poverty, being very rapid in their
diverse directions, must rapidly bring the wealthy and the poor into the
state of cut-throats against each other. And only very few men
understand that all these causes are but secondary, though working to
the same horrible end. While the real, effective cause for revolution
and bloodshed, with the nation, is the exceedingly unequal distribution
of wealth, and its rapid concentration in a very few hands.

It is this situation that our democratic people will not be able to
endure, because they are born [SN: PEOPLE THINK THEY ARE BORN FREE.]
free, whereas the storing up of wealth in a few hands makes them all
economic slaves; deprives them of the privileges they enjoyed; makes
them absolutely dependent upon the mercies of the rich, which, if shown
to them, they may live; if withheld from them, they must starve to
death.

Let us see, then, what it is that the Nineteenth Century has stored up,
which is to result in such a terrific convulsion in the Twentieth
Century.

The following diagrams present the Logical Premises from which the
“revolution and bloodshed,” as a conclusion, must inevitably follow,
provided their action is not checked.

Distribution of Wealth in the United States.[5]

Population: 62,622,250. Wealth: $65,037,091,197.

Millionaires .03 } Millionaires 20 }
Rich 8.97 } .09 Rich 51 } .71

Middle 28 } Middle 20 }
Lower 11 } .91 Lower 04 } .29
Poor 52 } Poor 05 }

“These diagrams showing by percentages the population and wealth
distribution in the United States, according to tables compiled by
George K. Holmes, U. S. Census Expert on Mortgage Statistics, are from
the Encyclopedia of Social Reform.”

The contents of the above diagrams show on the bases of statistics that
in 1890 three hundredths of one per cent of the population, [SN:
PERCENTAGES OF WEALTH AND PEOPLE.] which are the millionaires, held 20
per cent of the nation’s wealth. Eight per cent and ninety-seven
hundredths of one per cent of the population, which are the rich, held
51 per cent of the wealth. The middle class, consisting of 28 per cent
of the population, held 20 per cent of the wealth. The lower class,
consisting of 11 per cent of the population, held 4 per cent of the
wealth. And the poor class, consisting of 52 per cent of the population,
held but 5 per cent of the national wealth,[6] as this table shows:

Table I.

+-----------+------------+-----------+----------------+--------------+
| | | | | Distribution |
|Percentages| Population |Percentages| Aggregates of | of wealth |
|of People. | in Groups. |of Wealth. | Wealth in | per head |
| | | | Dollars. | in Dollars. |
+-----------+------------+-----------+----------------+--------------+
| 00.03 | 18,786 | 20 | 13,007,418,274 | 691,867 |
| 08.97 | 5,617,172 | 51 | 33,168,916,461 | 59,041 |
| 28.00 | 17,534,216 | 20 | 13,007,418,253 | 741 |
| 11.00 | 6,888,432 | 4 | 2,601,483,644 | 377 |
| 52.00 | 32,563,644 | 5 | 3,251,854,565 | 99 |
+-----------+------------+-----------+----------------+--------------+
| 100.00 | 62,622,250 | 100 | 65,037,091,197 | 1,036 |
+-----------+------------+-----------+----------------+--------------+

This illustrative table represents the exact value of the diagrams on p.
5. And nothing is more interesting in this table than the sad
differences in the worth of the groups, and especially when their
respective wealth is divided per every head. The right-hand column shows
that there are 18,786 persons whose aggregate wealth, if divided equally
among them, would give $691,867 to each man, woman, and child. And there
are 32,563,644 persons[7] in the last group, whose wealth, if equally
divided among them, can give but $99 to every person. These two groups
present the greatest possible extremes of group-poverty and
group-opulence.

The other three groups, as their averages clearly show, are intermediary
between the two extremes. [SN: PER CAPITA WEALTH.] And if all the wealth
of the nation were equally divided among its population, we could have
$1,036 to every man, woman, and child. This per capita wealth indicates
that the nation is very rich on the whole, but its riches, as you see,
belong to a very few persons.

What then is the difference between a rich man and a poor man, between a
rich woman and a poor woman?

If the 32,563,644 men, women and children had $100 per capita wealth,
then one rich man of the first group of the above table, would be worth
more [SN: WORTH OF MEN.] than 6,918 men of the last group of the same
table. A rich man’s horse often worth more than 10, 20, 30, or even
more, poor men taken together. A rich woman’s finger alone worth more
than 10 or 20 poor women taken together, because that finger is often
embellished with the diamond rings that cost thousands of dollars. A
complete ladies’ dress or a costume often amounts to more than $5,000,
and hence it is worth more than 40 or 50 women taken together with their
dresses. Such are the differences between the rich and the poor people
when they are valued by the dollar.

But the dollar differences cause a great many other differences between
the rich and the poor. The poor man is not only poor in wealth, but he
is poorer still in social [SN: POOR IN SOCIAL RIGHTS.] rights and
privileges. And there is no possibility for the poor to rise up out of
his poverty. For he has no resources of wealth which the rich people
have; and he has no property of his own; for if he is worth but $99,
which is really his house-scarb,[8] he has no productive property at
all; he is then absolutely dependent upon the mercy of the wealthy,
without which he cannot exist even for six months. He cannot acquire
higher education and training, because he is encompassed with poverty
which furnishes no means for the education that helps men to acquire
wealth. Hence, the lack of education keeps the poor in poverty; and this
poverty prevents him from getting the helpful education. So that,
poverty and ignorance become the bitter enemies of the above millions of
individuals in the modern world of progress. Yet the modern poor have a
far more potent enemy than poverty and ignorance combined, which we
shall see later on.

Meanwhile, we will say here, that the rich are the masters over the poor
in the sphere of law, in the sphere of politics, in the club, in the
theater, in the church, at home [SN: DOMINANCY OF THE RICH.] and
abroad—everywhere; as if all power were given unto them under the
heavens over the poor. And how many church-ministers would not give them
the same power and the best places in the hereafter? For the very
character of sermons in our days depends upon the pleasures of the rich
in many churches, because the ministers depend upon the wealthy few more
than they depend on the millions of the poor. While all these poor are
the rich men’s economic slaves, spending half of their labor energy in
favor of the wealthy. That is what the Nineteenth Century has provided
for the nation.

But the above statistical conclusions were by many regarded as “roseate”
and “extremely moderate conclusions.” And it was in consequence of this
that Dr. Spahr [SN: CONCLUSIONS ARE MODERATE.] was obliged to reiterate
the expression: “Since the completion of this study, a volume has
appeared that must set at rest all question as to the extreme moderation
of the estimates reached.”[9] For it was clear that every new
investigation of the distribution of wealth confirmed the fact of a more
and more rapid concentration of the national wealth in fewer hands than
before. And it is the question of poverty, that spreads like contagion,
that the American people have now to deal with, in view of a phenomenal
increase of the national wealth which concentrates in the few hands. And
it is this question that cannot be set at rest while millions grow
poorer and poorer and the propertyless increase in numbers, as we shall
soon see.

The people cannot set this question at rest until they know the truth of
the different statistical tables, indicating the nation’s situation and
destiny. And we cannot rest until we make a series of propositions for
the purpose of producing more equal distribution of wealth in this
country. And even then we cannot rest, until our propositions be applied
to the irrational life of the nation, with the purpose of working out
justice for the people. When we see all this in their actual life, then
we shall rest, as the people shall be regaining their freedom, their
property, their resources of income, their rights to work and to enjoy
the fruits of their toil. The intelligent people cannot and must not
rest before they reach a resting place. They cannot always be deceived
by the shallow and selfish arguments which prove that the national
wealth increases enormously,—for it so increases only with the few and
rapidly decreases with the entire people. But the time will come when
the tens of millions will no longer vote for men who deprive them of all
rights, self-respect and liberty.

As we shall see later on, the 32,563,644 persons [SN: UTENSILS AS
WEALTH.] of the last group of the table I possessed no real wealth at
all even at the census in 1890. For though the diagrams represent them
as having had $99 worth of wealth to every head, yet this wealth was
personal and not productive.

STATISTICAL CONCLUSIONS OF MR. SHEARMAN.

“An estimate of the distribution of wealth in the United States was made
by Mr. Thomas G. Shearman [SN: RESEARCHES OF MR. SHEARMAN.] in the
‘Forum’ for 1889, and for January, 1891. It was based on careful
estimates of the wealth of the very wealthy, a list of which he gave,
and estimates of the division of the remaining wealth of the country
between the middle class and the poor based on assessors’ returns.”[10]

“Mr. Shearman came to the conclusion that 1.4 per cent of the population
own 70 per cent of the wealth; 9.2 per cent of the population own 12 per
cent of the wealth; and 89.4 per cent of the population own only 18 per
cent of the wealth.”[11]

In these conclusions, we have a still greater twist of facts by wrong
handling. Now, to illustrate these conclusions as they stand by another
set of diagrams, they will be as follows:

Population: 62,622,250. Wealth: $65,037,091,197.

The wealthy 1.4 The wealth
of the
wealthy .70

Independent 9.2 Independent .12

The poor and Dependent
dependent 89.4 and the poor .18

Conclusions of Unrestrained Averages of 1890.

These diagrams indicate by percentages the exact conclusions of Mr.
Shearman in respect to the population and the wealth distribution in
this country. The author [SN: LOOSE AVERAGES.] of these conclusions
obviously put too much salt of his own into his averages; for, by
parceling out the wealth of a number of the well-to-do and rich people,
he succeeded in persuading his readers, that, in America, the body of
tens of millions of propertyless people, the paupers and the tramps, do
not possess, on an average, less than $200 worth of wealth for each
person, including women and children of all ages. Whereas, in reality,
the wealth from which he made the fictitious averages, belongs to a very
few persons of the nation. While an astonishing majority of the people,
as we shall see, have no rights whatever to this wealth.

Let us again illustrate the conclusions in a tabular way for the sake of
definiteness:

Table II.[12]

+------------+-------------+----------+------------------+------------+
| Percent. | Population | Percent. | Aggregates of | Wealth per |
| of | in economic | of | wealth per group | head |
| population.| groups. | wealth. | in dollars. | in dollars.|
+------------+-------------+----------+------------------+------------+
| 1.4 | 876,710 | 70 | 45,525,973,867 | 51,928 |
| 9.2 | 5,761,242 | 12 | 7,804,450,932 | 1,354 |
| 89.4 | 55,984,298 | 18 | 11,706,676,398 | 209 |
+------------+-------------+----------+------------------+------------+
| 100.00 | 62,622,250 | 100 | 65,037,091,197 | 1,036 |
+------------+-------------+----------+------------------+------------+

The first glance at this table and a glance at the table on page 6 show
the reader that Mr. Shearman divided the population into three groups;
and Mr. Holmes divided it [SN: LINES OF DIVISION OF THE PEOPLE.] into
five groups. The bases of division are economic in both tables; but the
lines of division are very different with the one statistical authority
and the other. If we examine these lines, we shall find that Mr. Holmes’
fifth group consists of over 32½ million persons who, taken together,
had been worth a little over 3 billion dollars; so that, each person of
the group could have about $99 worth of wealth, as the average of table
I shows. The next higher group of the same author, which comprises
nearly 7 million persons, had, on an average, more wealth to each
person, than each person could have in the fifth group, hence the per
capita wealth of the fourth group of people was $377. While the group
still higher up in wealth, which consists of little over 17½ million
persons, and which had over 13 billion dollars’ worth of wealth, could
have $741 to every head, that is, if this wealth were equally divided
among them. The second group of Mr. Holmes’ division consists of over 5½
million persons, among whom the poorest ones had, probably not less than
$5,000 worth of wealth, as their average worth of over $59,000 shows.
Such a division of the population into five economic groups, if every
family is rightly and honestly valued, presents an immense amount of
truth to the public judgment.[13]

But what Mr. Shearman really did with his estimates and conclusions is
this: Seeing that the extent of poverty is appalling, he made the
division line in the group of [SN: SWEEPING AVERAGE.] well-to-do people;
he thus made the group of the very poor extend so far as to comprise
nearly 56 million persons; and then, by dividing the wealth of the
well-to-do persons among all these millions, he obtained an average of
$209 worth of wealth to every pauper, to every tramp, to every man,
woman and child,—who have had no wealth, and have had no rights whatever
to the wealth they are nominally represented as entitled to.

Consequently, his distribution of wealth among the third group of people
is merely on paper, is nominal, is showy, and it does not correspond to
reality with reference [SN: ONLY NOMINAL DISTRIBUTION.] to more than 35
million persons as represented in Mr. Holmes’ distribution of this
wealth. Mr. Shearman might as well follow the example of Mr. Carroll D.
Wright[14] and, by a single effort in calculation, divide among all
individuals the 70 per cent of wealth that belongs to his 1.4 per cent
of the people. In doing that, he might apportion more than $1,000 worth
of it to [SN: JESUITS AND GALILEO.] every penniless individual, and then
might say, Why, we are all rich, we are the most civilized and righteous
people in the world! But such an effort, and such an assertion, however,
would not at all alter the real situation; no more than Galileo, when in
view of the danger of death, signing the Jesuit verdict in favor of the
non-revolution of our planet round the sun, could thereby stop the
actual revolution of the earth; for the earth’s progressive motion went
on, in spite of the ardent desire and policy of the Jesuits to make it
stand still by a verdict. Nothing but an indescribable shock of the
earth against another heavenly body can change its principles of motion.

The same is true of the nation. Once the principle of concentration of
wealth is left unimpeded in its action, it must work out its end; [SN:
DANGER.] it must of living necessity produce revolution and bloodshed.
And neither the extremely moderate statisticians, nor the false
averages, of even of the meanest falsehood, can prevent its action
toward such a horrible result. “You remember the French revolution?”
[SN: FRENCH REVOLUTION, ROME.] asked Hon. Jno. S. Crosby of his audience
in Binghamton,[15] N. Y., and then he said: “In France all the lands had
come into the hands of a few people, the king and nobles, and a majority
of the people were depending on them for a living. The time came when
these down-trodden people rose up and Paris streets ran with blood. Your
country will have the same experience if you keep on fooling with the
laws of God.

“Rome was once the mistress of the whole world. She lorded it over the
other countries. But she fell, and Pliny, her historian, lays the cause
of her downfall to land monopoly.”[16] And so it was with ancient Egypt;
so it was with ancient Assyria, and so it was with the Byzantine Empire,
those great and powerful nations that perished for similar misconduct in
relation to themselves.

Exactly so, this young nation also irrationally strides in the way of
Rome. The concentration of her wealth in a few hands is now more rapid
than it was before the last [SN: RUSH OF THE NATION.] census. That
census brought about astonishing conclusions, yet the nation rushes as
fast as she can to her ruin. And who can locate the weight of
responsibility for her end? Every one seems to think about his selfish
interests. Consequently, nothing has been done in the past to evade the
ruin; nothing but the greatest national harm is being done in the
present; and no fundamental [SN: LOGICAL PREMISES FOR THE YEAR OF....]
measure, no rational remedy, no serious means appear for delaying it in
the future. While the Logical Premises[17] for revolution and bloodshed
have been established in the nation’s life, and their forces have been
working to that inexorable end.

Now we are ready to present another conclusion that the statisticians of
1890 reached. It deals with the numbers of families, leaving out the
individual inhabitants.

We have been assured that the U. S. nation in 1890 consisted of
12,690,152 families, and that each family, on an average, consisted of
little less than 5 members, namely: 4.93 members.[18] The distribution
of the national wealth among families, therefore, was expressed as
follows:

“_Less than half the families in America are propertyless; nevertheless,
seven-eighths of the families [SN: HALF THE NATION.] hold but one-eighth
of the national wealth_,” and vice versa. “_While one per cent of the
families hold more_ (wealth) _than the remaining ninety-nine_,” says Dr.
C. B. Spahr.[19]

At last we have struck in these conclusions a piece of more serious
reality. “Less than half the families in the United States are
propertyless.” Here you are! “Less than half.” [SN: CONCLUSIONS OF
REALITY.] Yet even here, we are far from the fulness of truth. It seems
as if the statisticians themselves were afraid to reveal the full truth
to the people. And there are many intelligent persons who believe that
the pure and complete truth should be known only to God Omniscient,
while His creatures must be content to know but particles of truth mixed
with falsehood.

As long, however, as the U. S. nation remains a democratic nation, and
as long as responsibility for its prosperity or distress and disaster
[SN: RESPONSIBILITY OF THE PEOPLE.] rests upon a majority of its people,
this people ought to know not particles, but the whole truth of the
conditions of their existence. Otherwise the least possible minority of
the sharks in human form or the wolves in sheep’s skin, may devour or
ruin the greatest bulk of the people.

Let us then illustrate here one of the above conclusions, while leaving
the two others for later discussion.

“Seven-eighths of the families hold but one-eighth of the national
wealth,” and vice versa, as the diagrams on the following page indicate,
where the 12,690,152 families represent 62,622,250 individuals as in the
preceding diagrams.

Population: 12,690,152.[20] Wealth: $65,037,091,197.

Poor Poor
families } 7/8 families } 1/8

Rich Rich
families } 1/8 families } 7/8

These diagrams represent exactly the truth of the conclusion:
“Seven-eighths of the families of this nation held but one-eighth of the
national wealth;[20] or seven-eighths of the nation’s wealth was held by
but one-eighth of the families.

The table on the next page illustrates some of the details of the above
conclusion.

The upper division of that table presents the distribution of wealth
among the families, where the two “per family” averages indicate [SN:
FAMILIES.] a difference in the worth of more than 11-million families
that held $732 each, and the worth of little over 1½-million families
that held $35,875 each. So that, each family of the latter group was
worth as much as 49 families of the former. While the general average of
$5,125 shows that, if the national wealth had been equally distributed
among all families, every one of them would have had this average amount
as its own.

Table III.

+-----------+-------------++-----------+-----------------+------------+
|Proportions| Numbers of ||Proportions| Aggregate wealth| Average |
| of | families in || of | per group, | wealth per |
| | groups. || | in dollars. | family. |
+-----------+-------------++-----------+-----------------+------------+
| 7/8 | 11,103,883 || 1/8 | 8,129,636,399 | $ 732 |
| 1/8 | 1,586,269 || 7/8 | 56,907,454,798 | 35,875 |
+-----------+-------------++-----------+-----------------+------------+
| 8/8 | 12,690,152 || 8/8 | 65,037,091,197 | 5,125 |
+===========+=============++===========+=================+============+
| | Number of || | Wealth—the same | Wealth |
| | individuals.|| | in dollars. | per head. |
+-----------+-------------++-----------+-----------------+------------+
| 7/8 | 54,794,468 || 1/8 | 8,129,636,399 | $ 148 |
| 1/8 | 7,827,782 || 7/8 | 56,907,454,798 | 7,269 |
+-----------+-------------++-----------+-----------------+------------+
| 8/8 | 62,622,250 || 8/8 | 65,037,091,197 | 1,036 |
+-----------+-------------++-----------+-----------------+------------+

The lower division of the table represents the same amounts of national
wealth, the same population, only individually considered; and both the
wealth and the population [SN: INDIVIDUALS.] were divided into eight
parts each, in order to carry out the proportions between numbers of the
individuals and the wealth they possessed. The result in this division
is that 7,827,782 individuals have had an average wealth of $7,269 each
man, woman and child, and 54,794,468 individuals had but $148 worth of
wealth to every head.[21] The difference between the worth of one person
of the one group, and one person of the other group, is $7,121 in favor
of the rich person. And that, again, one person of the wealthy class, on
an average, is worth more than 49 persons of the poor class.

But the most astounding fact is that we have over 54½-million
inhabitants of this poverty-stricken class, and we have only a [SN:
NUMBERS NEAREST TO THE TRUE ONES.] little more than 7½-million
inhabitants of the wealth-swollen class. So that, these 54½-million
individuals appear to be totally dependent upon the mercies and motions
of 7½-million persons who are steadily growing richer and decreasing in
numbers, while the poor are growing poorer and rapidly increasing in
numbers. For such has been the growth of economic slavery that the above
millions have to combat with.

Besides all this, we have seen the statistical conclusion that, “Less
than half the families in America are propertyless,” which certainly
[SN: THE PROPERTYLESS FAMILIES APPEAR LITTLE BETTER OFF.] means, that
these propertyless families must be found included among the 54-millions
of the poor. So that the present average wealth of these millions, which
is $148 per every head, was made of the wealth of the upper classes,
which average was not at all possessed by the poor. The economic
conditions of the poor must be still worse than Table III represents
them. But we shall find this out in the next chapter; while the
conclusion that, “1 per cent of the families hold more wealth than the
remaining 99 per cent of them,” nearly corresponds with the conclusion
of Mr. Shearman, as represented on pp. 12 and 13.

CHAPTER II.

STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS.

In the preceding chapter, we have dealt with ready-made conclusions of
different statistical authorities, which, by the way of [SN: RESULTS OF
THE FIRST CHAPTER.] analysis, revealed to us, that 32,563,644
persons[22] of the population had on an average $99 worth of wealth,
according to Mr. G. Holmes; that 55,984,298 persons[23] had on an
average $209 worth of wealth, according to Mr. Thos. Shearman; and that
54,794,468 persons[24] out of 62,622,250 inhabitants, with
$65,037,091,197 worth of wealth, had on an average $148 worth of wealth
apiece, according to Dr. Spahr.

These differences in conclusions indicate that the national wealth is
very strongly concentrated with a few persons, and that in order [SN:
WEALTH IN THE HANDS OF FEW.] to obtain the nominal average of $148 worth
of wealth to every poor person, one has to move the line of division of
wealth so far up toward the wealthy few as to include nearly all the
people among the masses of the poor. While, without this unfair moving
of the line, more than 30-millions of the population would have no real
wealth at all. For $56,907,454,798 worth of the wealth actually belongs
to one-eighth of the population, or to 7,827,782 individuals, including
men, women and children. And among these, we are told, “1 per cent of
the population held more wealth than the remaining 99 per cent held
together.”[25] So that the day is not far off when these 99 per cent of
the people shall absolutely depend upon the 1 per cent of the rich and
far reaching.

Regarded as the Logical Premises of the life of the nation, this
extremely unequal distribution of wealth cannot be other than extremely
dangerous for the existence [SN: THE SITUATION IS DANGEROUS FOR THE
FUTURE.] of the nation as it is, for the logic is inexorable: Whatever
you have sown, that shall you also reap, is a saying that cannot be
mistaken either by the wealthy or the poor. The situation indicates that
this apparently polished nation presents only an enormous working
mechanism, made not of steel and iron, but a mechanism of wood, which
may be broken into pieces at any future time, in consequence of any
insignificant occasion, if it continues to work heedlessly on with a
wrong speed against itself. A rational regulation of its speed is
absolutely necessary, in order to save it from an otherwise unavoidable
destruction. A civilized nation cannot live long without a highly
intelligent regulation of all its working principles. For, to live a
national life is not to play a childish game.

Yes, we have examined the above conclusions, but we have not realized
the entire truth of the situation. For we were told that, [SN: THE
SITUATION IS WORSE THAN INDICATED.] “Less than half the families in
America are propertyless,”[26] which clearly means that the distribution
of wealth among the people is much worse than we have a right to suppose
upon the basis of the stated conclusions of 1890. As these conclusions
differ from each other in contents, we have the moral right to
re-examine the varying statistical tables that testify of the same
distribution of wealth. And we have a right to find the naked truth in
the mass of materials we have, and to look it straight in the face, if
we can.

But before proceeding to compare the main tables of statistics, it will
be well to show what the wealth of the nation in 1890 consisted of.
Accordingly, the table on the next page represents eight items into
which the wealth was classified. And it represents the summary of all
kinds of wealth that was found existing in the United States in the year
of the 11th census. While the next table, following it, represents the
history of the accumulation of wealth, by application of the labor
energy of the people upon various resources of land.

STATISTICS OF WEALTH.

“The census valuation of real and personal property in the United States
(Alaska excluded) in 1890[27] was prepared by J. K. Upton,” as follows:

Table of Wealth.

-------------------------------------+---+-----------------
Real estate with improvements | |
thereon | 1 | $39,544,544,333
| |
Live stock of farms, farm implements | |
and machinery | 2 | 2,703,015,040
| |
Mines and quarries, including | |
product on hand | 3 | 1,291,291,579
| |
Gold and silver coin and bullion | 4 | 1,158,774,948
| |
Machinery of mills and product | |
on hand, raw and manufactured | 5 | 3,058,593,441
| |
Railroads and equipments, including | |
street railroads | 6 | 8,685,407,323
| |
Telegraphs, telephones, shipping | |
and canals | 7 | 701,755,712
| |
Miscellaneous | 8 | 7,893,708,821
-------------------------------------+---+-----------------
Total (United States) | $65,037,091,197
-----------------------------------------+-----------------

Accumulation of Wealth.

+--------+-----------------------+--------------------+
| Years. | Aggregates of wealth. | Per capita wealth. |
+--------+-----------------------+--------------------+
| 1850 | $ 7,135,780,228 | $ 308 |
| 1860 | 16,159,616,068 | 514 |
| 1870 | 30,068,518,507 | 780 |
| 1880 | 43,642,000,000 | 870 |
| 1890 | 65,037,091,197 | 1,036[28] |
+--------+-----------------------+--------------------+

The last historic table shows that the accumulation of wealth by the
nation has been phenomenal, and equal to the expense of labor [SN:
INCREASE OF WEALTH PHENOMENAL.] energy which was embodied by the people
into that wealth. And if the amount of wealth existing in 1890 had been
equally distributed among the people, every man, woman and child, would
have had more than $1,000 of it, or exactly $1,036 as the nominal per
capita distribution of it by Mr. Carroll D. Wright indicates.

Let us, however, see the actual distribution of wealth, as it was in
1890:

The United States, 1890[29]—1st Table.

---------------------+------------+------------------+------------
ESTATES.[30] | Number | Aggregates of | Average
| (of | wealth per class | wealth per
| families). | in dollars. | family.
---------------------+------------+------------------+------------
The wealthy classes, | | |
$50,000 and over | 125,000 | 33,000,000,000 | 264,000
| | |
The well-to-do | | |
classes, $50,000 | | |
to $5,000 | 1,375,000 | 23,000,000,000 | 16,000
| | |
The middle classes, | | |
$5,000 to $500 | 5,500,000 | 8,200,000,000 | 1,500
| | |
The poorer classes, | | |
under $500 | 5,500,000 | 800,000,000 | 150
---------------------+------------+------------------+------------
Totals | 12,500,000 | 65,000,000,000 | 5,200
---------------------+------------+------------------+------------

It is difficult to understand why this important table has been
published in round numbers almost throughout. It is, however, not at all
difficult to see that it represents an extremely unequal distribution of
the wealth among the American people.

And in order to restore the figures of this table so as to bring the
whole into accord with the last census, it is necessary to regard the
[SN: EXTREMES TO BE EQUALIZED.] size of each family at 4.93 members, as
the census represents them. In doing this, it is also necessary to
restore the round numbers, supplying all omissions in the aggregate
totals and in the wealth of the groups. Before giving a further
explanation, then, the restored table will appear as follows:

1st Restored Table.

---------------------+--------------+------------------+------------
Economic classes of | Number | Aggregates of | Average
families. | of families. | wealth per class | wealth per
| | in dollars. | family.
---------------------+--------------+------------------+------------
The wealthy classes, | | |
$50,000 and over | 126,750 | 33,000,000,000 | 260,355
| | |
The well-to-do | | |
classes, $50,000 | | |
to $5,000 | 1,394,250 | 22,676,863,197 | 16,264
| | |
The middle classes, | | |
$5,000 to $500 | 5,584,576 | 8,522,541,600 | 1,526
| | |
The poorer classes, | | |
under $500 | 5,584,576 | 837,686,400 | 150
---------------------+--------------+------------------+------------
Totals | 12,690,152 | 65,037,091,197 | 5,125
---------------------+--------------+------------------+------------

Now, this restoring has been made up by borrowing $323,136,803 from the
wealth found in the 2d group; and again by adding $37,091,197 worth of
wealth which was omitted in the round numbers of the total aggregate of
wealth. These two amounts, consisting of $360,228,000 in the restored
table, have on the basis of the original averages been distributed among
the families of the 3d and the 4th groups. So that the 3d group of
families appears to be richer by $322,541,600; while the 4th group by
$37,686,400; and the 2d group appears to be poorer by $323,136,803 worth
of wealth. Hence, we have made the 1st R. table represent the
distribution of wealth by $360,228,000 more equal than the author of the
original table has actually found it to exist.[31]

On the other hand, in restoring the numbers of family-members to the
census average of 4.93, we [SN: FAMILIES MADE EQUAL TO CENSUS.] add
about 7 members to every 100 families of five members each, as Dr. Spahr
represents them. This addition of 190,152 families to the whole renders
the average-family and the total number of families in the United States
exactly as they were given by the census in 1890.

But in restoring this table to the census status, we do not for a moment
disregard its original value, as the most reliable work, nor do we think
of making an argument, or anything of the kind, in favor of anybody,
upon the ground of the surface restoration. No, there is a deeper sense
and a deeper ground in the restored and the next table, and we have an
abundance of other material for our purpose of showing the truth.
Meanwhile, this restoring of the 1st table that had omissions, has been
necessary for many reasons, and because it seemed to many thinkers as
probably an extreme representation, though it was true to the facts. For
these thinkers desired that the distribution of wealth should be more
equal than it has really been.

And, further, holding a conservative position, it was necessary too to
avoid a serious disturbance in the original averages of the family
wealth found by Dr. Spahr, thus making the table comparable with another
table, which is the most important one, because it indicates the tenants
of farms and homes and the owners of mortgaged farms and homes.

Furthermore, the restored table may serve as a means of comparison of
its classes of different worth with the corresponding classes in the
following table, based upon the eleventh census facts. Accordingly, the
next table represents the families of different worth which were
classified upon the same economic bases as in the table of Dr. Spahr.

U.S. 2d Table, 1890.[32]

We have read on pp. 11 and 12 that, when Mr. Shearman made his list of
statistics of wealth distribution, “that his table was based on careful
estimates of the wealth of [SN: METHODS OF RESEARCH.] the very wealthy;
while the wealth of the poorer classes was estimated on the bases of
assessors’ returns;” just as the table of Dr. Spahr, p. 28, which
represents the very wealthy families in the 1st group, the well-to-do in
the 2d, and the poor families in the 3d and 4th groups. This arrangement
and representation of the families evidently agrees with that of Mr.
Shearman, and proves the fact that both distinguished authorities used
the same or similar methods in studying the actual distribution of
wealth, and in representing their conclusions to those that were anxious
to know of the distribution.

But the 2d statistical table, on the preceding page, was based upon the
carefully averaged conclusions of Mr. G. K. Holmes, the U. S. Census
Expert on Mortgage Statistics in 1890.

“Mr. Holmes,” as the author of the 2d table says, “follows a method
contrary to that of Mr. Shearman, and by estimating the wealth of the
poor, arrives at the wealth of the rich. He finds that .03 per cent of
the people own 20 per cent of the wealth; 8.97 per cent of the people
own 51 per cent of the wealth, and 91 per cent of the people own only 29
per cent of the wealth.[32]

“The fact that Mr. Holmes is not a partisan either of conservatism or
radicalism, gives to his estimates an unwonted value. As published in
the Political Science Quarterly,” says the Editor of the Encyclopedia of
Social Reform, “and in the Journal of the Royal Statistical Society,
these estimates have resulted in these four groups of families seen in
the 2d table, p. 32.”

We agree with Rev. W. Bliss and others in regarding the estimates of Mr.
Holmes as exceedingly valuable, because without them we could neither
have known the [SN: IMPORTANCE OF HOLMES’ WORK.] number of _the tenant
families_, nor the number of _the mortgagor families_, in the United
States. And hence, we could not have known the seriousness of the
situation in the economic conditions of the nation. While having the
table based upon his estimates, the reader may, at the very slight
examination of the first two groups of it, reflect and know the great
danger implied in them for the nation. And it is this table that can
tell the number of the propertyless families in the United States, even
without regarding any further material on the subject.

But the first trouble about this table[34] is, that the author of it has
omitted $38,468,981[35] worth of wealth from the aggregate wealth of the
group 4, for the sake of roundness [SN: FIRST DIFFICULTY.] in the great
numbers, I suppose. Otherwise it is impossible to admit that the omitted
wealth did not belong to anyone in the United States at the time of his
making up the table. So that, restoring the $38,468,981 worth of wealth
to the 4th group, we find its aggregate amounting to $48,638,468,981
worth of wealth. And it thus begins to correspond with the great masses
of wealth owned by the first two groups in the 1st table, p. 28 or 29.
This omission cannot be regarded as a serious one; but, to reach a
definite conclusion, we must restore it.

The second trouble in the same table, p. 32, is, that the total of
families in it contains exactly 1,000,000 families more than the nation
consisted of in the year 1890. For there were 12,690,152 families in the
United [SN: SECOND DIFFICULTY.] States, whereas the second table
represents 13,690,152 of them, an absolutely round number having been
added to some group of the families. As this table has been published
since 1896, it may be that the author of it had a reason to add one
million families to the 1st group, because, as the population has
increased, so the families without property have also greatly increased
during the seven years since 1890. And he is undoubtedly right in his
calculations as to the growth of the propertyless. The statistics of
1890, also, represented an ample ground for similar calculations on the
part of anyone who has studied them.

The estimates of Mr. G. Holmes, however, do not warrant the conclusion
that there were 7,871,099 family-tenants of farms and homes in the
United States in 1890. For, whatever degree of moderation [SN: NOT SO
MANY TENANTS.] might be in his estimates, this number of the
propertyless families could not have existed at that time in the United
States. For, if so many propertyless families had been in existence ten
years ago, a thousand presidents at this time might lose their heads in
view of the national troubles that could result from that abnormal
situation of so vast an extent. The individuals that now howl about an
unusual prosperity might be the indirect butchers of human flesh before
they themselves are butchered. No, we drop out the surplus million
families from the 1st group of the 2d table, and the table will be more
correct as follows:

======================================================
2d Table Restored.
--------------------+-+-------------+-----------------
Holders of Wealth. | |No. of Farms.|Value in Dollars.
--------------------+-+-------------+-----------------
Tenants of farms and| | |
homes |1| 6,871,099| 2,837,049,500
Owners of mortgaged | | |
farms and homes | | |
worth less than | | |
$5,000 |2| 1,483,356| 2,614,955,764
Owners of free farms| | |
and homes worth | | |
less than $5,000 |3| 3,078,077| 10,946,616,952
Owners of farms and | | |
homes worth $5,000| | |
and over |4| 1,257,620| 48,638,468,981
--------------------+-+-------------+-----------------
Totals | 12,690,152| 65,037,091,197
======================================================

The conclusions in the first two groups of families of this table now
appear as trustworthy as the entire conclusions of Dr. Spahr in the 1st
table, p. 28 or 29; and, that [SN: TRUSTWORTHY CONCLUSIONS.] the first
two groups, made up on the basis of Mr. Holmes’ estimates, actually
surpass everything in statistical importance for this country, no one
will doubt, when he has read this work. For the first group represents
the tenant-families that hire their farms and homes from others, being
themselves propertyless. And the second group represents families that
are in debt, and that are also rapidly becoming propertyless, as we
shall see in Chapter V.

The differences between the 1st and the 2d tables, however, appear very
great. The 1st table shows that the national wealth is quite abnormally
concentrated in a [SN: DIFFERENCES IN THE TABLES.] comparatively few
hands, represented by the first two groups. The 2d table shows that the
same wealth is more equally distributed among the families of the last
two groups, than is true in the 1st table. And it is the 2d table which
was compiled from the estimates that by some men were regarded as
extremely moderate, and, therefore, inconsistent with the real situation
of the people.

It is certainly not difficult to misrepresent the whole situation even
without intending to do any wrong to the nation. For the right or the
wrong representation of realities [SN: COULD BE MADE UNINTENTIONALLY.]
depends very greatly upon the handling of the averages in the
distribution of wealth among the people. The census facts or the
assessors’ returns may be right, as well as the classifications of these
facts or returns. And yet the final representations of them may be
twisted, either according to the desire of the statisticians or
according to the abstract rules of arithmetic. So that these rules and
desires may be satisfied, but the realities may easily be obscured, and
even the greatest national dangers may be concealed under an improper
use of the averages.

Thus, we have seen the average of Mr. Shearman, which, including some of
the well-to-do families among millions of the poor, makes these poor
appear as if every [SN: OR WITH A BIAS OF WILL.] one of them possessed
$209, because Mr. Shearman’s average covered nearly 56-millions of
individuals.[36] While Mr. Carroll D. Wright,[37] describing the
problem: “Are the rich growing richer and the poor poorer?” makes a
single average on the basis of the entire population. His sweeping
average actually and correctly makes, not only the 56-millions of the
poor of Mr. Shearman, but every pauper, every tramp, and everyone in
hundreds of the lunatic and other asylums, worth $1,036 of wealth.
Whereas, in reality, 1 per cent of the population held more wealth than
the remaining 99, as Dr. Chas. Spahr has proved.[38]

Now, something similar has taken place in the 3d group of the 2d table,
where more than 3-million families are represented as the “owners of
free farms and [SN: A DEGREE OF MODERATION.] homes worth less than
$5,000.” And, consequently, the difference between the 1st table and the
2d table in the wealthy groups appeared. The 2d table contradicts nearly
all statistical authorities and has been spoken of as based upon
extremely moderate conclusions. It is, therefore, necessary to show the
degree of moderation implied in its distribution of wealth.

The fact that all families in the United States [SN: FIRM BASIS OF
CLASSIFICATION.] were classified according to their economic worth, as
families worth $5,000 and over and $5,000 and under, gives us the best
basis for a comparison of the two contradictory tables of the great
authorities.

Let us first see the inconsistency in the groups of families which
represent the middle classes in the two tables.

Now, the restored group of the middle classes of the first R. table
should be absolutely in favor of diminishing the differences in the
worth of the identical families and in [SN: INCONSISTENCY POINTS TO
TRUTH.] their number. Yet the two groups reciprocally exclude each other
by their opposite terms. So that, the comparison shows that the greater
number of families has much smaller amount of the aggregate wealth; and
the lesser number of families has much larger amount of the aggregate
wealth; and that the difference in family-numbers is greater than
2½-millions in favor of the group of the 1st table; and the difference
in the wealth, nearly 2½-billion dollars worth is in favor of the group
of the 2d table. Hence, the opposite terms of the two economically
similar groups can in no way coincide with one another.

This being so, it is not difficult to find out the true situation as to
the actual distribution of wealth which ought to have been represented
by the 2d table. The alleged moderation of this table has [SN: AVERAGES
ARE THE CAUSES.] been brought about by the same influence of averages
which we have seen in the conclusions of Mr. Shearman.[41] One average
of this gentleman has covered 89.4 per cent of the population, and thus
made the wealth of the richest of them to be distributed among the
millions of the very poor. The 89.4 per cent includes nearly 56-millions
of individuals, whose aggregate wealth amounts to 18 per cent of the
national wealth, and apportions $209 worth of it to every individual.
But if you exclude only 20 per cent out of the 89.4 per cent of this
great mass of people, selecting the wealthiest of all for the exclusion,
you will thus have 69.4 per cent of the people left with less than 9 per
cent of the national wealth. Your average then will be altogether
different; it will cover masses of the poorest people, and every one of
them will have less than $99 worth of wealth.

It is by a similar inclusion of a number of the well-to-do families
among the group of “owners of free farms and homes” that the more equal
distribution of wealth [SN: SOME OF THE RICH AVERAGED WITH THE POOR.]
has been obtained in the 2d table. Otherwise, this table could represent
a more melancholy array of facts than the presentation of these facts
which appeared in the first table. But, however bitter the truth may be,
it is always better to taste it than to be ignorant of its existence,
because one falsehood must create thousands of other falsehoods, and,
accumulated and multiplied into a tremendous mass, these falsehoods may
lead the nation to self-destruction even as many other nations were led
to it.

Dividing again all families of the nation into the families worth less
than $5,000, and families worth [SN: THE SAME ECONOMIC BASES OF THE
AUTHORS.] over $5,000, we shall now compare these two classes of
families in both tables upon their common basis. And, as this basis
presents the very bottom of statistics, the comparison therefore cannot
fail to show us the very naked truth as to the actual distribution of
wealth which has partly been obscured by the 2d table.

As you see, the comparison of the families of the same worth in the
different tables shows that the poor classes of the 2d table are larger
by 263,380 families, and richer by $7,038,394,216 worth of wealth, [SN:
DIFFERENCES REVEALED.] than they are in the first table. On the
contrary, the comparison of the wealthy classes that consist of families
worth $5,000 and over, shows that the 1st table is larger by 263,380
families, and richer by $7,038,394,216 worth of wealth, than the same
families in the 2d table. Hence, the concentration of wealth in the
first table is by $7,038,394,216 worth greater than it is in the 2d
table. And it is clear that this amount of wealth is closely connected
with the 263,380 families of the well-to-do classes. The question,
therefore, is, Where could Dr. Spahr find so many more families worth
$5,000 and over, than Mr. Holmes has found?

We know that both these great authorities dealt with the same primary
facts of statistics, though Dr. Spahr dealt with them as they appeared
in the Surrogate Courts, thus raising the value of the [SN: BASAL FACTS
UNALTERABLE.] facts. And we know that these facts or returns represent
the worth of every family, just at it actually was at the time of the
11th census. Supposing then that the above families were represented as
worth $26,723 each, could Dr. Spahr make each one of them worth $4,000
of wealth, with the purpose of including them among the millions of
families worth $5,000 and under in each case? And could he thus rob the
263,380 families of their ownership of wealth, in order to make the
distribution of wealth so abnormal as his table shows it? No, sir; this
is an utter impossibility on anyone’s part. And Dr. Spahr represented
the above families among those that were worth $5,000 and over in each
case, and that is what anyone ought to have done in his place.

While in the case of the second table, the little more equal
distribution of wealth appeared not because it was actually so, but
because the above 263,380 families, with their $26,723 worth of wealth
[SN: UNREAL BASIS OF MORE EQUAL DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH] on the average,
unintentionally or accidentally, were included among the families worth
less than $5,000. Consequently, their aggregate wealth, amounting to
$7,038,394,216 worth, has been nominally distributed among the group of
“owners of free farms and homes worth less than $5,000” to every family.
This inclusion was as easily performed as was the inclusion of the
well-to-do among the poor by Mr. Shearman. We therefore subtract the
above families and their wealth from the 3d group and add them to the
4th group of families worth $5,000 and over, in order to show that these
families and wealth belonged to another class of the people, as follows:

Now this table represents the very essence of statistics on the
distribution of wealth which was [SN: TABLE MOST VALUABLE.] worked out
by the two contradictory authorities. The 4th group of it contains the
263,380 families with their aggregate wealth, and equals the first two
groups in the 1st R. table, these two and that being made of the
families—each worth $5,000 and over.

It should be noticed here, that neither the 263,380 families that we
have now included in the proper group of the table, nor their aggregate
wealth, had anything to [SN: GROUPS SIGNIFICANT.] do with the groups of
mortgagors and tenants in the 2d table. These two groups of families
have been separated from the influence of the free owners of wealth, by
being debtors and tenants, who have a definite significance of their own
in the statistics. And this is the reason why the subtracted families
worth $5,000 and over could only be lodged in the 3d group of families
worth below $5,000 under its wholesale average.

It should also be remembered that, though the 4th group of the last
table represents an enormous amount of wealth, yet there are hundreds of
thousands of families in it which are worth but few dollars [SN: THE
WEALTHY ONLY FEW.] over $5,000 worth of wealth. So that, the real
concentration of that enormous amount of wealth remains in the
possession of less than half a million families, as these facts have
been represented by Mr. Shearman and the others in the first chapter.
And nothing can be said against the accuracy of the careful estimates of
the wealth of the very wealthy by Mr. Shearman and the other
authorities.

In order to have a more definite idea of the distribution of wealth, let
us compare both tables on one page, and remember that if the group
wealth were equally divided among the group-families, each family could
have such amount of it as the averages indicate. And mind that the next
two tables, being based upon the same census facts, represent the
results of careful comparison of the original ones.

The 1st Table as Restored.

--------------------+------------+----------------+----------
Owners of Wealth. | Number. | The wealth of | Average.
--------------------+------------+----------------+----------
The poorer classes | | |
under $500 | 5,584,576 |$ 837,686,400 |$ 150
| | |
The middle classes | | |
$500 to $5,000 | 5,584,576 | 8,522,541,600 | 1,526
| | |
The well-to-do | | |
classes $5,000 | | |
to $50,000 | 1,394,250 | 22,676,863,197 | 16,264
| | |
The wealthy classes | | |
$50,000 and over | 126,750 | 33,000,000,000 | 260,355
--------------------+------------+----------------+----------
The totals. | 12,690,152 | 65,037,091,197 | 5,125
--------------------+------------+----------------+----------

The 2d Table as Restored.

--------------------+------------+----------------+----------
Owners of Wealth. | Number. | The wealth of | Average.
--------------------+------------+----------------+----------
Tenants of farms | | |
and homes | 6,871,099 |$ 2,837,049,500 |$ 413
| | |
Owners of mortgaged | | |
farms and | | |
homes worth less | | |
than $5,000 | 1,483,356 | 2,614,955,764 | 1,762
| | |
Owners of free | | |
farms and homes | | |
worth less than | | |
$5,000 | 2,814,697 | 3,908,222,736 | 1,388
| | |
Owners of farms | | |
and homes worth | | |
$5,000 and over | 1,521,000 | 55,676,863,197 | 37,117
--------------------+------------+----------------+----------
The totals. | 12,690,152 | 65,037,091,197 | 5,125
--------------------+------------+----------------+----------

It should be noticed again, that the differences in the family averages
of the corresponding groups of the two tables, depend on the differences
in the [SN: AVERAGES OF FAMILIES’ WORTH DIFFER.] numbers and in the
aggregate wealth of the same groups of the tables. And these differences
could not be avoided, since the two authorities have made a different
classification of the families of different worth.

But the comparative importance of the two tables consists in the fact,
that the last group of the 1st table shows the extremely abnormal
concentration of wealth in [SN: THE RICH AND THE POOR GROUPS.] the hands
of 126,750 families, which possess more wealth than the remaining
12,563,402 families do, on the one hand. While, on the other hand, the
first group of the 2d table shows that there have been 6,871,099
families without real property; and the second group shows, that there
were 1,483,356 families in debt and in danger of losing their
properties, and that both these groups of families have been in the
state of economic slavery to the wealthy few. But we shall examine their
conditions of existence later on.

GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE, AND GERMANY.

“The distribution of private property in Great Britain and Ireland in
1891,” was such that it was said “that less than 2 per cent of the
families of the United Kingdom [SN: THE PROPERTYLESS IN BRITAIN.] hold
about three times as much private property as all the remainder, and
that 93 per cent of the people hold less than 8 per cent of the
accumulated wealth. There remains, therefore, nearly 6,000,000
families”—i. e., 30,000,000 individuals—“or more than three-fourths of
the people of Great Britain and Ireland, without any registered property
whatever. They have indeed their household goods, but the total value of
these can hardly exceed £100,000,000,”[44] which is little over $16 to
every individual.

“The ownership of land is an important factor in the social condition of
a people,” says Mayo Smith.[45] And “if we contrast the [SN:
DISTRIBUTION OF LAND IN FRANCE AND ENGLAND.] peasant proprietorship
system of France, with more than 4,500,000 owners of land, with the
landlord system of England, with its 325,000 owners, the social as well
as the economic influence must be very different”[45] in the two
nations. Certainly the French people feel and enjoy economic freedom,
while the British people are pressed down by an economic slavery.

In fact, the statisticians seem to agree that the distribution of
wealth, even in Paris, the capital of France, and in Berlin, the capital
of Germany, is proportionally much more equal than it is in the nation
of Great Britain or in that of the United States, although it is natural
that the largest cities, as a rule, have the distribution of wealth much
worse than the nations behind them.

[Illustration:

ILLUSTRATIVE CHART.

Every block here represents a comparative average wealth of one man,
woman, or child of the respective groups in the 2d Corrected Table,
p. 51; while the figures above show the numbers of individuals
owning one block each, as indicated.]

While the thirty millions of British people have on the average $16
worth of wealth, the American people of the same class have somewhat
more of this kind of wealth than the British, as the last table,
individually regarded, shows the average property of every person of the
families. It is as follows.

The 2d Corrected Table, 1890.
--------------------+--------------+----------------+----------
Holders of Wealth. | Individuals. | The wealth of | Average.
--------------------+--------------+----------------+----------
Tenants of farms | | |
and homes | 33,908,277 |$ 2,837,049,500 |$ 83
| | |
Owners of mortgaged | | |
farms and | | |
homes worth less | | |
than $5,000 | 7,319,697 | 2,614,955,764 | 357
| | |
Owners of free | | |
farms and homes | | |
worth less than | | |
$5,000 | 13,888,979 | 3,908,222,736 | 287
| | |
Owners of farms | | |
and homes worth | | |
$5,000 to $50,000 | 6,879,935 | 22,676,863,197 | 3,296
| | |
Owners of farms | | |
and homes worth | | |
$50,000 and over | 625,362 | 33,000,000,000 | 52,769
--------------------+--------------+----------------+----------
The totals. | 62,622,250 | 65,037,091,197 | 1,036
--------------------+--------------+----------------+----------

The average of $83 worth of personal property in the 1st group of
individuals here is a little too large, because, subtracting the surplus
million families from this group,[46] we have left the wealth [SN: THE
POOREST CLASSES, 1890.] of it untouched. In any way, this group contains
27,117,000 individuals having on the average $30 worth of property each,
according to the last group of families in the table of Dr. Spahr.[47]
It does not, however, make a great difference on the whole, because the
group of tenants, since 1890, has undoubtedly increased up to 38,837,849
without having been able to add anything more to its aggregate wealth.

The increase of the propertyless accrues from the natural increase of
the population, and from the loss of the mortgaged properties [SN:
CAUSES OF THE INCREASE OF THE PROPERTYLESS] by foreclosure of the
mortgages in the 2d group, and from the immigration of the propertyless
foreigners[48] without special means; while the people of the 3d group
have sunk by thousands into debt from having mortgaged their properties;
and only about a million families of the last two groups have been
exceedingly prosperous, as we shall understand the situation later on.

CHAPTER III.

PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE.

The statistical authorities told us that “Less than half the families in
the United States are propertyless,”[49] and we desire to know the
chances for, and resources of, their living; and what it means to be a
propertied person or to be a propertyless person upon earth.

Let us see the clear distinction between the [SN: CONDITIONS OF LIFE OF
THE PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS.] state of a property owner and the
state of a propertyless person; between the conditions of life of the
former, and the conditions of life of the latter, and how both are
affected by and related to these conditions.

First of all an owner of property and a propertyless person, are, on an
average, perfectly equal in that they have physical strength, and in
that they have equal rights to use or to apply that strength somewhere
[SN: EQUAL IN PHYSICAL STRENGTH.] upon the wealth of an owner of wealth.
And here we meet the first difference between them: An owner of property
has a chance to apply, and to spend his strength upon his own property;
if, for instance, this property is land that gives him any kind of
returns in exchange for his [SN: THE ONE HAS, THE OTHER HAS NO CHANCE.]
labor and toil. The propertyless person has neither this chance nor this
right to toil anywhere, unless he pays for the opportunity of using his
strength, by dividing the results of his labor between himself and the
owner of wealth who permits him to draw some income from the resources
of his own property or wealth. So far, the advantage of the propertied
person is such that he has twice as much right in his strength, and
twice as much chance to profitably use his personal strength.

Now, every one knows that whatever the wealth of a nation may be, it is
primarily derived from land which is the only inexhaustible source of
riches, or, of derived wealth. And when a person gets [SN: LAND PRIME
ORIGIN OF WEALTH.] into his possession a portion of land, whether it
will be in a city, town, or in the country, he then obtains a number of
resources for his life; he becomes a propertied man, and he can apply
his strength, his skill or his intellect upon his own property and thus
reap the fruits of his labor. The land then is the first store of
wealth; but it almost never yields anything to man, unless he labors,
works upon it, with a hoe, a plough, a scythe or some other implement
that aids him to draw greater returns from his land. Again, if iron, for
instance, is primarily derived from land, then [SN: LAND MAIN FACTOR OF
WEALTH.] when it comes to the forge, where the hammer, the anvil and the
other tools aid the blacksmith to make an ax out of the rough iron, the
ax will be of a greater value than the material he used for it. But what
really made the ax is his personal strength and the skill that were
aided by the tools he used. These tools with the blacksmith, and those
implements with the farmer are economically called [SN: SKILL SECOND
FACTOR OF WEALTH.] “capital,” because they aid to draw more wealth by
the labor of man. It follows, that land is the main factor of wealth;
that human energy or labor is the next factor of wealth; and that
capital, as aiding labor and land to produce more wealth than they can
yield without it, is the third factor of wealth. Money is not regarded
as direct capital here.

As _capital_ is a very important source of income to a propertied man,
and as it is perhaps not clearly understood by all, let me illustrate
this factor of wealth by introducing more examples of it.

Capital from an economic standpoint is that wealth which produces
farther wealth, or simply aids to create farther wealth. A needle is
capital, because it aids to [SN: CAPITAL THIRD FACTOR OF WEALTH.] make a
shirt that costs more than the material used for it. A sewing machine is
capital of more effective kind than the needle used by hand, because it
aids to produce more wealth than the tailor or the seamstress can
produce without it. A lathe is capital, because it not only shapes the
round forms of any material more accurately than [SN: MACHINERY, TOOLS,
ARTIFICIAL WEALTH.] the artizan would ever be able to make without it,
but it greatly saves his time on every piece of the work; thus saving
time it aids in producing more wealth. A factory, as a whole (including
the building and machinery), is capital, because all the machinery, all
tools and instruments used in it produce farther wealth from the raw
materials, and serve as sources of income to the owner of this property.
Under the care of the stock-raiser, cattle are capital, because they
grow and multiply; but the meat or beef is utility, because it may be
unproductively consumed.[50] Agricultural implements, as well as the
fertilizers, like guano, phosphates and many others are capital, because
they increase fertility and increase the produce of land, which makes a
greater income in favor of its owner. A thousand different machineries
and special instruments might be introduced here to show that each one
of them has been invented for the purpose of aiding to create more
wealth out of less wealth. And that all of them and every one, when used
by an owner of wealth, is a definite source of income and of profit to
him, because it aids his own skill and energy to obtain greater returns
in exchange for his labor and mind, than he can obtain without it.

But the most effective factor in aiding to produce more wealth and a
much greater income for an owner of wealth is the energy of steam or any
other mechanical force, applicable to various forms of labor [SN:
MECHANICAL FORCE; INCREASE OF STEAM.] and completely obedient to the
bidding of man. “Steam power has increased in the United States from
3½-millions, in 1860, to 17-millions horse power in 1895; while in Great
Britain and Ireland it has increased from 2½- to 13-millions; Germany
from ⅞- to 7⅔-millions, and in France from 1 to 5-millions horse-power.
The increase of this capital has been most manifest in manufactures,”
says Dr. Henderson.[51] But it should be remarked at once that no one of
the families worth below $5,000 could apply these millions of horsepower
of steam force upon their properties. This energy has all the time been
a profitable source of great income in favor of the families that made
the wealthiest group in the tables of statistics, whereas the others
have had but little crumbs of its increase of wealth. The mechanical
force, as every one knows, is in service of the capitalists.

But when we look into the limits of towns and cities, we find millions
of rentable properties of all possible kinds; and every factory, [SN:
SOURCES OF INCOME.] every storehouse, every shop and every dwelling
house there is a sure source of income to the propertied man. The very
sweat-shops, where the working people can not, on an average, live
longer than 28 years—even these dens of poison and pestilence are
inexhaustible sources of income and profit to their owners.

As to the town and city lots, they are all sources of greater or less
income to the men who own them. Whether these lots of land are occupied
by [SN: SOURCES OF INDIRECT INCOME.] anything or are remaining waste,
makes little difference, because as the town population increases, their
values also increase in proportion as the city population and its
business increase; the owners of properties towards centers of the
cities are usually bound to be rich out of the resources of rent. Even a
simple house, somewhere about the marginal line of a city or town is
usually a source of indirect income to its owner, because he and his
family may have a comfortable shelter in it, without which they would
pay the rent for another’s house,[52] and would carry on all other
expenses of life, just as they do in their own house, in which they save
the rental money for some other purposes of living.

Now then, whatever property you may think of—whether natural or
artificial, whether animate or inanimate, that a person has possession
of—it is always wealth, and a source of income in his favor. [SN: WEALTH
CREATED BY LABOR.] The natural wealth is the land, wherever it may be in
convenient places, it may always provide one or more resources of income
in exchange for the application and expense of strength or skill of
labor upon it. The artificial wealth includes all capital, whatever it
may be, it is capital, if it can assist the labor energy to double,
triple or multiple the income and profit, drawn from the natural
resource to which the labor-strength is applied. The rentable house or
any other building is artificial wealth. And it is also a source of
income to its owner who, by a use of skill and by an application of
labor energy, can make his source of income give a multiple yield, in
return for the expense of his personal strength upon it.

Thus, the indirect and direct resources of a propertied person,
therefore, are always many and complete when he works out the wealth
himself. [SN: COMPLETE AND INCOMPLETE INCOMES OF PROPERTY OWNERS.] By
complete I mean this, that whatever his intelligence and strength can
draw out of the source they are applied to, it is always his and is
always to his benefit. An incomplete income or yield from a source of
wealth, to its owner, will be this, that, if he hires the energy, or the
skill of another person to apply upon his property, then his income is
incomplete, because he has to pay for the hired labor energy as well as
for hired skill. In this way an owner of wealth of any kind may even
divide the yield and the product of the source of income into halves.

But as long as a person is an owner of wealth, an owner of capital, and
an owner of physical and mental energy, he is a possessor of [SN:
PROPERTY GUARANTY OF LIFE.] resources; his labor energy and his
existence are then fully guaranteed for himself, his wife, and children
by his wealth, because wealth or property becomes a direct source of
income, when he himself labors on it, and an indirect, when he rents it
to others. A propertied man, therefore, is safe forever by the resources
of his property, which yield incomes and profits for sustenance of the
highest possible life, highest education, freedom, and enjoyment.

But what about the propertyless man? How many resources, or how many
sources of income [SN: HAS THE PROPERTYLESS ANY SOURCE OF INCOME, ETC.?]
has he for his own life, the life of his wife and children? What sources
of income has he for education, for bread and butter, for clothes and
dress, for their shelter and his own? What resources has he for his
sustenance in this world, when the entire world tends rapidly to be the
property of a very few persons?

He has neither land, nor capital, nor house; he has neither natural, nor
artificial wealth to serve him, and hence, has not a single one of the
above described sources of [SN: THE PROPERTYLESS HIMSELF IS A SOURCE OF
MULTIPLE EXPENSE.] income and profit which the Creator provided for
man’s enjoyment. On the contrary, the propertyless man himself is a
source of multiple expense; he has but a store of labor energy within
himself, which store must be supported by its own effort, and that too
while his life is guaranteed by nothing but by his physical strength and
natural mind. And it is only these two that unite to support him who is
the single source of the following manifold expenses in favor of many
owners of properties and wealth, who sometimes make enormous fortunes by
the efforts of the propertyless.

If a propertyless man desires to exist at all in the sight of his God in
this quasi-civilized world, he must spend his life in the following
ways:

1. He must pay from it for a shelter to one or another property owner,
when this owner has a rentable house, which house serves as a source of
income and profit to the owner. So that the tenant of his house becomes
a permanent resource for the owner’s well-being, because he cannot avoid
paying rent to the one or the other.

2. He must pay for his clothes to another property owner or an owner of
wealth, who gets income and profit from selling the [SN: EXPENSES FOR
CLOTHES, ETC.] goods, and who gets incomes and profits for making and
producing the goods. And as a consumer, the propertyless man is relied
upon as a source of income by these owners of wealth, and hence, he is a
resource of their own well-being. He must also pay for laundry to
another owner of wealth and must be a real source of income and profit
for him, because he too is a propertied man and has many resources for
life.

3. He must pay for his board, whether in a boarding house or in a
restaurant, it makes some difference; but by boarding in either [SN:
EXPENSES FOR NOURISHMENT.] one or the other, he must be a source of
income and profit to servants and waiters every day, and to a crowd of
owners of wealth who are ever ready to draw all from him they can. But
if he boards in the house he rents, and if his wife performs the
domestic duties in his case, then the expense of his life is reduced
through this channel in favor of the wife. Nevertheless, he must
continue to be a source of income in favor of the butcher, the baker and
grocer, and some other propertied men who derive their profits from him
at a certain per cent in the way of his nourishment.

4. The propertyless man is another source of expense in favor of the
support of the general government of the nation, a state government, a
county government, and perhaps a municipal one. And he [SN: EXPENSES FOR
GOVERNMENT, ETC.] pays the taxes in the prices of the goods and clothing
he wears; in the prices of food and the drinks he consumes,—these
expenses make him a sure source of income to many other owners of
wealth, and so on. And to this channel of drain must be added his
expenses for education, for different asylums, for churches and other
institutions; expenses for the books and newspapers he reads; expenses
for the carfare, etc., he cannot avoid; expenses for the physicians he
is cured by, and the drugs his strength is invigorated with, and so on.
Thus every one of these propertied persons obtains his own percentage of
income from the resourceless man. And certainly there are many other
channels of expense for him in the society he comes into contact with.
It is really impossible to number here even the unavoidable expenses of
the propertyless man.

It is then in the above directions that the physical and mental energy
must run out of the propertyless person. And of course it runs out in
the form of currency or the money by which he pays for shelter, for
clothing, etc., for services [SN: HIS ENERGY IS DRAINED BY THE
PROPERTIED MEN.] and all utilities, to the owners of wealth. But, if the
propertyless man himself is only a source to be drained by the others,
and if he has neither land, nor capital, nor any other natural or
artificial wealth to draw an income from, then his very strength is good
for nothing. For the strength itself can neither be eaten nor can he pay
with it any one who has the right to draw on it. His energy must,
therefore, be first exchanged either for money or for some other
utilities of value which are derived out of wealth, out of property that
he does not possess. How then can this persistently drained source
become filled or supplied again? Where is the resource of his own
income? Surely he can not exist without one at least. And, being
propertyless, he naturally does not have even the single one outside of
himself. Yet he has to live from without or he must die of starvation
from within.

Now, the only chance for the propertyless man to live is to go again to
an owner of wealth, and to hire some one or another resource [SN: HE MAY
HAVE BUT ONE CHANCE FOR A PAYMENT.] of income from him and to apply his
energy to it, paying for the permission. Again paying, paying is the
only hope for the propertyless man. And this is the most important point
after all, because he must pay even for the application of his personal
energy to all natural and artificial resources of wealth, or income. Has
any one understood what it means—to pay for an application of labor
energy to wealth that the merciful Creator provided for man? I am sure
that the politico-economists do not understand it. A few of them hit
this point, sometimes, but unconsciously, without conceiving its
significance.

The propertyless person, then, who is drained in all directions, and who
has but one chance to restore his expended energy from a single source
of income—this man again becomes an additional source of expense in
favor of an owner of wealth, an additional source of income and profit
to propertied men.

But where, and how, can this unfortunate creature of God, this multiple
source of income and profit for men, further pay and expend his
strength, for becoming a still further source of income in favor of the
propertied men?

This question, after the four previously explained series of drains of
the propertyless man, demands the next point.

5. The propertyless man can not even make himself the source of income
and profit to others without paying an exorbitant price for it to an
owner of wealth. If, for instance, he labors for wages, his employer and
others finally obtain from 25 to 50 or 75 per cent or even more profit
out of the results of his labor. If he works on a farm, in a plant, or
any other wealth [SN: HIS EXPENSES FOR EMPLOYMENT IN ANY SPHERE.] with
capital, or works in making capital, he must in any way divide the
results of his work between the owner of wealth and himself. His portion
is usually paid by time in money, as wages, as a salary, or in some
other way; while the whole result of his work remains, and is dispensed
by the owner of wealth who is profited by him. If the propertyless
person serves to an owner of wealth as a clerk, a bookkeeper, salesman,
or in any other capacity, he cannot serve unless he or she is a
profitable source of income to the propertied master who gives him the
chance to supply his ever drained source of multiple expenses. If,
further, the propertyless man leases a farm or any other wealth of a
propertied person, he has always to divide the results of his labor
between himself and the owner of wealth. Whereas, if the owner of it
himself labors on his wealth, then, the whole result of his toil must
remain as a reward to himself. And there is the difference: The tenant
or the lessee is obliged to labor twice as hard as the propertied man in
order to derive so much income for himself, as the owner of wealth can
derive by working half as hard; and that is because the owner of
property is drawing all income of his labor for himself, while the
propertyless man is drawing income for himself and for the propertied
man, to whom the former is a source of income by paying rent. If,
finally, the propertyless man labors upon a rentable source of income,
and then borrows money for improvements, in addition to the paying for
that source, he thereby makes himself a source of income in favor of the
creditor, by paying per cents for the loan; and, consequently, he must
divide the results of his toil between himself and between two owners of
wealth. The improvements, being a capital, must aid him to produce more
wealth than he can produce without it; but the high rate of percentage
which exists in America must surely ruin the debtor, because per cents
in favor of lenders of money, etc., generally run from 6 to 12 per cent
per annum; and in some cases the money sharks obtain even from 15 to 18
per cent.

What then are the advantages of the propertied person and the
disadvantages of the propertyless man?

From the preceding it is clearly seen that both men are on an equality
merely in the physical energy. And the propertied person has an absolute
advantage for developing his mental energy or skill. We [SN: ADVANTAGES
AND DISADVANTAGES.] have, therefore, to regard their physical energy as
an equal in both. But, with the propertied man, this energy is
surrounded by multiple resources of income; so that to whatever resource
he applies his energy, it always yields him the whole results of his
labor. An application of capital in his power multiplies the yield in
his favor. An application of the hired labor energy still farther
multiplies the yield and increases his income. His [SN: A PROPERTIED IS
A MAN OF MULTIPLE INCOMES.] physical energy, therefore, must be regarded
as a source of multiple income even in relation to a small amount of
wealth or income-bearing property.[53] On the contrary, when there is
plenty of employment, the energy of the propertyless person is itself a
source of multiple expense in favor of the propertied men. And again,
[SN: A PROPERTYLESS IS A MAN OF MULTIPLE EXPENSES.] when there is
employment, he is permitted to apply his energy but to a single resource
of income; and when permitted to do so, the propertyless man can only
draw about half the income that this resource can yield to his energy,
while the other half of it must go to the multiple incomes of the
propertied men who employ him as the people call it. Hence, being
surrounded with the inexhaustible wealth of nature, with innumerable
resources of income, the propertyless man is only a semi-sourced man—a
man of semi-sourced income. He is a man who is entitled to a portion of
the yield, for the expense of energy which is equal to two or more
portions of it. And there is nothing more in the whole realm of wealth
than a semi-income from one source for the man who himself is a source
of multiple expenses in the favor of many owners of wealth. A greater
injustice than this could not be fabricated by mankind under the
heavens.

But what about the propertyless, when there is no employment at all? Or,
when the caprice of the propertied is not satisfied by the halves of the
yields produced by the [SN: PROPERTYLESS OUT OF EMPLOYMENT.] labor
energy and skill of the propertyless people? What, when they demand
still more impossible efficiency in product from the emaciated energy of
their victims? The answer is clear and but one. These economic slaves,
these victims of the greatest injustice and absurdity are thrown back by
thousands into the sphere of humiliation under public relief. And who
constitutes this public? Nearly all the same propertyless millions, who
relieve the others, when they themselves are not yet on the point of
starvation.

And who is after all accused? Who is searched? Whose character and
history of life is mercilessly scrutinized at the bars of charity? [SN:
HE IS REGARDED AS INFERIOR.] Again the same propertyless victims, the
same economic slaves, whose lives have been spent in working for the
owners of wealth, owners of property, of fortunes.

It is certainly not with Japan, nor even civilized England, where
primogeniture persists to reign, and where the hereditary noblemen [SN:
PRINCIPLES OF INJUSTICE.] equally continue to suck the energy of the
British and Irish people and of the peoples of their colonies that we
have to deal with. “In 1891 Great Britain and Ireland had had nearly
6,000,000 propertyless families[54];” and they have been accustomed for
centuries to spend more than half of their energy in favor of the lords
of property, who are the lords of nearly all resources of wealth in
Britain and in many other parts of the world. But we have to deal with
the people of the United States, whose fathers tried by all means to
escape the influence of primogeniture, and whose children have now
reached the same economic [SN: DIVIDOGENESURE.] condition of slavery,
but under a different title, viz., that of dividogenesure.[55] As its
definition here shows, the principle of dividogenesure involves both the
individual and class dependence of the needy upon the wealthy and
applies to the entire millions of the group of tenant families, as well
as to the group of mortgagor families of the 2d table.[56] For all these
families have been dividing the sole results of their labor or toil, in
one way or another, between themselves and their economic masters that
they wholly or partly depend upon. The subsequent chapters, however,
will better explain the situation of their dependence.

While here we shall but briefly indicate that dividogenesure, as a
principle of tacit reality, separates the people into two classes: 1st,
into individuals of multiple expenditure in each case, but with a
possible semi-income [SN: ECONOMIC CLASSES.] for supplying this
expenditure; and 2d, into individuals of also multiple expenditure for
living, but at the same time of multiple incomes sufficient to leave a
considerable net profit or balance for their future. This balance or
profit, in some cases, gradually amounts to millions of dollars’ worth
of wealth, remultiplying further incomes most rapidly; while the
individuals of the first class become absolutely dependent upon the
second even for the semi-income which may at any time be refused them on
account of too many individuals in need of resources for incomes
belonging to the second class.

And it further follows, that when the resourceless are admitted into the
sphere of dividogenesure, [SN: ONE SPHERE.] then their multiple
expenditure is meagerly supplied. But when they are refused admittance
into this sphere, then their unavoidable fate is starvation or falling
back into the realm of public relief for the unemployed.

As to their fate under the public relief, Dr. Amos G. Warner says: “The
most difficult [SN: CHARITIES ANOTHER SPHERE.] problem in the whole
realm of poor-relief is this of Providing for the unemployed. England
has worked at it intermittently from the time of Elizabeth” (1558-1603)
up to date without success. For there were more than 30-millions of
individuals without property in Great Britain and Ireland, when Dr.
Warner was writing, and he continued as follows:

“The most careful investigation made in this country regarding enforced
idleness was probably that conducted by the Massachusetts Bureau of
Labor during the [SN: LOSS OF TIME.] depression of 1885. There were
during that year in Massachusetts 816,470 persons engaged in gainful
occupations; of these 241,589 were unemployed during part of the year.
The time lost, if we consider only the principal occupation of each
individual, was 82,744 years; but many persons, when unable to work at
their principal occupation, had some subsidiary work. Making the proper
deductions for the time thus put in, the net absolute loss of
working-time amounted to 78,717.76 years. * * * Averaged among those who
lost a certain amount of time, the loss per man was 3.91 months.”[57] or
nearly four months.

This description shows the absolute helplessness of the resourceless
people in the State of Massachusetts alone, while there were 48 other
States and Territories besides Massachusetts in this country. In [SN:
LOSS OF MONEY.] all these States and Territories, therefore, not only
millions of years of working-time must have been lost during the
depression of 1882 to 1885, but millions of dollars of public and
private money was unproductively spent for the relief of the
propertyless from starvation, cold and from other distresses. And after
all, that was a comparatively mild reality. For the same Dr. Warner
further writes:

“This present chapter passes from my hand in March, 1894, when special
relief-work for the unemployed is being carried forward on a _scale
never before known or [SN: HOMELESS CONSTANT FACTOR.] needed in this
country_.[58] It is therefore not possible to give the results of this
emergency work.” * * * But the relief must be given. “The present
chapter is concerned especially with _the problem of the homeless poor
as a constant factor in the administration of charities_.[59] The
question of how to deal with the tramp is said to be of special urgency
in every locality in the United States with which I am at all
acquainted. From Boston to San Francisco, and from St. Paul to New
Orleans, complaints come of a number of tramps, which is alleged to be
‘especially’ large in each case.”[60]

In fact, Dr. Warner’s book of more than 400 pages is one that represents
the saddest spectacle [SN: TWO SISTERS OF INIQUITY.] of human misery on
the largest scale. It treats all possible causes of the misery,
excepting the main, and all-powerful, cause of all the minor causes,
which I have named dividogenesure, because it is the sister of
primogeniture, the one being as iniquitous for millions of families as
the other.

As a universally pernicious principle, dividogenesure is always working
in behalf of a few favorites. It has always been unjust to the
employees, even when those [SN: IMPLIES DEGREES OF INJUSTICE.] favorites
commanded an equal number of places of employment to the number of the
employees in a nation, because the latter have always been obliged to
divide the results of their toil at an unjust rate of per cent with the
former. The injustice of dividogenesure, however, intensifies as soon as
the number of the employees becomes greater than the number of the
places of employment, and this injustice grows especially intense when
these employees appear to be the propertyless individuals. And when a
nation has so many propertyless individuals as to outnumber by millions
the places of employment, then, the great injustice of dividogenesure
changes into the very foundation of iniquity. For its favorites, then,
make all possible devices, like the blanks with tens of scrutinizing
questions, and other humiliating devices for the purpose of selecting
the most efficient applicants for employment at the cheapest possible
rates of payment. Thus, the employed ones become harder and harder
economic slaves of these favorites, while the unemployed are cast out of
the sphere of the slavery without bread, etc., into the sphere of
starvation and the public relief.

Further, dividogenesure is not a system of ordinary slavery, where the
slaves are dependent upon their masters for living and dying. It is not
the slavery that imposes a moral obligation upon the masters [SN: IT IS
NOT AN ORDINARY SLAVERY.] in favor of the slaves who are subject to
them. No, no, dividogenesure has made millions of families absolutely
dependent on its favorites, but it has removed from these favorites all
moral obligations in favor of the modern economic slaves. The modern
master of hundreds of the slaves can extort the last inch of labor
energy from each of them, and yet can live in perfect peace under the
shield of dividogenesure without responsibility and without the
slightest remorse of conscience. He does not compel any of the slaves to
make applications for employment, for working out his wealth and
fortune. But he knows very well that there are invisible, omnipotent and
omnipresent forces, [SN: UNSEEN FORCES.] namely: Hunger and thirst, or
the multiple expenditure in every individual case, which mightily push
the slaves to his commanding mastership. And the only duty
dividogenesure bids him to perform, is to choose the most efficient
applicants for the lowest pay, as they would seem to be the most
profitable for himself. As to the rejected ones, it is neither his
business nor his duty to care whether they live or perish by fire, by
cold, by disease, wither away or starve to death.

CHAPTER IV.

ABNORMITY OF THE SOCIAL SITUATION.

The preceding chapter has shown the differences between the conditions
of life of the propertied [SN: DIFFERENCES IN CONDITIONS OF LIFE.] and
of the propertyless people. It has explained the multiple expenditures
of the resourceless, and how they are obliged to labor under the
principle of dividogenesure without ever being able to appropriate the
full results of their labor to themselves. The present chapter will
reveal the astonishing number of the propertyless in the United States,
and the places where they are mostly to be found.

However, before proceeding to examine the investigations about the
people without property, we must add here, that the propertyless [SN:
THE PROPERTYLESS PAY RENT OR ARE EXPELLED.] are those that occupy
houses, or rooms, or simply little cells in the rentable properties of
the propertied, paying rent for them. They are, therefore, regarded as
the tenants of homes, and when occupying rentable farms, they are
regarded as the tenants of farms. And as long as they are able to earn
and to pay the rents on time, they are regarded as good people, good
families and respectable persons, because they constitute the real
sources of income to the owners of the rentable properties. But as soon
as they cannot find a situation, cannot find employment, cannot find
work, cannot find a job, cannot borrow money, cannot pawn anything,
hence cannot pay rent at the well defined times, then they are gently or
ruthlessly kicked out of the rooms, and regarded as “no good,” as
degenerates.

Expelling them from the tenement houses or farms, some gentlemen or
lady-proprietors sometimes even express sympathy or [SN: CANNOT HELP THE
SITUATION.] sorrow to lose their tenants; and sometimes they anticipate
further sufferings and privations for their unfortunate roomers, etc.,
but cannot help them under the existing conditions. The expelled tenant
then wanders about, suffers privations, humiliations, till he falls into
prison, or she falls into prostitution, and into all the miseries of the
world. And it is only at the point where these propertyless lose their
real manhood and womanhood that they cease to be the sources of income
for the propertied.

Now let us deal with the homeless and landless in the statistical
accounts, where the tenants and mortgagors are described together, but
with greater details in respect to the mortgagors than to the tenants.
For the sake of clearness, therefore, I must prominently represent here
the tenant families, as the propertyless, and must leave the mortgagor
families for the next chapter.

The following census statistics represent only percentages of families
occupying farms and homes in the United States, while I have supplied
the figures implied in the relative percentages of these families.

STATISTICS OF THE TENANTS.

“Extra Bulletin No. 98 of the United States Census, 1890, says:

“There are 12,690,152 families in the United States, and of these
families 52.20 per cent,” or 6,624,259 families, “hire their farms or
homes, and 47.80 per cent own them.”[61]

“In regard to the families occupying farms the [SN: FARM FAMILIES.]
conclusion is, that 34.08 per cent,” or 1,624,655 families, “hire, and
65.92[62] per cent own, the farms cultivated by them.” So that “among
every 100 farm families 34 hire their farms,” being landless.

“The corresponding facts for the families occupying [SN: HOME FAMILIES.]
homes are, that 63.10 per cent,” i. e., 4,999,396 families “hire, and
36.90[62] per cent,” i. e., 2,923,560,[62] families, “own their homes.”
So that “in every 100 home families, on the average, 63 hire their
homes, and 37[63] own them.”

“There are 420 cities and towns that have a population of 8,000 to
100,000, and in these cities [SN: CITIES 64.004 PER CENT. HIRE.] and
towns 64.04 per cent of the home-families hire and 35.96[63] per cent
own their homes.” So that in these cities and towns, 64 out of every 100
families hire their homes, and 36 own them, or as the Bulletin states:
“in 100 home families, on the average, are found 64 that hire their
homes, and 36[63] own them.”

Besides this, “the cities that have a population of 100,000 and over,”
i. e., cities up to millions, like Philadelphia, Chicago, New [SN: LARGE
CITIES 77.17 PER CENT. HIRE.] York and so on, “number 28, and in these
cities 77.17 per cent of the home families hire their homes and
22.83[63] per cent own them.” It follows, that in these large and very
populous cities of the United States more than 77 families out of every
100 are tenant families or those that hire their homes, and 23[63] own
them. Or, as the Bulletin says: “In these cities among 100 home
families, on the average, 77 hire and 23[63] own their homes.”[64]

Now then, what this Extra Bulletin reveals to us is as follows:

1. That in 1890 we had 1,624,655 families hiring farms. The difference
between hiring a farm and owning a farm is this, that an owner of a farm
reaps all the benefits [SN: NUMBER OF FAMILIES HIRING FARMS.] of his own
farm; whatever amount of energy he spends upon his farm, he obtains all
the results of it by himself and for himself, remaining all the time an
independent man. A farm tenant is just the contrary. He is a dependent
being and is a subject to dividogenesure. He works upon a rentable
property and must first of all satisfy the rightful owner of the farm.
He must divide the results of his labor between his master and himself,
by paying rent. And in order to be equally well off with the farmer that
works upon his own farm, the tenant must exert almost twice as much of
labor energy as the owner of a farm. But this is impossible. And this
impossibility rests upon all the tenants of farms. They are economic
slaves of their masters, slaves under the principle of dividogenesure.
If they don’t wish to divide the sole results of their labor, then they
must starve, and there is no other alternative for them, because they
are propertyless and hence resourceless.

2. That at the same time we had 4,999,412 other families that were
hiring not the farms but rentable homes of the propertied men. And these
nearly [SN: NUMBER OF FAMILIES HIRING HOMES.] 5-million families were
not only the sources of income and profit in favor of the owners of the
homes, but also the sources of income for the employers that permit them
to labor. So that a farm tenant is a direct[65] source of income to one
lord of property; while a home tenant is a direct[66] source of income
for two owners of wealth. And a great injustice hangs on the neck of
every one of these millions, because they have no property of their own.
But the principal point is this, that neither one of them has the right
to expend or apply his labor energy anywhere without paying for it to
those that may not labor at all and live.

Adding now the two classes of tenant families, we have 6,624,259 of
them; and regarding their [SN: NUMBERS COMBINED.] numbers individually,
we have 32,656,808 propertyless persons who are in bondage of
dividogenesure, because they have neither the right to expend their
strength nor to restore it without paying for both to the propertied.

The question now is, Do these numbers show that we had “less than half
the families in the United States without property?”[67] Even without
examining the numbers of the propertyless in cities and towns, the Extra
Bulletin proves that there were 279,023 more of the propertyless
families than the half of the entire population. And [SN: COULD BUILD A
LARGE CITY.] this little more than the half represents 1,345,683
propertyless individuals who could build and could inhabit yet another
one of the largest cities in the world, while under the unjust principle
of dividogenesure they have neither a farm, nor a lot, nor a single
house of their own.

But what do you think about the whole number of the propertyless? We had
fully 32,656,808 individuals of them in 1890, according to this
Bulletin, and they could [SN: COULD BUILD 32 LARGE CITIES.] likewise
build and inhabit 32 great cities having in each more than a million of
good citizens. A million population in one city, as you know,
constitutes one of the most populous cities in the world; and we could
have thirty-two such cities in the possession of these now propertyless
people. These millions of people could make one of the finest nations on
earth with 32 of most populous cities which they could erect by their
labor energy. How is it, then, that they are obliged to remain homeless,
landless, propertyless, resourceless? Have they been lazy to work? Have
they been incapable of doing anything for themselves? Have they been
degenerates? No, no, these tens of millions have been working hard, but
they have been deprived of the results of their labor by the unjust
principle of dividogenesure that compelled them to labor for the few
families of the wealthy group of the two tables on p. 47, which own the
results of their labor and toil.

And do you realize what it means to have 420 cities and towns with the
population of 8,000 to 100,000 individuals in each? Do you know what
[SN: CITIES BUILT BY LABORERS.] it means to have nearly seven-tenths of
their population without property, when they cannot exist without it?
And what it means to have 28 cities whose population is above 100,000,
and which goes up to millions in some of them; and yet nearly
four-fifths of their people are without homes, without property, and
without any resources of their own? And do you know that these very
cities (and towns) have almost all been built out of the realized labor
energy or on account of the results of labor of these slaves of
dividogenesure?

And this is not all, for, according to the Bulletin, we had 32,656,808
of the propertyless individuals, while the 2d R. table, p. 36, [SN:
COULD BUILD 33 GREAT CITIES.] which resulted from the 2d table on p. 32,
and which was published in 1897—this table authoritatively demands that
we should add 1,251,469 more propertyless people to the number found in
the Bulletin. This additional number of the propertyless could make yet
another one of the most populous cities in the world. And, being added
together, these people could inhabit not 32 but 33 cities, with the
total population of 33,908,277 individuals or nearly 34-millions of
souls.

Imagine! The whole nation in 1865 was made [SN: WHOLE NATION OF 1865
PROPERTYLESS IN 1890.] up of this number of people, whose wealth
aggregated over $24,000,000,000 worth. Now the principle of
dividogenesure required but 25 years to render the [SN: BY INCREASING
PROPERTY MEN LOST PROPERTY.] number of the propertyless equal to the
entire nation of 1865. Is it not an astonishing fact that while this
great number of the propertyless people grew up, the national wealth
actually increased by the worth of about $41,877,475,129? For in 1860
the total aggregate of it was $16,159,616,068, whereas in 1890 it
aggregated to $65,037,091,197 worth of wealth.

In view of these contrasting facts, can any one say that the 33-millions
of the property-losers were idle? or that the phenomenal increase of the
wealth was produced [SN: HUMAN ENERGY IS THE INITIAL OPERATOR IN
PRODUCTION.] by the very few owners of it because they had the most
effective capital at their own hands? No, sir, the capital itself is
dead in every respect and form, and not a single piece of it can produce
anything by itself. But, being effective aid, assistant in production,
capital only helps _the living human energy_ to increase the results of
its labor. And it follows that whatever the increase in production due
to mechanical forces or to other capital may be, it must be attributed
to the activity of human energy which manipulates all invented forms of
capital. And surely _the blessings of the various inventions_ consist in
the fact that the inventions _can aid the labor energy to produce more
wealth than it can produce without them_. Hence the real blessings of
the invented capital ought to have been preëminently in the fact of its
increasing the well-being of the millions of laborers in the various
grades of industry.

How is it, then, that the wealth of the United States nation, from 1865
to 1890, increased by more than 42-billion dollars worth, [SN: IS IT
LOGICALLY CORRECT OR MORALLY RIGHT?] while the well-being of its
producers greatly decreased? How is it that the tens of millions of the
workers not only could not obtain the due share of the wealth they
increased, but many millions of them in addition lost their own
properties? How is it that the great blessings of the inventors have
been changed into great curses against their well-being, because now
they appeared to be absolutely dependent for life on the wealthy few,
having nothing of their own? No explanations of minor causes can answer
these questions, but the great injustice of dividogenesure explains
them.

But what can the propertyless people do when they increase and when all
the wealth and capital produced by the people are monopolized by a few
families, as even the 1st and 2d tables, p. 47, show the facts? What can
the 33,908,277 individuals without property do, when they have nothing
to hope for but labor under the principle of dividogenesure for the
wealthy few that consist of less than a million families in the enlarged
nation?

It is evident that their fate condemns them to labor, as slaves, on
permission, and to satisfy first the demands of dividogenesure and
afterward take [SN: THE CLAIMS OF DIVIDOGENESURE REGARDED FIRST.] for
themselves what may be allowed from the results of their toil on the
rentable farms, while the millions of families which hire homes in the
448 cities and towns are still harder slaves of dividogenesure than the
families that hire their farms. They are harder slaves because they are
more liable to be freed even from the oppression of dividogenesure, and
liable to remain months and months in the sphere of starvation without
employment.

Can there be a greater iniquity in the world than the iniquity that
proceeds from the abnormal system of dividogenesure?

No! No nation in human history has seen an iniquity that can be compared
with the results of dividogenesure as they are at present, for it now
deprives men of their [SN: DIVIDOGENESURE IS A FOUNTAIN OF GREAT EVILS.]
fruits of toil to the utmost degree; it deprives them of their energy,
of their rights, and of their property; it deceives them by the medium
of exchange of commodities and products; it makes them economic slaves
of the very few masters or throws them out of the region of the slavery
into the region of resourceless starvation and degeneration; it
concentrates masses of the people’s wealth into a few hands, leaving
millions of families without income in despair and casts them out of the
rentable homes; it drags them into the courts, throws them into prisons,
drives them into penitentiaries, fits them for and chases them into the
lunatic and insane asylums. And not only this, but nearly all causes of
murders, of parricides, of infanticides, etc., and of the suicides
perpetrated by the people, can indirectly be traced to the abnormal
system of dividogenesure, which most fundamentally conditions almost all
national, social and private crimes, because sound life always depends
upon sound economic basis of a nation.

The system of dividogenesure, however, is pernicious not only to the
tens of millions of the propertyless people alone, but it has [SN: IT
COMPRISES THE PROPERTIED EMPLOYEES.] enslaved millions of families that
have homes and have other little properties not bearing direct incomes
for subsistence. These families therefore are also compelled to be in
gainful pursuits under the same conditions with the landless and
homeless. And Mr. Carroll D. Wright, onesided and severely criticised,
wrote about some of them as the American bread-winners, as follows:

“Bread-winners in 1870 engaged in supporting themselves were 12,505,923,
or 32.43 per cent” of the population. “The bread-winners in 1880 were
17,392,099, or 34.67 per cent of the total population” of that time.
“The bread-winners in 1890 were 22,735,661, or 36.31 per cent.” By
“bread-winners” he meant “wage earners, salary receivers ... or any one
who was engaged in gainful pursuit,” including “proprietors of whatever
grade or description, and all professional persons.”[68]

I must here make a diversion to examine this author’s argument.

For the purpose of proving that the poor, the producers of wealth, were
getting better off from 1870 to 1890 by their gainful pursuits, Mr.
Wright has placed in the [SN: MR. C. D. WRIGHT.] same class individuals
of incomparable description, and, by making averages upon equally
incomparable basis of their gains, logically arrived at the false
conclusion that the wages in general had risen during that period of
time. And hence, he added that “the rich are growing richer and the poor
are getting better off.” He thus arrived at the same nominal conclusion
at which Mr. Shearman has arrived in making nearly 56-millions of
individuals appear to be in possession of $209 each.[69] And it is
exactly in the same way Mr. Wright himself made the per capita wealth in
the United States, as a whole, amount to $1,036 for every inhabitant of
the nation. The rules of arithmetic are accurate in every calculation.
But the nominal distribution of wealth has never made the millions of
the people better off; and it has never altered the fact, that in 1890
we had nearly 34-millions of them without property; and we had a little
over 7-millions of other individuals owning more than 55½-billion
dollars worth of wealth.[70] Whereas, at the same time, there were more
than 27-millions of individuals whose aggregate wealth was only
$825-millions, which is but $30 to each person.[71]

This little diversion from our main thought once more testifies that the
increase of the 42-billion dollars worth of wealth which accrued from
1865 to 1890 did not in the least raise the wages of those producers of
the wealth who were compelled even to lose their own properties. On the
contrary, while the salaries and incomes of some professional persons
had decidedly increased, the wages in general had fallen, as we shall
see later on. Consequently, the tens of millions of the creators of that
wealth appeared to be all the worse off, as we have seen on pp. 85, 86.

And when Mr. Wright adds “that the transportation has been so
perfected,” during the same time, “as to bring to the door of the [SN:
THE PROPERTYLESS HAVE NEITHER DOOR NOR WINDOW.] poor man and the rich
the results of industry of far away people” in order that they may buy
them from different monopolists; this sentence really sounds like a
mockery to the 34-millions of individuals who had in 1890 neither their
own door nor even window, and who were absolutely dependent upon chances
for a semi-income under the oppressive dividogenesure.

But as to how many people were engaged in the gainful pursuits and how
many of them were entirely subject to the system of dividogenesure, we
can better know from the researches of Prof. Mayo Smith. He says as
follows:

“Persons in gainful pursuits, United States 1890, by classes of
occupations, in ten years of age and over, were 47,413,559. Out of them
[SN: PROF. MAYO SMITH.] 24,352,659 were males and 23,060,900 were
females.” After this statement he innumerates their respective
occupations and adds “That 9,013,201 persons were in gainful pursuits in
agriculture, fisheries and mining, and that 8,333,692 of these last are
males and 679,509 are females.”[72] So that out of 62,622,250
inhabitants of the country 47,413,559 individuals of 10 years of age and
upwards were engaged in the gainful pursuits.

Now these nearly 47½-millions of persons in gainful pursuits could not
all be the slaves of dividogenesure. For some of these [SN: FAVORITES OF
DIVIDOGENESURE SPECULATE.] persons serve its favorites for very high
salaries and their services are well remunerated. Nor could this number
include many of the favorites of this unjust principle. For its real
favorites are those that possess extensive rights in natural and
artificial resources of wealth; they are those that earn their enormous
incomes even in their comfortable beds, by simply speculating on and
relying upon the energy and productivity of the subjects to
dividogenesure. And as the productivity of the American people is very
high, it therefore becomes as easy for them to grow very wealthy under
the favor of dividogenesure as for the millions of makers of their
fortunes to grow very poor and emaciated.

Reviewing then the various occupations of the people in the United
States as these are represented by different authorities, we [SN:
1,000,000 FAMILIES AND 38,837,849 INDIVIDUALS.] have sufficient reason
to judge that since the year 1890 there have been about 38,837,849
persons who may be regarded as positive slaves to dividogenesure on the
one hand. And there have been about one million families that were more
or less profited by their highly productive labor and skillful energy on
the other hand. The above number includes nearly all the homeless and
landless of the last census, and includes about six millions of those
who had their little homes and other properties of no importance.

The productivity of these people may be exemplified by the following
reports:

“Mr. Mulhall, in the ‘North American Review,’ for June, 1895, says:

“An ordinary farm-hand in the United States raises as much grain as
three in England, four in France, five in Germany, or six in [SN:
PRODUCTIVITY OF FARMERS.] Austria, which shows what an enormous waste of
labor occurs in Europe, because farmers are not possessed of the same
mechanical appliances as in the United States.” (Enc. of Soc. Ref. p.
1093.)

“Mr. Edward Atkinson gives the following statements on the industrial
productivity of the United States.” He says:

“One thousand barrels of flour, the annual ration of 1,000 people, can
be placed in the city of New York from a point 1,700 or [SN: 7 PERSONS
SERVE 1,000 WITH BREAD.] 2,000 miles distant with the exertion of human
labor equivalent to that of only four men, working one year in
producing, milling and moving the wheat. It can then be baked and
distributed by the work of three more persons, so that seven persons
serve 1,000 with bread.”[73]

“The average crop of wheat in the United States and Canada would give
one person in every 20 of the population of the globe a [SN: ENOUGH TO
FEED THE WORLD.] barrel of flour in each year, with enough to spare for
seed. The land capable of producing wheat is not occupied to anything
like one-twentieth of its extent. We can raise grain enough on a small
part of territory of the United States to feed the world.”[74]

“The general conclusion at which I have arrived is that in the year
1880, the census year, [SN: GROSS INCOME IN YEAR 1880.] when the
population of the United States numbered a little over 50,000,000, the
annual product had a value of nearly, or quite $10,000,000,000 at points
of final consumption, including, at market prices, that portion which
was consumed upon the farm, but which was never sold. Omitting that
consumed upon the farm, it was about $9,000,000,000.”[75]

“At an average of 200 pounds per head in the United States, the largest
consumption of iron of [SN: ONE OPERATOR SERVES HUNDREDS WITH GOODS.]
any nation, we may yet find that the equivalent of one man’s work for
one year, divided between the coal-mine, the iron-mine and the
iron-furnace, suffices for the supply of 500 persons. One operator in
the cotton factory makes cloth for 250; in the woolen factory for 300;
one modern cobbler (who is anything but a cobbler), working in a boot or
shoe factory, furnishes 1,000 men or more than 1,000 women with all the
boots and shoes they require for a year.”[76]

These paragraphs sufficiently indicate the general capability of the
American people for production under the existing conditions.

If an Austrian wine-producer or a farmer is six times less capable to
produce than an American farmer; and if this Austrian farmer [SN:
POVERTY IS IMPOSSIBLE.] can easily defray the multiple expenses of his
family and his own out of the results of his less capable labor and live
comfortably every year, the American farmer ought to have five times as
much of net profit from the results of his capable labor energy as the
Austrian farmer can spend every year for his living. So that, living in
the same way as the Austrian, the American farmer ought to be in six
years fully thirty times wealthier than an Austrian farmer of an
ordinary type.

How is it then that the wealth of the sturdy American farm tenant
consists on the average of but $360 per family of nearly five members
each; while an Austrian farmer is incomparably better off, being almost
always a propertied man?

And if seven American laborers are able to serve 1,000 persons with
bread and feed themselves every year, it is perfectly legitimate, then,
that every one of them should have a yearly profit of his labor, which
is equal to the value of bread, yearly consumed by nearly 143 men. And
this yearly profit must quickly make a considerable amount of wealth in
his store.

How is it then that the millions of American producers of bread, each
supplying hundreds of [SN: POVERTY EXISTS.] persons, are obliged to live
from hand to mouth, having neither property nor land, nor any other
wealth in store for their future? And if their productivity testifies
that they are able to feed and clothe the world, as Mr. Atkinson very
reasonably affirms, is it not highly important to find out who profits
by their remarkably efficient labor energy? Or, who yearly devours the
surplus of their products, leaving them in poverty?

Further, the work of one American miner, “for one year, divided between
the coal-mine, the iron-mine and the iron-furnace,” ultimately [SN: NO
ROOM FOR POVERTY.] “suffices for the supply of 500 persons” with the
metallic goods and utilities they consume in a year. “One operator in
the cotton factory can provide goods for 250, in the woolen factory for
300, in a boot or shoe factory for 1,000 men or more than 1,000
women”—one worker in any of these industries, in one year, can work out
the respective goods these numbers of consumers require for a year, thus
showing that the productivity of every operator is simply phenomenal.

How is it then that these very operators who can and do supply hundreds
and even thousands of consumers with different utilities [SN: YET
POVERTY EXISTS IN THE ABSENCE OF JUSTICE, ETC.] for living and enjoying,
are unable to support their own families for six months after they cease
to be in their exceedingly productive employment? And why are nearly all
of them homeless? Is it the essential and necessary demand of modern
ethics, that the more one produces the poorer one must be? Or is it
exactly the demand of modern justice that millions of human beings
should only toil and work for others, without having the right to work
for themselves and to partake of the fruits of their own labor? And
where is the court of justice to be found which can vindicate their
cause in view of their unusual productivity?

Many consumers are convinced that these operators as well as all other
American laborers are always paid what they deserve, though they cannot
provide for [SN: ILL-BASED REASONING.] their future. Many other
consumers think that they could not be so productive if it were not for
the highly efficient aid of costly capital under their operations. And
as a logical inference, these consumers further think that this capital
must be highly paid for its own productivity. Hence the capitalist must
have a lion’s share from the results of the active energy of every
operator with the mechanical forces in production. And, although the
error of such reasoning is transparent from beginning to end, yet it
seems that justice itself is thus often satisfied.

These reasoners seem to never ask, Whose energy is embodied in the
capital that the inventors have [SN: JUSTICE CLAIMS A DEEPER BASIS FOR
REASONING.] left as great blessing for working humanity? And whose
energy has realized, or rather materialized, the existing inventions
after they had been created in the minds of the great men? Has all this
been done by inanimate dollars or money, or by the same animate and
intelligent beings whom we now regard as the mere operators in every
sphere of human activity? Is it not their energy that flows like a river
into all things of utility?

Then they say that the organizers, the managers, the superintendents
must be paid manifold for their superior work and intelligence. All
right, nobody denies that.

But will you show me a single article in use, in existence, or an object
in the process toward use and existence, which does not represent the
energy [SN: THE WHOLE ARTISTIC WORLD IMPLIES EXPENDED HUMAN ENERGY.] of
the laborers in need of some of the necessaries of mere existence? Show
me a brick or a stone in its use, an iron-bar, a steel-rail, a machine
or an engine, a steamer or cable, or whatever you please, which has not
been washed with the sweat of the brow of their makers in need? Show me
that building, that palace or mansion, a house or home, which does not
directly imply, or does not testify of the energy of the propertied poor
and the homeless?

Or show me that article, a heavy stone in a structure, a lump of iron or
coal, a coin of silver or gold, or show me anything in the world, which
should prove to have been only stained with the sweat of the brow of a
mere speculator in motions of values, in rentable farms and homes, or in
products of the workers in need? I am sure you cannot.

While as facts I can show that the crystallized energy of the homeless,
the poor and the landless, in possession of others, floats on the
rivers, the seas and the oceans; it [SN: IT HAS NOT BEEN JUSTLY PAID
FOR.] fills up the land, builds up the towns and cities, heats them in
winter, lights them at night. In possession of others, their energy is
sold on the markets, and is laid in the stores and the banks of others.
Further, their energy stands in the forms of the plants and the
factories working in speed throughout the country; and it burns in the
stoves, in the furnace of the various works; it steams in the boilers
and moves the machines of its own making; and it pulls on the cables and
the cars upon the roads made by its muscle and bone. It crystallizes in
goods and all objects of use; it then moves on in masses upon the lines
of rails, and runs on from cities to cities, obeying speculators’
commands. So, having been shaped into millions of different forms, and
having escaped from the working hands of its genuine owners, the energy
quickly changes into more and more durable forms; and after several
motions, it finally rests in the clean hands of the speculators, as if
it were their righteous net profit and wealth.

Even this picture indicates the true basis where one should look for
justice and rights, for losses and profits.

“The profits of the Wall street kings the past year were enormous,” says
Dr. Josiah Strong,[77] about January, 1880. “It is estimated that one of
them made $30,000,000; another, $15,000,000; two, $10,000,000 each; one,
$8,000,000; and four, from $1,000,000 to $2,000,000 each; making a grand
total for 10 or 12 estates of about $80,000,000”[77] in one year.

While “Mr. F. C. Waite, special agent of the Eleventh Census, in charge
of True Wealth, makes the following statement as to the gross and net
earnings of important natural monopolies for the census year 1890.”[78]

-----------------------------+---------------+-------------
Items. |Gross Earnings.|Net Earnings.
-----------------------------+---------------+-------------
RAILROADS: | |
From operation |$1,051,877,632 |}
Other sources | 126,767,064 |}
Unreported roads | |}$331,373,057
(about) | 50,000,000 |}
Express companies[79] | 53,000,000 | 11,000,000
Street railways | 90,000,000 | 28,000,000
Water transportation | 191,000,000 | 31,000,000
Telegraph companies | 25,000,000 | 7,000,000
Telephone companies | 16,404,583 | 5,260,712
INSURANCE COMPANIES: | |
Life | 90,000,000 | 59,000,000
Fire, etc. | 54,991,613 | 19,000,000
BANKS: | |
National | 144,614,053 | 72,055,564
All others (estimated) | 200,000,000 |
ARTIFICIAL GAS | |
COMPANIES: | |
(Estimated) | 25,000,000 |
-----------------------------+---------------+-------------
Total earnings[80] | 2,118,654,945 | 553,689,333
-----------------------------+---------------+-------------

Now, these totals show what an enormous amount of the people’s
crystallized energy accrues to the monopolists in one year, and in every
year, besides covering all yearly expenses. No wonder, then, why we find
that the highly productive people, of which Mr. Atkinson speaks and
which could even in 1880 put upon the market, “at final points of
consumption,” the annual surplus of $9,000,000,000 worth of various
kinds of products, appeared in 1890 to be in possession of only about
$10,000,000,000 worth of aggregate wealth, belonging to more than
55-millions of individuals. Whereas, on the other side, there appeared
less than 7½-millions of individuals in possession of more than
$55,000,000,000 worth of wealth.[81]

It is certainly understood that all products, while reaching the “points
of final consumption,” rise in their value, on account of the enormous
earnings derived from them by the speculators in the products of human
energy, while they move these products by the cheapest possible labor of
millions of employees, under the principle of dividogenesure. The rising
of their value is, of course, inevitable from beginning to end. For as
the raw materials, or the products of any kind, continue to acquire
their consumable state in the hands of the operators, more and more
energy is being spent upon them or added to them. And it is just and
meet that the persons who thus add their energy to the products should
be paid for it, whether engaged in the factory, in the plant, in
transportation or in the final distribution among consumers.

Yet what do we find? We find that the 38,837,849[82] slaves of
dividogenesure, who work in the whole field of production and
distribution, are losing a great amount [SN: THEY LABOR FOR LESS THAN
THE DUE.] of their energy in favor of about one million[82] families
that employ them for less payment than these families finally derive
from the results of the labor energy of these employees. By “less
payment” I mean that net profit which is called the undue concentration
of the producers’ wealth in the employer’s hands; and I mean what is
absolutely due to the laborers and not what is undue. The facts of the
undue concentration of wealth in the hands of these few families will be
shown in chapter VI.

If we now regard one million families of the wealthy group of one of the
tables[83] as the employers [SN: THE RATES OF INCOMES.] of the
38,837,849 propertyless and the propertied poor, the daily injustice of
the million families will be expressed in their daily incomes from every
individual as follows:

Obtaining daily from each individual worker:

1c. they derive $ 388,378.48
2c. „ „ 776,756.96
3c. „ „ 1,165,135.44
4c. „ „ 1,553,513.92
5c. „ „ 1,941,892.40
6c. „ „ 2,330,270.88
7c. „ „ 2,718,649.36
8c. „ „ 3,107,027.84
9c. „ „ 3,495,406.32
10c. „ „ 3,883,784.80
11c. „ „ 4,272,163.28
12c. „ „ 4,660,541.76
15c. „ „ 5,825,677.20
20c. „ „ 7,767,569.60

So that, if only 20c is obtained from each of the propertyless and the
propertied poor in any employment whatever, then every one of the
million families on the average gets daily more than $7 of the unjust
income. And that is simply because the resourceless people cannot apply
their energy anywhere without oppression. But, if the principle of
dividogenesure allows these families to squeeze out of every one’s
energy daily 25c, then the daily dividend of these families will amount
to $9,709,462.25, which is nearly $10 to each family among the million.
And this is one way how the rich are growing richer and the poor are
growing poorer. While the next chapter will show another way of getting
rich and the poor.

No one ought to suppose, however, that the million families, variously
employing the above number of the absolutely dependent people, obtain
equal shares of the [SN: THE LOSSES AND PROFITS ARE UNEQUAL.] unearned
profits from the workers in the United States. Nor ought one to suppose
that these workers lose equal amounts of energy in favor of the owners
of capital, means of transportation, or distribution of products, in
favor of landlords and houselords, etc. No, some of the workers lose
more than others, just as some of the families get much more than
others. The net profits of the different monopolies, p. 101, as
represented by the census agent, illustrate these differences in the
gains of several families connected with the monopolies.

But, notwithstanding the differences in the detailed gains and losses,
there cannot be any doubt or discrepancy in the general fact, that if
“the natural” and other[84] “monopolies” shall continue to earn billions
of dollars worth of wealth every year, all the nation will soon be
absolutely enslaved by a very few families of the wealthiest type. The
economic slavery of the nation then will grow harder and harder upon the
people absolutely dependent on the principle of dividogenesure.

For if each one of the 38,837,849 individuals now daily loses, on the
average, 25c worth of wealth produced by his energy, the continual [SN:
DEPENDENT INDIVIDUALS.] increase of these dependents must bring about a
continual increase in the rates of the daily incomes in favor of the
wealthy few—at the rates shown on p. 104, which shall then go higher up.
The concentration of wealth will go on, and from the standpoint of
dividogenesure, these rates will indicate a continual increase or
decrease in the unjust concentration of wealth in a few hands.

No one must suppose, however, that by the rates of dividogenesure we
mean only the underrated wages and salaries. No, we mean here the losses
of the people in all stages of productive and distributive activity and
the final gains of those that unjustly profit by this general activity
of the people. And I view the nation as a whole with its future.

If the situation be left, as it is at present, many possibilities can
unmistakably be predicted for the nation’s future.

When the nation is rapidly growing into the economic slaves of a few
favorites of dividogenesure, there is no use to think about the freedom
and political power of [SN: POSSIBLE FUTURE.] the enslaved people,
because such thinking or talking will only be a general mock-flattery
against the helpless by the ignorant or dishonest men who may also be
slaves over the slaves. And this modern dependence of the people will
certainly be to their own harm. The tens of millions of families
together shall neither be able to support the public schools, colleges,
churches, nor any other public institutions without the means of the
wealthy few. Then it will be that the very teachers, professors,
ministers and every one else in the public service will also be in
bondage. Then it will be that they shall be bound to educate the people
by so shaping their nervous system as to bear even greater economic
slavery than any savages could tolerate. Then it will be that they shall
be unable to teach any truth valuable for the well-being of the people
even if they know it perfectly well.[85] And then it will be that every
one shall feel his impotency and littleness in attempting to throw off
the heavy yoke of the few rich families.

Besides, we may see here a type of the Venetian Republic with all its
inherent miseries, on a large scale; while the people shall continue to
groan even as the Venetians did [SN: VENETIAN REPUBLIC.] under a few
prosperous families. But the American groaning and misery may
undoubtedly be even greater than theirs, because they were oppressed and
labored as beasts of burden, but they were never compelled to work on a
par with the modern mechanical forces. And as the misery of the American
Republic will be greater, the oppression heavier, and the economic and
other forms of slavery will be more degrading, it will be necessary to
have a greater Napoleon Bonaparte in order to liberate the future
Americans from their oligarchic plutocracy than the one who spoke to the
Venetians: “I am your liberator; I am not your enemy; I am your friend;
don’t be afraid,” and so on.

It is, however, to be hoped that the present American fathers will not
hesitate to provide something better for their children.

CHAPTER V.

MORTGAGOR FAMILIES.

It must be borne in mind that in this chapter we have to consider only
those families of the nation which were in possession of real or
artificial[86] property before and after the year 1890. And we have
especially to consider those of them whose properties were mortgaged;
and those whose properties were to be lost in consequence of the
mortgages they were encumbered with. While the propertyless or the
tenant families, that were treated in the preceding chapter, will now be
kept in the background of the statistics with which we have to deal.

When, however, we are through with the statistics, we may make
references to and may even make special statements about the tenant
families treated before; while the prominent position will now be given
to the mortgagor families, showing how they fall from the class of
property owners, become debtors to the owners of greater wealth, lose
their properties and increase the numbers of the propertyless.

It is important to note here that the loss of the rights to property
always precedes the actual loss of property itself; and that the fall of
the propertied into the sphere of dividogenesure, also precedes the
actual economic slavery of those that become propertyless.

The very day in which a propertied person mortgages his property he
loses his rights for the wealth he has owned, because his property goes
from him as a security [SN: LOSS OF RIGHTS PRECEDES LOSS OF PROPERTY.]
for the loan he makes. And while losing the rights, he takes upon
himself the obligation to divide the results of his labor between the
lender and himself, and thus falls under the influence of
dividogenesure. For, henceforth, he spends his active energy in favor of
the creditor and himself, and is obliged to regard the interests of the
creditor as of more importance than his own. The rate of interest to the
creditor must be accurately paid so much per cent per annum for the
loan. Hence, the mortgagor at once appears in the position of a tenant
of farm or of any other property. And it depends on the rate of the
percentage he agreed to pay out of the results of his labor whether he
is better off or worse even than a mere tenant. It also depends on the
fact whether his mortgaged property is a large one or small, and whether
he has mortgaged one part or the whole of his resources of wealth. In
any way, a mortgagor, according to the degree of his indebtedness, is an
economic slave of the owners of greater wealth. And he must have a
supernatural ability and must use an extraordinary effort in order to
pay his debt or to redeem his property. Otherwise his property must pass
into the absolute ownership of the wealthy families that millions of
other individuals already labor for under the modern type of slavery.

But let us now see the statistical facts and then we may better judge of
what mortgages signify and what they mean to the nation. We shall take
the other class treated in the same bulletin out of which we extracted
the 6,624,259 tenant families for the preceding chapter.[87]

STATISTICS.[88]

“Extra Bulletin No. 98 of the United States Census, 1890,” (of the
mortgagor families) “says:”

That out of the whole 4,767,179[89] farming families in the United
States only “65.92 per cent,” or 3,142,414 families “own the farms [SN:
FARM FAMILIES IN DEBT.] cultivated by them.” And “that 28.22 per cent,”
or 886,839 families out of the 3,142,414 owning ones, “own subject to
encumbrance,” i. e., they are in debt; “and 71.78 per cent,” or
2,255,575 families, “own free of encumbrance.” So that among every 100
farm owning families 72[90] own without encumbrance and 28 own with
encumbrance.

And the same Bulletin further says: That “on the owned farms there are
liens[91] amounting to $1,085,995,960, which is 35.55 per cent of the
value of the encumbered [SN: DEBT AT 7.07 PER CENT.] farms, and this
debt bears interest at the average rate of 7.07 per cent,” which is more
than 7 dollars for every $100 borrowed. It is at this rate per annum
that the farmer’s labor energy is drained by the wealthy creditors or by
the bankers. “Each owned and encumbered farm on the average is worth
$3,444.” This average, of course, includes the families far above $3,444
worth and far below it—“and” each, on the average, “is subject to a debt
of $1,224.”

Hence it follows that the principle of dividogenesure, in these cases,
has a yearly demand that every debtor should, on the average, pay about
$86.53 worth of the results [SN: INTEREST.] of his labor energy to his
creditor. And it is a question whether even a highly effective capital
worth $1,224 is really able to increase the yearly results of the
debtor’s labor to the extent of $86.53—I mean an increase in his product
absolutely due to the aid of the borrowed capital on which he is to pay
this sum as the annual interest charge. It is rather probable that the
majority of the mortgagors pay more than half of this annual percentage
at the expense of their personal energy, even under the condition of the
most effective use of the borrowed means. For the rate of 7.07 per cent
is unconscientiously exorbitant and is generally abnormal.

As to the families owning homes, the corresponding facts are “that
27.70[92] per cent,” or 809,831 families, out of the 2,923,577
home-owning families, “own their [SN: HOME FAMILIES IN DEBT.] homes with
encumbrance, and 72.30 per cent,” or 2,113,746, “own them without
encumbrance.” So that in every 100 home-owning families 28 are in debt
and 72 are free of debt. “The debt on owned homes aggregates
$1,046,953,603, or 39.77 per [SN: DEBT AT 6.23 PER CENT.] cent of the
value of the encumbered homes, and bears interest at the average rate of
6.23 per cent. An average debt of $1,293 encumbers each home, which has
an average value of $3,250.” This average again includes the family
homes worth far above and far below the indicated value. While the homes
below this value may have greater encumbrances than the others; and it
is certainly the poorer families that lose their properties first, if
they attempt to get rich by means of the loans they can obtain at the
rate of exorbitant per cents.

If then the average debt of these 809,831 families is $1,293 and the
rate per cent for it is 6.23 per cent per annum, every one of them [SN:
AVERAGE OF INTEREST.] is, therefore, a subject to the principle of
dividogenesure at the rate of $80.55 a year. It must, however, he
understood that the averages indicate only the general truth, and always
conceal the particular miseries and distress of many millions of the
people. And I understand that many of these debtors have been in the
gainful pursuits spoken of by Mayo-Smith, and hence the dividogenesure
presses upon them from two or even more sides. But it is only the next
census that will show us the situation these debtors are in.

Let us now speak about the cities and towns with one side of which we
have become acquainted in the preceding chapter.

CITIES AND TOWNS.

“There are 420 cities and towns that have a population of 8,000 to
100,000, and in these “cities [SN: OWNERS OF THE CITIES FOUND AMONG
414,544 FAMILIES.] and towns 64.04 per cent,” i. e., 1,120,433 “of the
home families hire and 35.96 per cent,” i. e., 629,146 families “own
their homes, and of the home-owning families 34.11 per cent,” i. e.,
214,602 “own with encumbrance and 65.89 per cent,” i. e., 414,544 “own
free of encumbrance. The liens on the owned homes are 39.55 per cent of
the value of those subject to lien. Several averages show that the rate
of interest is 6.29 per cent; value of each owned and encumbered home is
$3,447; lien on the same is $1,363.” (See Appendix I.)

So that these debtors of the 420 towns and cities are also subject to
the principle of dividogenesure at the rate of $85.73 each per every
year, as long as the mortgages remain in force and are not foreclosed.

“The cities that have a population of 100,000 and over” (up to millions)
“number 28, and in these cities 77.17 per cent,” i. e., [SN: OWNERS OF
THE LARGE CITIES FOUND AMONG 276,744 FAMILIES.] 1,503,911 “of the home
families hire and 22.83 per cent,” i. e., 444,923 “own their homes;
37.80 per cent,” i. e., 168,179 of the latter families have encumbrance
and 62.20 per cent,” i. e., 276,744 families are free of encumbrance.
Averages for owned and encumbered homes are: Encumbrance, $2,337; value,
$5,555; rate of interest, 5.75 per cent. Homes are encumbered for 42.07
per cent of their value.” This is the largest average encumbrance among
all encumbered homes and farms.

So that every debtor in these 28 large cities (and there are 9 of them
in every 100) is a subject to the principle of dividogenesure at the
rate of $134.37 each in every year as long as the mortgage is in force
and is not foreclosed. It is after the foreclosure that the debtor
cannot even redeem his mortgaged property; he has then to remain
propertyless. Let us now sum up the preceding conclusions in a tabular
way, as follows:

United States Farms and Homes.

This double table shows clearly enough that there were 8,320,831 tenant
and mortgagor families that have been subject to the principle of
dividogenesure. And [SN: SUBJECT TO DIVIDOGENESURE.] that these families
had 41,061,563 individual members, including children that have now
grown up to the same fate of the drain of labor energy, under which
their unfortunate parents have been. For all these individuals, of
course, cannot exist without working in favor of the few money lenders
and propertied men, because the tenants have no resources to apply their
energy to, and the mortgagors cannot profit themselves by the loans of
exorbitantly high per cent of interest. Hence, they are all drained and
all are economic slaves of the wealthy few.

Besides, the necessary life-expenses of every one, subject to a strong
dividogenesure,[94] are absolutely greater than the same expenses of any
one in the wealthy group. While the incomes of the rich that the
millions of other individuals and the forces of capital work out, cannot
even be compared with the semi-incomes of the poor that are obliged in
any way to work for the wealthy, when these are disposed to give them a
chance to work.

Further, is it not an abnormal reality that the 420 towns and cities in
the United States should belong [SN: CITIES OWNED BY LESS THAN 24 PER
CENT OF THEIR PEOPLE.] to less than 24 per cent of the entire population
in them? And is it not strange that the remaining 76 per cent of the
inhabitants in these cities and towns should live and labor with the
purpose of feeding, fattening and enriching these 24 per cents of the
people who are really the owners of these towns and cities? And is it
not abnormal in the extreme to have 28 cities, populated by hundreds of
thousands and by millions of individuals; and that these [SN: CITIES
OWNED BY LESS THAN 14 PER CENT OF THEIR PEOPLE.] cities, including all
kinds of buildings, machines, houses, etc., etc., should actually be
possessed by less than 14 per cent of their population? And that, in
addition to this extreme abnormity, the remaining 86 per cent of their
people should be obliged to divide all results of active and creative
energy with these few owners of the great cities?

But what is inconceivably strange is that this extremely abnormal
situation should be produced in a nation governed by the people’s
representatives chosen by their good will and purpose; and that this
will and purpose should bring about the results of so great injustice
and wickedness against this people, is only possible on the basis of
ignorance, neglect of duty and selfishness.

Let us now have an idea of the progress of development of the principle
of dividogenesure in the United States, and of the rapidity with which
the people fall under its oppressive influence, thus gradually becoming
propertyless or the absolutely helpless economic slaves of those that
capture them within the extensive nets of that principle.

* * * * *

“Extra Census Bulletin No. 71 gives the statistics on mortgages by
amounts, length of mortgage, rate of interest for the United States from
1880 to 1889.”

It says: “That during that time 9,517,747 real estate mortgages, stating
amount of debt incurred, were made in the United States, representing
[SN: INCREASE OF MORTGAGES.] an incurred indebtedness of
$12,094,877,793. The number of mortgages made during one year[95]
increased from 643,143 in 1880 to 1,226,323 in 1889, or 90.88 per cent,
and the yearly incurred indebtedness increased from $710,888,504 in 1880
to $1,752,568,274 in 1889, or 146.53 per cent.”

“With regard to mortgages on acre-tracts, the number made during 10
years was 4,747,078, representing an incurred indebtedness [SN:
ACRE-TRACTS.] of $4,896,771,112.” The increase in making them was as
follows: “The number of these mortgages made in” the year “1880 was
370,984; in 1889, 525,094.” So that during the years between these “an
increase of 41.54 per cent” was made; “while the incurred indebtedness
increased from $342,566,477 in 1880 to $585,729,719 in 1889, an increase
of 70.98 per cent.

“The increase was relatively larger in the case of mortgages on lots.
They numbered 4,770,669 during the 10 years, and the indebtedness [SN:
ON LOTS.] incurred under them amounted to $7,198,106,681. From 1880 to
1889 the annual number made increased from 272,159 to 701,229, an
increase of 157.65 per cent. During the same time the amount of annual
indebtedness incurred increased from $368,322,027” in the year 1880, “to
$1,166,838,555” in the year 1889, “an increase of 216.80 per cent.”[96]

As you see, the yearly increase in the numbers of making new mortgages
was astonishingly great on all sides. This progress of falling under the
influence of dividogenesure, falling into debt, indicates that the
people could not avoid becoming slaves to the percentages for loans.
This progress indicates that they were compelled by the generally
abnormal conditions of existence to take the risk of losing their
properties. And all cities thus grow as “New York City,” where “but 6⅓
per cent of the families owned their homes”[97] in 1890.

“AMOUNTS:”

“During the decade 622,855,091 acres were covered by 4,758,268 mortgages
stating and not stating the amount of indebtedness incurred under them.
The number of acres covered by mortgage in 1880 was 42,743,013; in 1889,
70,678,257; an increase of 65.36 per cent. In the case of lots covered
by mortgage the increase was 198.25 per cent. The number” thus “covered
by mortgages stating and not stating amount of indebtedness in the
former year being 429,955; in the latter year 1,282,334.

“At the end of the decade, January 1, 1890, the [SN: ON ACRES AND LOTS.]
real estate mortgage indebtedness amounted to $6,010,670,985,” on the
whole, “represented by 4,777,698 mortgages,”[98] which were divided into
the mortgages on the acres and the mortgages on the lots.

It was also computed that the average length of a mortgage in the United
States is longer than four and a half years, or exactly [SN: LIFE OF
MORTGAGE.] “4.660 years.” The Bulletin calls it a “life of a mortgage,”
which may last “as much longer without being paid off;” that is, a
mortgage may last as long as the creditor gets his rate of interest, or
as long as his increasing interest is secure in the whole value of the
mortgaged property. Otherwise a mortgage is foreclosed.

But what is specially important for us is whether the mortgagors are
able to extinguish their debt with the same rapidity with which it was
incurred by them? If they are able to pay off their debts at the proper
times, then mortgaging of property would at least appear uninjurious to
their well being, though it could not be regarded as profitable to them.

The same “Bulletin No. 71,” however, states that, “since mortgages in
force were made, 12.68 per [SN: ORIGINAL DEBT PAID: 12.68 PER CENT.]
cent of the original amount of indebtedness incurred under them has been
extinguished by partial payments.” Now, it was time to extinguish all
the original amount on mortgages in force. Yet 87.32 per cent of the
original indebtedness could not be paid off by the debtors. And this is
a sign of the [SN: ORIGINAL LOSS OF PROPERTY: 87.32 PER CENT.] most
forcible argument, showing that the greatest majority of the mortgagors
have been on the way to ruin, and on the way of losing their properties.
It is thus the millions of tenants appeared in 1890.

THE PER CAPITA DEBT.

Instead of being paid off at proper times, the mortgage debt was
accumulating so far that if it were divided among the entire population
in 1890, every man, woman and child would have been in [SN: PROPORTIONS
ON STATES.] debt of $96. Just as the Bulletin says that “the mortgage
debt per capita in the United States is $96; the three largest state
averages (omitting the District of Columbia) are $268 in New York, $206
in Colorado, and $200 in California. The smaller ones are found in the
south and the Rocky Mountain region.”[99] Such is the per capita debt in
these three States.

“In 41 States 28.86 per cent of the taxed acres are covered by mortgages
in force. The largest proportion of mortgaged acres is in Kansas, where
60.32 per cent of the total number of taxed acres are mortgaged.
Nebraska stands next, with 54.73 per cent; South Dakota third, with
51.76 per cent.[99]

“In the five States, Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and South
Carolina, 23.99 per cent of the taxed lots are covered by mortgages in
force,”[99] and so on in the other States. But the most important fact
is the annual interest the people have to pay to the wealthy few for
their loans.

AVERAGE RATE PER CENT ON THE
DEBT.

“The average rate for all mortgages in the United States is 6.60 per
cent. For mortgages on acres,” the average is “7.36 per cent; for
mortgage [SN: U. S. RATE PER CENT.] on lots, 6.16 per cent. These rates
make the annual interest charge on the existing real estate mortgage in
the United States amount to $397,442,792.”[100]

Now we have reached the principle point in these statistics. Imagine
that the families in debt are annually charged with the rate of interest
amounting to $397,442,792 [SN: INTEREST CHARGE.] worth of the results of
their labor, and that the group of creditors get this amount of wealth
yearly without work. And think that, if the average life of a mortgage
is even 4½ years long, these families have to pay $1,788,492,564 worth
of wealth produced by their energy during this time. But we were told
that the average length of a mortgage life continues “as much longer
without being paid off,” that is, it lasts nearly 10 years, and these
families have, therefore, to pay nearly $4,000,000,000 worth of the
wealth produced by them during this time. That is how the debtors are
affected by the principle of dividogenesure which steadily works in all
directions in favor of the wealthy few. This is the economic slavery
that the Nineteenth Century has established for the people of the United
States.

The Bulletin shows that this interest charge is for mortgages on
acre-tracts and on lots, against which the debt of $6,010,670,985 was in
force in 1890, after which it continued to exist and to increase
probably with the same rate as it increased in the previous decade. For,
nothing special has been done to prevent the needy people from
mortgaging their properties. So the mortgages were increasing and the
annual interest charge against lots and acres, too, continued to
increase.

But the Extra Bulletin No. 98 shows that the indebtedness on owned farms
was equal to $1,085,995,960,[101] and the same on owned homes was equal
to $1,046,953,603;[102] [SN: INTEREST CHARGE ON FARMS AND HOMES.] so
that, added together, these two classes of debt amount to
$2,132,949,563, as was stated in this Bulletin. And the average rate of
interest on this debt is shown at the end of the second Bulletin to have
been 6.65 per cent per annum. And “the annual interest charge is
$141,910,106”[103] that has been a burden on 1,696,670 families
represented here in the table, p. 116. Of course, thousands of these
families have now lost their properties forever, as there were liens on
their farms and homes representing the above total of more than
2-billion dollars.

If we now unite the annual interest charge on [SN: COMBINED INTEREST
CHARGE.] the acres and lots mortgage debt, and the annual interest on
farms and homes mortgage debt, we find that these charges amount to
$539,352,898 in every year, which must be paid in any way.

It is certainly not the yearly charge of the memorial past, but it was
stated as existing in the year 1890, and would naturally continue as an
annual interest charge up to the present day. The debtors must use an
extraordinary effort in their toil, in order to get sufficient results
from their applied energy for clearing up this annual interest charge,
and keeping themselves alive.[104] And to speak about an unusual
prosperity of the people under such conditions is as absurd as to say
that the creditors are growing poor from receiving the annual interest
charge consisting of $539,352,898 worth of wealth because they get it
yearly without work.

Yes, every one that speaks about prosperity in the United States knows
what he means. For the statistical facts prove that there is an unusual
prosperity for the very few that the tens of millions of individuals are
bound to work for. But, is it prosperity for these millions of the
propertyless * * * and debtors? No, there is positive enslavement for
them and their children. And it is the innocent children or posterity
that are to be specially pitied.

These tens of millions of individuals become weaker and weaker consumers
of their own products and products of the nation. So that, the few
prosperous families are obliged to look after wider foreign markets to
export to the produce that the millions here have no means, no
purchasing power to acquire. It has long been the case in England, where
millions of the people wear overcoats, for instance, from 5 to 10 years
each, without being able to procure new ones; while the exports of all
goods are ever going on to the different foreign markets. And the
United States are growing similar to Great Britain in almost every
respect. * * *

“The percentages representing encumbrance for various rates of
interest,” says the Extra Bulletin [SN: RATES OF INTEREST ARE HIGHER ON
THE POOR.] No. 71, “show that the larger encumbrances bear the lower
rates of interest, as a general fact.” And the differences in the rates
of interest are from “less than 6 to greater than 12 per cent.” Hence,
the poorer the mortgagors, the greater the weight of oppression they
bear; and the greater oppression they bear, the quicker they lose their
properties, and the greater becomes the number of tenants and of
economic slaves which we have.

The brute-minded creditors think that it is natural to skin the
helpless, because they have no great security for the loans.

What is the significance of mortgages for the nation? And what do other
men acquainted with mortgages think of them?

The significance of mortgages has already been considered by many
thoughtful men, and it is not out of place to quote here the ready views
of some of them.

SIGNIFICANCE.

As there are two economic classes of the people in the United
States,[105] so “there are two views, both of which must be understood.”
The [SN: SEMI-OPTIMISTIC VIEW.] view presented by writers like Mr.
Edward Atkinson is known to some people as worthy of regard,
notwithstanding that these writers knock their heads against a
mountainous wall of facts. “They argue that the mortgage is an
indication of prosperity.” Mr. Atkinson says, in the “Forum” for May,
1895, writing (before the complete mortgage returns given above had been
reported) concerning the census returns for 33 States:

“The first startling fact is that in these 33 States and Territories
nearly 7,000,000 mortgages have been recorded in ten years for a total
sum of nearly $9,500,000,000. The final statement, covering the whole
country, which has not yet been published, discloses the fact that
9,517,747 mortgages were executed in the decade 1880-89 to the amount of
$12,094,877,793.”[106] * * *

And then because “on the first of January, 1890, the amount of these
mortgages remaining unpaid in the whole United States was
$6,019,679,985,[107] Mr. Atkinson says: “It therefore appears that
during the decade one-half of the mortgage debt incurred had already
been paid.” But he forgets to deal with the process of losing property
by the thousands of the debtors who appeared without property in 1890.

And being uncertain about mortgages on acres and lots at the beginning
of the last decade, he infers that “the least estimate of the sum due on
acres and lots at the beginning of this period (1880-90) would
be $1,500,000,000.” And continues that “these original mortgages
executed prior to 1880 must have been wholly liquidated, mostly by
payment.” * * *

As regards this point we have equal or even greater reason to say that
those mortgages have mostly been liquidated by an absolute loss of
property, because at the end of the decade we have had many millions of
propertyless families.

But the chief feature of the situation Mr. Atkinson wishes to vindicate
is that the mortgage growth indicates prosperity and not the system of
tenancy and landlordism as in Great Britain. He says:

“The evidence is conclusive that the increase of hired farms does not
imply the permanent establishment [SN: AFRAID OF PRIMOGENITURE.] of the
relations of landlord and tenant after the English fashion. It does not
imply the concentration of land in fewer hands, but rather the reverse.
It does imply better and more intelligent methods of agriculture, larger
and more varied crops produced from lessening areas of land throughout
the whole great grain-growing section,”[108] and so on.

As to the prosperity, I will say, that a family securing a large amount
of borrowed money or capital at low rates of interest may [SN:
CONDITIONS OF PROSPERITY.] prosper under mortgage by efficiently
applying the capital on its wealth, by efficiently applying the labor
energy of the family members, and, especially, by efficiently applying
hired labor upon its farm or any other kind of property. So that, only
those mortgagor families can have prosperity, which are aided by many
agencies in drawing incomes from their land. While all the poorer
families must be ruined by the mortgages.

As to the argument that we have no establishment of tenancy after the
English fashion of primogeniture, it is enough to refer the reader to
the third chapter of this work, and beg him to understand it well by
reading a second time. For the effects of primogeniture and
dividogenesure are the same, as both principles demand that millions of
individuals should divide the sole results of their applied energy with
the few owners of capital and wealth, or else these millions must starve
without employment. They produce economic slavery in England and in the
United States, where most of the people are now propertyless and
therefore helpless.

Dividogenesure, however, differs from primogeniture by including all
mortgagors into its sphere of oppression.

And it seems to me perfectly naive to assert that “larger and more
varied crops are produced from lessening areas of land throughout [SN:
LOGIC QUEER.] the whole grain-growing section” of the country. For it
really means that the more land the people lose through mortgages, the
better crops they will produce, and hence the best crops must be
produced by them when they lose all the land they formerly owned.

But Mr. Atkinson does not here deal with the fact that more than 64 per
cent of the population in 420 cities and towns, and 77 per cent of it in
the 28 largest cities are also tenants of homes, beside the tenants of
farms he writes about. He does not speak of the fact that the 420 cities
and towns actually belong to less than 24 per cent of their population,
and that the 28 great cities in the United States really belong to less
than 14 per cent of their population; and that the whole population of
the 448 cities and towns are bound, by dividogenesure, to work in one or
other way for the small per cent of their wealthy neighbors, the only
independent population that holds the others in slavery. A dealing with
these tenants would disprove his position. See appendix I.

Mr. G. H. Holmes, writing in the “Annals of the American Academy and
Social Science Quarterly,” gives a more balanced view on the subject. He
says:[109]

“While mortgage debtors must admit that they have done better to obtain
real estate on credit [SN: PINCHING EFFECTS.] than not to obtain as much
of it as they have done, or not to obtain it at all, they are
nevertheless in a situation where they feel the pinching effects of a
reduction or loss of income more than real-estate owners do who are not
debtors. This is owing to the interest that is wanted by the mortgagee.”

While a still better view is given by Rev. Wm. Bliss, editor of the
Encyclopedia of Social Reform.[110] He says:

“The mortgage indicates a hope of progress, but also a slavery to
interest under which many sink.”

It is exactly the point of reality, for many propertied families borrow
money with the hope of getting economically better off, but the [SN:
DECEITFUL HOPES OF VERY MANY.] hopes mostly deceive them, and they find
themselves in the trap of slavery on account of paying too high rate of
interest for the loans they obtain. And it is this slavery to interest
that makes them absolutely propertyless, slaves to dividogenesure.

And it follows that the claim of Mr. Atkinson, that mortgages are
profitable to both the mortgagor and the mortgagee is only true in the
cases of paying the rates of interest not exceeding 3 per cent per
annum, which, however, does not exist in America. And if this rate had
been in existence, then, an effective application of all possible
agencies of production could make the mortgages profitable to the
mortgagors and the mortgagees. While under the present conditions they
are only ruinous to the former and most profitable to the latter.

But let us see the other view on mortgages which must be understood too.

“The view that America is becoming a nation [SN: SEMI-PESSIMISTIC
VIEWS.] of tenants is well known,” says Mr. J. P. Dunn, Jr., writing in
the Political Science Quarterly for March, 1890, after describing the
situation as regards the Western States.[111]

“BURDEN OF DEBT.”

“The mortgage indebtedness of the Western States is a matter worthy the
attention of economists [SN: MOUNTAINOUS AND IMMOVABLE.] and statesmen,
as well as of the people of those States. Whatever may be thought of its
effects, it is a fact—mountainous and immovable. And more, the
probabilities that loom far above the figures here presented make it
very questionable whether the alarmists who have discussed the subject
have in fact materially exaggerated the existing conditions. * * *

“If the people of the Western States may be considered thrifty and
judicious, the people of Michigan may, and by the official records their
condition appears to be as bad as that of their neighbors in Indiana. In
1887 an attempt was made by the bureau of statistics to ascertain the
mortgage debt of the State through personal declarations of the owners
of land. * * * The returns show (report of 1888) that the real estate
mortgages of the State amount to $129,229,553, with an annual interest
payment of $9,451,851 on [SN: AN EXAMPLE OF FORECLOSURES.] a total
realty valuation of $686,614,741. Of this amount $64,392,580 is on
farms, and the annual interest charge is $4,636,265,” which the farms
pay out of their produce. “The number of foreclosures made during the
year was 1,667, and in only 131 cases were redemptions made, leaving a
net loss of 1,536 pieces of property by foreclosure in one year. The
situation apparently justifies the statement of Commissioner Heath that
a very large per cent of the people seem to be in a financial rut, and
are unable to extricate themselves.”

Here you are. Mr. Dunn’s view is not an argument based upon an inference
from a guess, but on immovable facts of evidence which testify that the
State of Michigan [SN: LOSSES IN ADDITION TO LOSSES.] alone assists the
prosperity of the few wealthy families by the yearly contributions of
$9,451,851 worth of wealth produced by the labor energy of its debtors.
And that in addition to this contribution, the same debtors make a net
loss of 1,536 pieces of property by foreclosure in one year. That’s how
this civilized nation regulates the system of money-lending for helping
the people to live. And that’s how the civilized slavery is instituted.
It is by becoming mortgagors that the families pass from a bad degree of
slavery to a worse, until they lose all property, and become totally
helpless slaves of dividogenesure.

But do not flatter yourself by thinking that this is only the fate of
Michigan. No, the people’s economic conditions are more or less similar
in all the States and Territories, and some States are much worse off
than Michigan, as the statistics show their situation.

Mr. D. R. Goodloe, in the “Forum” for November, 1890 (not knowing yet
the facts of the East), says:

“The conclusion from this melancholy array of facts is irresistible. The
virgin soil of the West is rapidly ceasing to be the home and [SN: A
CURSE OF HUMANITY.] the possession of the sturdy American freeman. He is
but a tenant at will, or a dependent upon the tender mercies of soulless
corporations and of absentee landlords. We have abolished monarchy, and
primogeniture, and church establishments supported by the State, yet the
universal curse of humanity, the monopoly of the earth by the wealthy
few, remains.” * * *

And I can tell Mr. Goodloe that these few have monopolized, not only the
earth of the country, but also the hundreds of cities and towns,
together with their buildings, their capital, their natural and
artificial wealth, their houses, etc., etc., and the tens of millions of
the inhabitants of these towns and cities too, have been economically
enslaved, under the system of dividogenesure, to the same wealthy few.

CHAPTER VI.

CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH IN MONOPOLIES,
ETC.

The first and the second chapters have revealed to us that, since the
year 1890, there have been nearly 34-millions of individuals without
property in the United States. The third chapter has shown that about
one-half the results of their labor must be expended for the necessary
support of existence, while the other half must go to enrich the owners
of rentable farms and homes for which these owners draw incomes from the
propertyless, without any labor or without any expenditure of their own
energy. Besides this, out of the more than 47-millions of individuals in
the gainful pursuits,[112] there must have been hundreds of thousands of
families who have small properties, like homes, but their members have
been obliged to support themselves by laboring under the same conditions
of dividogenesure as did the propertyless.

If we admit then that there have been only 38,837,849 individuals in the
gainful pursuits absolutely under the principle [SN: DAILY INCOME FROM
THE POOR.] of dividogenesure, and that if one million families have
employed them in various ways, gaining 25 cents daily from each person
thus employed, the total daily income of these families would be
$9,709,462 per every day.[113] And if the labor year on an average, for
all, consists of 250 days, the yearly income of the million families
would amount to $2,327,365,500. This amount then would be yearly added
to the aggregate wealth of the fourth group of the 2d R. table, p. 47.
Though most of the income would go to only a few families among the
million.

And if the mortgagor families continued to exist even without an
increase in their numbers—which is really impossible, for the mortgages
certainly must have increased—and continued to pay the annual [SN:
INCOME FROM THE DEBTORS.] interest charge at the rate of $539,352,898,
as has been stated on pp. 125, 126, then the yearly income of the
wealthy families in the 4th group of the 2d R. table must have been
still greater than what they could get from the propertyless alone on
the condition of giving them employment, and renting them the rentable
farms and homes. In fact, the direct and indirect profit in favor of the
wealthy few from the application of the labor energy of the above
millions of the economically enslaved would amount to $20,067,028,786
worth of wealth during seven years. And what do we have?

Mr. G. B. Waldron, continuing the estimates of the increase of wealth by
the Director of the Mint, from 1870 to 1897, has shown that by 1890 the
increase [SN: INCREASE OF WEALTH.] of wealth had reached
$65,037,091,197, as has been already stated in several places, while in
1897 the increase amounted to $86,825,000,000 worth.[114] So that an
addition of $21,787,908,803 worth of wealth has been made by the
people’s energy during seven years. Yet, with this enormous increase of
the wealth in seven years, listen! listen! to what the statisticians
said in 1897:

“In the United States wealth has increased phenomenally; wages since
1873 have fallen (on account of too great supply of labor); the
concentration of capital has [SN: STATISTICAL CONCLUSIONS.] increased;
the number of the out of work has grown.”[115] Some men tried to
minimize the significance of these statements by proving the contrary
situation. Mr. Atkinson is one of those who said that “wages have risen
and prices fallen,” which view he entertained on the bases of government
reports. But all such arguments “have been shown in the article ‘Wages’
of Enc. of Soc. Reform, to be false.”[116] And Prof. Mayo Smith has
disproved all attempts of these men to show that the wages have risen,
on the whole, by showing the falsehood of the averages such men
represented in their arguments.[117]

Further, the fundamental doctrine of wages in economics is that the
rates of wages depend principally on the efficiency of labor and [SN:
THE ECONOMIC DOCTRINE OF THE RATE OF WAGES.] on supply and demand of
labor. That is, if the efficiency of the laborers is high, the wages can
be high, and if the demand is great and the number of the laborers
small, the wages are again high; but if the demand for laborers is
small, and the supply is large, the wages must naturally be low, whether
the efficiency of the laborers is high or low.

The wages in the United States since 1873, on the whole, have gradually
fallen, but not so low as they ought to have done. For, as [SN: WAGES
WOULD BE TWICE AS LOW.] the propertyless people have increased in
numbers up to tens of millions, the wages should have fallen twice as
low, otherwise only half the employees at a time should have employment,
because of the over-supply of laborers. But, since the trade-unions have
been organized, the wages have artificially been kept up (for the
employed) by these organizations, and by the employers themselves to
some extent.

“A trade union,” says Mr. Webb, “is a continuous association of
wage-earners for the purpose of maintaining or improving the conditions
of their employment.[118] The chief object of it is to elevate the
social position [SN: WAGES ARTIFICIALLY KEPT UP.] of its members. * * *
It is a union of individual forces in order to compete against the undue
and unfair encroachments of capital into the continuance of the
established well-being of the united individuals.”[119] Hence, “the
trade unions wish to keep up the rates of wages, and to prevent a
laborer from accepting employment, under stress of starvation, on terms
which in its common judgment would be injurious to the union’s
interests. And they would rather encourage idleness than cheap labor.
Such idea existed with them since the beginning, or when it originated.
This idea originated in 1741,” says Mr. Webb,[119] “but the special
enforcing of it commenced at the beginning of the eighteenth century.”
* * * And surely many an employer knows very well what the “Strike in
Detail” of the trade unions under this enforcing means.

The trade unions have used all the means in their power for the purpose
of holding up the wages. But, if the wages have fallen notwithstanding
the artificial support, their falling testifies to the presence of a
mightier force pressing them down.

In 1896 it was said that, “according to the last volume of the
Connecticut Labor Report and the Massachusetts Statistics of
Manufactures, the nominal rate of wages in [SN: GROSS INCOMES OF WORKERS
DECREASED.] 1894 had declined 7 per cent below the level of 1892, while
the yearly incomes of laborers had been still farther reduced by the
lack of employment.” The Connecticut Report testifies that wages for the
same period fell about 10 per cent, and it says that “the heavy losses
of the wage-earners, however, came not from reduced pay, but from
reduced employment, and that the reduction in pay and in the employment
had decreased the total wage-payments 25 per cent.” And “the great mass
of families in Connecticut had had their incomes reduced one-fourth,”
says Dr. Spahr.[120] So that, in Connecticut and Massachusetts,
together, “the family incomes of the laborers between 1892 and 1894 fell
at least 20 per cent. In Pennsylvania they fell 24 per cent. The fall of
wages in agriculture from 1890 to 1894 reduced the incomes of laborers
to the extent of 20 per cent.”[121] And the rents of houses, on the
whole, have risen against the homeless.

It is not necessary to multiply the same examples in the remaining
States, since we know that the supply of labor has increased throughout
in the United States; and since we know that the demand for labor has
proportionately decreased. And, consequently, the wages in general must
have fallen according to the fundamental principles of economics,
because of the increase of population without property and without
resources.

Now then, if the incomes of, say, 40-millions of individuals in the
gainful pursuits, have on the whole been reduced; and all these [SN: WHO
PROFITS BY THE INCREASE OF WEALTH?] millions of people have been made
worse off, we have the right to ask: Who was profited by the phenomenal
increase of wealth during the period of the seven years? In other words:
Who had obtained the amount of $21,787,908,803 worth, the increase of
wealth up to 1897? Is it the group of tenants, or the group of
mortgagors? or is it the group of owners of free farms and homes worth
$5,000 and under, as they are represented in the 2d R. table, p. 47? And
was it possible for all these highly productive families to retain a
goodly share of this phenomenal increase of the wealth?

The above total of the increased wealth, divided by the 7 years, gives,
on the average, an increase of $3,112,558,400 every year. It being, of
course, understood that this average was smaller in the year 1891, and
augmenting year by year, it became largest in the year 1897. And this
augmenting necessitates a progressive increase in the business of all
monopolies, trusts and combinations, highly increasing the gross and the
net incomes of all.

THE TOTAL ITEMS OF THE CONCENTRATION
OF WEALTH.

Let us then sum up the net earnings of the natural monopolies alone, as
they are given on p. 101, leaving out their necessary increase [SN:
PROFITS OF NATURAL MONOPOLIES.] consequent upon the unavoidable growth
of business in their favor during the seven years. The net earnings of
$563,689,333 by these monopolies in every year amount to $3,945,825,331
worth of wealth in seven years. This is one item of positive loss by
tens of millions of the people in favor of a few families, connected
with the monopolies.

Another item of similar earnings, we have seen on pp. 125, 126, consists
of the annual interest charge, equal to $539,352,898, from the results
of labor of the mortgagor [SN: PROFITS OF MORTGAGEE MONOPOLIES.]
families, who are compelled to lose this amount of their substance
yearly in consequence of the abnormal distribution of wealth in general.
And, as there is no reason to suppose that mortgages were not increasing
in their numbers, and the mortgagor families were not losing their
properties by foreclosure, so there is no reason whatever to suppose
that the above annual interest charge against mortgages, on the whole,
had diminished up to 1897. Hence, we consider that the above annual
interest charge continued to be paid at least as it was paid in 1890.
For, in order to diminish it or to stop its ruinous effects, some
important reform must be accomplished, which, however, has not been
done.

The annual interest charge of $539,352,898, against the private
family-mortgages, in seven years amounts to $3,775,470,286 worth of
wealth or of the products of the mortgagor families, lost during the
period in favor of group 4 of the 2d table (p. 45 or 47). This amount is
in addition to “the net earnings of $3,945,825,331, which accrued to the
same group of families in the table.

Further, we have seen in the lower table, p. 116, that there were
4,999,396 families that hire their homes, because being homeless. [SN:
MONOPOLIZERS OF RENTABLE HOMES.] And this number of the homeless must be
augmented by 246,938 families, found in the group of the “tenants of
farms and homes,” which are represented by the author of the same 2d
table to be so many more than the lower and upper tables, p. 116,
contain of the tenant families. We have therefore to deal with 5,246,334
families that hire their homes[122] mainly in the 448 cities and towns
we have spoken about on pp. 81, 114-15, 132. For it is they that find
shelter in the rentable houses of these cities, towns, etc., by paying
rents. And our problem is to find the amount of rent they paid to the
owners of these houses.

An example of average monthly rentals may here be presented for Boston,
as follows:

Monthly rentals under $5 average $4
From $5 to $10 average 8
From $10 to $15 average 12½
From $15 to $20 average 16⅔
From $20 to $25 average 22[123]

These averages may be too small for many cities and too large for the
whole United States. But if we take the general average for all [SN: PER
FAMILY HOUSE RENT.] families at $9.50 a month, it will probably be
little below,[124] but cannot be above the true one. In fact, if every
family of 4.93 members paid an average of $9.50 of monthly rent, it
would indicate only the net income in favor of the owners of the
rentable houses, and absolute losses on the side of the homeless.

Now then, by paying $9.50 a month each, the 5,246,334 homeless families
paid $598,082,076 rent in one year. And by paying the same amount seven
years, without regarding the increase of families, they paid
$4,186,574,532 worth of their energy, as an unavoidable tribute to those
that speculate in their comfortable beds, while performing every action
by the hired labor of agents and building new houses by hired laborers.

Furthermore, we have seen in the upper table, p. 116, that there were
other 1,624,765 families that hire their farms, because being landless.

If we regard the average tenements of these families at 136 acres of
land per family,[125] we shall [SN: MONOPOLIES OF RENTABLE LANDS.] find
that the 1,624,765 tenant families held about 220,968,040 acres of land
every year. Although this general average for all farmers in the United
States may be a little too small for the tenant families, because their
acreage increases much more rapidly than that of the families owning
their farms, as we shall soon see, yet we shall consider this average as
it is given.

As to the average rent per acre of the farming land for the United
States, the general average was $2.81 for wheat and $3.03 for corn
raising lands.[126]

Supposing, however, that many farm tenants hold the grazing and other
less valued lands, let us even admit that the general average rent per
acre was only $2.75 for all lands hired by these tenants.

By paying then $2.75 of rent per acre, the 1,624,765 tenant families
paid $607,662,110 in one year for the 220,968,040 acres of land [SN: THE
PROFITS OF LAND MONOPOLIES.] that does not belong to them. And by paying
the same amount seven years—from 1891 to 1897 inclusive—they paid
$4,253,634,770 worth of wealth to a number of the speculators upon land
and upon the energy of the farmers who are the slaves of dividogenesure.
It follows that every farming family of this group, on the average, paid
about $374 for the land alone.

It seems, however, that there are many farm tenants that pay separate
rents for the farm houses. And in the year 1890 these paid [SN: HOUSE
RENT ON FARMS.] the total of $140,000,000 of the house rent, says Dr. C.
B. Spahr.[127] By paying this rent seven years they paid an additional
amount of $980,000,000 worth of their crystallized energy. Including
this total into the general total of house rents, let us now sum up the
above losses of the productive people, which are the gains of the few
monopolists and speculators for the seven years as follows in the 1st
table of concentration of wealth on the next page:

1st Table of Concentration of Wealth.

-----------------------------------+------------------
Monopolies and Combinations. |Total Net Incomes.
-----------------------------------+------------------
The natural monopolies[128] |$ 3,945,825,331
Mortgagee monopolies[128] | 3,775,470,286
Companies, etc. of rentable houses | 5,166,574,532
Monopolies of rentable lands | 4,253,634,770
-----------------------------------+------------------
Grand total |$17,141,504,919
-----------------------------------+------------------

Even this grand total indicates that a nation of thirty millions of
individuals would be rich by it, yet it does not include many other net
incomes.

Besides these certain facts, the highest rentals derived from the
offices, hotels, and other rentable properties found in the central
parts of the cities above and below 100,000 population are to be
ascertained. And no one will doubt that the comparatively very few
owners of these city-centers must have collectively drawn a greater
amount of the net incomes from rent, than can be expressed by three
billion dollars’ worth of wealth, derived without work by the few owners
of the most valuable parts, especially of the 28 cities far above
100,000 population.

Further, we have not treated the net earnings of the companies and
combinations filling up the large storehouses of the wholesale and
retail business in the same great cities, which distribute the
industrial products of the people, for consumption at home and abroad.
And while the distribution of these products is carried on by cheap
laborers, we have not represented here the few monopolists that grow
into multi-millionaires behind the busy work of the distribution. The
net incomes of these will be included into the incomes of the
Manufacture and Mechanical Trades hereafter.

But further still, we entirely omit the indication of the net earnings
of “the meat companies” in the large cities, like those of the Chicago
stockyards, “the cattle companies, [SN: THE TRUSTS’ NET INCOMES
OMITTED.] uniting more than $100,000,000; combinations of the millions,
invested in the elevators of the Northwest against the wheat-growers; in
whiskey and beer about $100,000,000; in sugar, $75,000,000; in leather
over $100,000,000 (1894). The trust of piano-makers was to have a
capital of $50,000,000, and there is the Cordage Trust that gets from 40
to 50 per cent on its capital; the Cotton Seed Oil Trust and Lard Trust”
and others.[129]

Finally, we have not treated the earnings of some other well-known
monopolies, trusts and combinations, which have, as all the others, been
established with no other purpose or end in view than to draw from the
productive people all they can for themselves by means of speculation.
For, drawing wealth by combined speculation is the easiest thing in the
world for those who were enabled to make its beginning.

Omitting the above trusts and combinations, because of the uncertainty
of their net earnings, we have positive means to find out the [SN:
OWNERS OF THE CENTRAL PARTS OF THE CITIES.] highest rentals of all
central parts of the cities and towns spoken of before. In estimating
the total income of the nation for the year 1890, Dr. Spahr found that
“the total income from house and office rents, as estimated in the text”
(his text) “is one-seventh of the total income of the non-agricultural
population.”[130] And the total income of the latter population was
$8,200,000,000,[131] one-seventh of which is equal to $1,171,428,571
3-7—apart from the agricultural land rents. This one-seventh, then, paid
seven times in seven years, amounted to the same $8,200,000,000, which
amount shows that the owners of the central parts of the cities and
towns obtained at least $3,033,425,468 rent from their properties.

It does not, however, make a difference whether we accept the whole
amount of rent estimated by Dr. Spahr or simply add the three billions
and over to our grand total, p. 150. In any way, these facts indicate
that the wealth has concentrated with the very families that were
enormously wealthy in 1890 and appeared to be much wealthier in 1897.

Yet the concentration of wealth is not only very rapid in drawing the
wealth of all the 11,190,152 families worth $5,000 and under[132] to
[SN: CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH IN HIGHER SPHERES.] a very few families of
the 4th group in the 2d table,[133] but it is also rapid among the
families worth $5,000 and over,[134] so that all are crushed by the
monopolies, the trusts and combinations. In order to illustrate it, I
here quote the same authority that estimated the increase of the wealth
from 1890 to 1897 before making a conclusion from the foregoing,
respecting industries, as follows:

“As to development of ‘the’ trusts before 1890,” Mr. G. B. Waldron says:

“Of the manufacturing and mechanical industries, whose statistics were
returned in the census [SN: TRUSTS IN INDUSTRIES.] of 1890, there are 43
whose manufactured product for the year 1889 was about $30,000,000,
whose capital averaged above $10,000 per establishment, and which
admitted of comparison with the census of 1880. Of these 43 industries
we have chosen 30 as especially illustrating the growing concentration
of capital during the 10 years from 1880 to 1890.

“It is a significant fact that while in 1880 these industries were
carried on by 84,708 establishments, or about 33 per cent of the total
number of manufacturing establishments of the country, the same
industries in 1890 were carried on by only 69,659 establishments, or
about 22 per cent of the total establishments, and fewer in number by
over 15,000 than in 1880.

“The value of the total product of these 30 industries in 1880 was
$3,125,915,574, or 58 per cent of the total manufacturing products of
the country. In 1890 these same industries produced products to the
value of $4,595,804,626, or about 51 per cent of the total product.

“The concentration of capital in these 30 industries is shown from the
fact that in 1880 their total capital was $1,735,577,540, or an average
of $20,489 per establishment, while in 1890 their total capital reached
$3,468,277,249, or $49,789 per establishment, a gain of 143 per cent in
10 years. There has been a similar concentration of employees in these
industries. In 1880 the 84,708 establishments used 1,340,490 employees,
or an average of 16 to an establishment. In 1890 there were 1,964,232
employees in these industries, or an average of 28 to an
establishment.”[135]

This is a separate and an additional item of the concentration of wealth
which undoubtedly continued—from 1890 to 1897—to farther aggravate the
general situation, shown by the grand total of the net incomes in favor
of monopolies, on p. 150, beside the uncertain ones.

For the 30 different industries, taken out of the 43, have perhaps
forever supplanted 15,049 factories and other establishments in ten
years. During the same time the supplanters did much more than double
their own capital. In fact the increase in the capital of these
supplanters reached the amount of $1,732,699,709 over the capital they
had in 1880.

But, if Mr. Waldron would investigate the same facts in the total number
of industries, he could probably show us that the supplanting of
different establishments reached at least 21,586, and that the increase
of capital reached over two billion dollars’ worth with the fewer
supplanters. That is, if the above rate of concentration of the capital
were the same, as it must have been, throughout the industrial
operations in the entire country.

And while there was also the concentration of the employees, we know
that, with the astonishing increase of the capital in favor of the
supplanting trusts, the wages of these employees have fallen,[136]
notwithstanding that their highly productive labor enormously increased
the capital of the fewer employers.

As regards the fall of wages in all the manufacturing industries since
1890, it will not be out of place to state here the minimum injury
thereby sustained by the employees in the seven years under our
consideration.

When all the available data of the Eleventh Census were published, Dr.
Spahr started to estimate the total income of the nation for the year
1890. In estimating it he found out that the total income of the
manufacture and mechanical trades alone amounted to $2,790,000,000,
including their net profits of $1,116,000,000 for the year. The total
number of persons engaged in these trades was 5,091,000, of whom
4,650,000 were wage-earners, while the remaining 441,000 were officers,
firm members and clerks. Disregarding these, the average of actual wages
of the wage-earners for the year was $360. After that year these meager
wages, by reduction and unemployment, “had decreased 25 per cent,” says
Dr. Spahr.[137]

But if we regard the average reduction of these wages at 10 cents a day
only, and the average labor year at 250 days, leaving thus [SN: SPECIAL
LOSSES OF THE WAGE-EARNERS.] a sufficient room for unemployment, we then
find that the 4,650,000 wage-earners were losing $116,250,000 every
year. And distributing the same losses over seven years, they have lost
$813,750,000 worth of their energy in favor of the trusts and
combinations. The losses, however, have been greater than this amount,
although we consider only this minimum, which is simply an increase in
the injustice brought about by the principle of dividogenesure.

But while the real producers of wealth thus constantly lose their energy
in products, the net profits of the trusts of these industries for the
year 1890 amounted to $1,116,000,000.[138] This great yearly income [SN:
NET INCOMES OF THE TRUSTS.] excludes all expenses, and excludes even the
yearly waste of machinery, tools, and of the other capital used in
operations. Obtaining such profits seven times in seven years, these
trusts have profited themselves by about $7,812,000,000. And these
enormous profits accrued to them for nothing more than the trouble of
buying the machinery and other capital that the real producers of wealth
operated upon, mostly under hired supervision. And while the human and
mechanical forces work out these results, the real beneficiaries do
nothing but speculate on the ways of concentrating the entire increase
of wealth to their hands.

The speculative efficiency of these trusts and the profound injustice of
it will be more apparent, if we remember that these profits do, not only
imply the systematic extortion of the crystallized energy of the real
producers of wealth by means of exorbitancy in dividogenesure, but they
imply a similar extortion from the public at large, which consume the
products of these industries for excessive payments.

The question of the “excess of selling price over the cost of
production” in these industries has been well ascertained. A cost of
production according to economists, implies [SN: COST OF PRODUCTION.]
cost of materials used; salaries, wages, rent, taxes, insurance, repairs
paid; waste of machinery, instruments, and of other capital valued; in
short, it implies all expenses, including reasonable percentage on stock
and reasonable remuneration for the troubles of capitalists and
entrepreneurs. And all these expenses must be collected by means of
selling prices from consumers of the products. While what is
unreasonable in such prices under ordinary circumstances is called an
“excess of selling price over the cost of production.” This excess was
raised by the trusts up to 12.95 per cent in 1890.[139]

If then we take the selling prices even of the total profits of
$1,116,000,000 of the manufacture and mechanical trades for the year
1890,[140] and subtract this excess from [SN: EXTORTION FROM THE
PUBLIC.] it, we find that the excess amounted to $144,522,000 in one
year. Admitting that the above percentage sustained some fluctuations,
we cannot but think that, with the increasing activity in combinations
of the trusts, this percentage of the excess must have increased soon
after that year. So that the average of it, from 1891 to 1897 inclusive,
must have been carried on by the trusts in different ways and means. If
so, then they must have exacted from the consuming public fully
$1,011,654,000 worth of its wealth, as an excess of selling price over
the cost of production of the goods consumed. This loss of the public
wealth, of course, does not exclude the losses of the families worth
$5,000 and over; nor does it include any relation to exports of the
products of these trades. The loss simply indicates an extortion from
the public by perverted morality and profound selfishness of the
combines.

The next item in the concentration of wealth has been drawn from the
agricultural regions.

It has been estimated that the wages and earnings of all farmers from
1890 to 1895 have fallen over 20 per cent;[141] and that 8,497,000
persons engaged in agriculture [SN: SPECIAL LOSSES OF THE FARMERS.] have
suffered from the fall, according to the estimates of Dr. Spahr,[142]
which he based upon various reports. If, however, we admit only 10 cents
of this loss from every person, every labor day, in favor of the various
monopolies, trusts and combinations which use the raw materials and
transport the agricultural materials and products, we find that in about
266 working days in one year the above people lost $226,020,200 worth of
their products. Distributing these losses equally over seven years we
find that these people have lost and the monopolies, etc., have gained
about $1,582,141,400 worth of their wealth for nothing. And this is only
the minimum loss that was carried throughout the period of seven years,
as constant drain.

Another item of similar losses is represented by the 350,000 miners
whose wages since 1890 have fallen “exceptionally low.”[143] So that it
would be perfectly safe to regard [SN: SPECIAL LOSSES OF THE MINERS.]
the average fall in their daily wages at 15 cents, and the labor year at
266 days, allowing again for a possible unemployment. This being so,
they have lost about $13,965,000 in one year. And as their average wages
did not really rise again during the period under consideration, they
must, therefore, have lost about $97,755,000 worth of their labor energy
in favor of the mining trusts and monopolies. While the profits of these
monopolies in 1890 amounted to $80,000,000,[143] when the total income
was $210,000,000 which we leave out of further consideration. [SN:
PROFITS OF THE MINING MONOPOLIES.] The $80,000,000 profits must
naturally have increased with these monopolies. But even if repeated as
they were in that year, they must have amounted to $560,000,000 during
the seven years. Considering the excess of selling price over the cost
of production here at the rate of 12.95 per cent, this amount of net
profits includes $72,520,000 worth of the public losses, of
unjustifiable extortion.

Beside all this, I find the telephone and telegraph monopolies[144] had
an increase of $229,624,566, and the railroad monopolies[144] of
$80,377,053 in their net earnings over and above the amount on pp. 101,
150. The same course is true of many other monopolies and combinations.

And as Henry B. Brown, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme
Court, in an address at the Yale Law School, June 24, 1895, said:

“If no student can light his lamp without paying to one company; if no
housekeeper can buy a pound of meat or of sugar without [SN: ALL
PRODUCTS ABSORBED BY COMBINATIONS.] swelling the receipts of two or
three all pervading trusts, what is to prevent the entire productive
industry of the country becoming ultimately absorbed by a hundred
gigantic corporations?”[145] The foregoing facts clearly show that the
corporations, whether under boards of trustees or under directors of
monopolies, with the principle of dividogenesure do, not only absorb the
entire mass of products of the people, but absorb even the wealth that
was formerly produced and now being gradually lost.

But let us now turn to the meaning of the increase of the population in
connection with the preceding facts and estimates for the seven years.
The table on the next page shows it.

Increase of Population.

+----------------------+-----------++----------------------+-----------+
| Years. Individuals. | Percents || Years. Individuals. | Percents |
| | in Cities.|| | in Cities.|
+----------------------+-----------++----------------------+-----------+
| 1790 3,929,214 | 3.35 || 1850 23,191,897 | 12.49 |
| 1800 5,308,463 | 3.97 || 1860 31,443,321 | 16.13 |
| 1810 7,239,881 | 4.93 || 1870 38,588,371 | 20.93 |
| 1820 9,633,822 | 4.93 || 1880 50,155,783 | 22.57 |
| 1830 12,866,020 | 6.72 || 1890 62,622,250 | 29.20 |
| 1840 17,069,453 | 8.52 || 1897 71,551,571 | [146] |
+----------------------+-----------++----------------------+-----------+

The preceding table shows that, from 1891 to 1897 inclusively, the
population of the United States increased by about 8,929,321
individuals, or, distributing this [SN: INCREASE OF POPULATION.] number
over seven years, the increase will be 1,250,000 souls in each
successive year. And the approximate proportions of this increase
indicate that every year about 105,665 new families were reproduced by
the 5,246,334 families that hire their homes; and about 31,698 by the
1,624,765 families that hire their farms, leaving out here the
propertied. And the heritage of these 137,363 newly formed families
under the conditions is to be homeless and landless subjects of
dividogenesure, even as their unfortunate parents are. For scarcely any
of them could acquire property and thus escape paying rent.

If then we conclude that the one set of the newly born families
consisted of the tenants of rentable [SN: RENT PAID FOR HOUSES.] homes,
while the other of the tenants rentable farms, we must admit that they
paid at least the same average rents for homes and farms as their
parents did. Therefore, the first set per family paid $9.50 a month as
follows:

Table of the House Rent Paid.

105,665 families in 7 years paid $ 84,320,670
105,665 families in 6 years paid 72,274,860
105,665 families in 5 years paid 60,229,050
105,665 families in 4 years paid 48,183,240
105,665 families in 3 years paid 36,137,430
105,665 families in 2 years paid 24,091,620
105,665 families in 1 year paid 12,045,810
------- ------------
739,655 Total $337,282,680

Thus the homeless families of the year 1891 paid the largest amount of
the house rents up to the [SN: RENT PAID FOR FARMS.] end of 1897.
Meanwhile the other yearly additions of the new families paid less and
less, on account of having been younger in age. The number of the
increased families renting houses, then, was 739,655, and the total of
the rent they paid was $337,282,680.

The increased families of the farming occupations, by having paid the
average rent of $2.75 per acre, for the average of 136 acres of land per
family,[147] have paid sums as follows:

Table of Rent Paid for Land:

31,698 families in 7 years paid $ 82,985,364
31,698 families in 6 years paid 71,130,312
31,698 families in 5 years paid 59,275,260
31,698 families in 4 years paid 47,420,208
31,698 families in 3 years paid 35,565,156
31,698 families in 2 years paid 23,710,104
31,698 families in 1 year paid 11,855,052
------- ------------
221,886 Total $331,941,456

That’s what the increase of the homeless and landless population means.
The newly formed families could neither avoid paying the rents in favor
of the same landed and propertied rich; nor could they avoid paying
indirect taxes in favor of the national government, as we shall soon
see. And they could not avoid being the slaves of dividogenesure, nor of
being victims of extortion by various trusts and monopolies. In making
our final conclusion of the profits and losses, the above amounts of
$669,224,136 worth of paid rents by the increased families will be
included into the previous totals of house and land rents.

But, in respect to all farmers’ rents and the average acreage, it should
again be noticed that we have dealt only with minimums of their
expenditure in favor of the land monopolies. [SN: INCREASE OF RENTED
FARMS.] For, “according to the _abstract_ of the eleventh census (p.
97), farms cultivated by their owners increased 9.56 per cent; rented
farms, 41.04 per cent, and farms rented for a share in product,[148]
19.65 per cent. In the north central division farms cultivated by their
owners increased less than 1 per cent, while rented farms increased 66
per cent. In the North Atlantic division, rented farms increased only 6
per cent, while farms cultivated by their owners actually diminished.
The farmers thus complain that they are losing possession of their farms
and becoming tenant farmers.”[149]

On p. 112 we have seen the enormous amount of indebtedness on the owned
farms in the United States.[150] “The percentage of incumbered farms
was, for the United [SN: PERCENTAGE OF INDEBTED FARMS.] States, 47;
Kansas, 30; Iowa, 32; New Jersey and Mississippi, 34; Nebraska,
Delaware, and South Carolina, 35; South Dakota, 39; and at the other
extreme, Oklahoma, 95; Utah and New Mexico, 85; Arizona and Idaho, 74;
Montana, 73; Maine, 71.”[151] This economic state of the farms and
farmers continued to exist from 1890. Consequently there is enough
evidence to make one sure that thousands of farm mortgagors have lost
their mortgaged farms by foreclosure, and have become merely tenant
farmers without real property. The increase of the propertyless through
mortgages may even be greater than through the increase of the
population, though we regard only the latter.

Seeing also that the “Principal of Public Debt” has increased from
$1,549,206,126 in 1890 to $2,092,686,024 in 1899,[152] it is probable,
therefore, that the indebtedness of private families [SN: INCREASE OF
PUBLIC DEBT.] has also greatly increased up to the end of 1897. Yet,
except the annual interest charge against the indebtedness in force from
1890, neither the increase of the mortgage losses, nor the increase of
the gains from them, has entered into our accounts, even as the great
net earnings of the non-national banks, often drawing immense profits
from mortgages, etc., have been totally omitted from our estimate.[153]

If, therefore, there should be any decrease in the few unrevised net
earnings of the natural monopolies after 1890,[154] the net earnings of
the above banks alone would abundantly fill up the loss with a great
remaining superfluity. Seeing also that the cities grow and the
population increases, increasing every business in favor of the same
monopolies, no one will doubt that our conclusions will be moderate, and
especially so, because we have failed to ascertain the net incomes of
several trusts.

As to the trusts, the American Anti-Trust Journal, No. 3, Chicago, says:
“Go and talk to the thousands of commercial travelers—those skirmishers
on the firing line of commercial independence—who have been thrown out
of employment by the trusts. They will tell you of hundreds and hundreds
of business men who have been forced out of business within the last
four or five years. They will tell you how the trusts ordered one man
after another to close his establishment. They will give you the names
of ambitious and thriving proprietors who are now clerks or agents of
gigantic corporate combinations, all hope dead, all opportunity gone.”
Dealing as it does with the trusts of still later development, the array
of facts in this Journal shows that our final conclusions for 1897 can
only be very moderate.

This being so, and disregarding the crooked ways of making profits, let
us then make up the complete summary of the preceding losses by the
United States people during the period from 1891 to 1897 inclusive, as
follows:

2d Table of the Concentration of Wealth.

----------------------------------+--------------------
Monopolies and Combinations. | Total Net Incomes.
----------------------------------+--------------------
The natural monopolies[155] | $ 4,255,826,950
Mortgagee monopolies[156] | 3,775,470,286
Owners of rentable houses[157] | 5,503,857,212
Monopolies of rentable lands[158] | 4,585,276,226
Owners of rentable offices, etc., |
in cities | 3,033,425,468
Manufacture and mechanical trades | 7,812,000,000
Mining monopolies | 560,000,000
----------------------------+--------------------
Grand total | $29,526,156,142
National and local taxes paid by |
them[159] | 3,455,963,952
+--------------------
THE TOTAL CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH | $26,070,192,190
|
The total increase of national |
wealth | 21,787,908,803
----------------------------------+--------------------
Excess of net incomes over and |
above the total increase of the |
national wealth | $ 4,282,283,387
----------------------------------+--------------------

The above table of the net incomes shows the conclusions that must
deeply astonish the thinking people. It shows that a “terrible change
has occurred in the conditions of life in America within fifteen or
twenty years.” But this concentration of wealth has taken place within
seven years, when the national expenditures for wars and the incomes of
monopolies and trusts started to increase. The latter obtained
$26,070,192,190.

Think of this total concentration of the wealth in seven years! It is
twenty-six thousand seventy millions of dollars’ worth of wealth. [SN:
TOTAL LOSS OF WEALTH.] While the total increase of the national wealth,
during the same time, only amounted to $21,787,908,803, which was
entirely concentrated in the hands of monopolies and combinations,
together with the additional concentration of yet another amount of
$4,282,283,387. This astonishing fact indicates that the _net income of
about one million families in the United States has been greater by
$4,282,283,387 than the total increase of the wealth collectively
produced by the nation_ during the period under consideration.

The whole increase of the wealth then has been lost in favor of the few.
But what does this over four billion dollars difference between the
total increase and the total net incomes of the monopolies and
combinations mean in view of the situation? Where does this over four
billion dollars’ worth of wealth come from?

This surplus amount of $4,282,283,387 of the net incomes certainly
cannot mean anything else than that the families, unconnected with
monopolies, trusts, and other combinations were quickly eating up [SN:
LOSS OF THE PREVIOUS WEALTH.] themselves. They not only have absolutely
lost all that they produced during the time of seven years, but have
also lost $4,282,283,387 worth of the wealth which they owned in 1890.
So that the aggregate of about $9,260,228,000 worth of wealth which was
owned by the 11,190,152 “families worth $5,000 and under”[160] in that
year, must have been greatly reduced by monopolies, trusts and
combinations. There cannot be any doubt, too, that hundreds of thousands
of the “families worth $5,000 and over”[160] have also suffered from the
same causes. Hence, the absolute loss of $4,282,283,387 worth of the
previously owned wealth must have been shared by all in favor of the
very few families whose undoubted prosperity has indeed been unusual.
For they have concentrated the enormous total of over $26,000,000,000
worth of the people’s wealth in seven years, and have thus made the
greatly increased population much poorer in 1897 than it was in the year
1890.

And this fact of growing poverty has not been unsuspected. For, if Mr.
W. H. Mallock, in trying to prove the contrary, admits “that the rich”
in England “do grow [SN: THE POOR GROW ABSOLUTELY POORER.] richer and
the poor grow relatively poorer, because their numbers increase,
although it seems that in the distribution of wealth a greater share (of
it) falls on their part.”[161] As for the United States, it was also
said that “since 1873 the poor have grown relatively, if not absolutely
poorer.”[162] The method used here for establishing this fact leaves no
doubt that the rich in both countries do grow absolutely richer and the
well-to-do and the poor in the United States do grow relatively and
absolutely poorer: accordingly, “the largest fortunes” in this country
“are increasing most rapidly,” says Dr. Charles R. Henderson.[163]

The reasons why “the largest fortunes are increasing most rapidly” have
already been indicated in this and in the preceding chapters. The most
potent of these [SN: THE REASONS WHY THE RICH GROW ABSOLUTELY RICHER.]
reasons are: 1. The profoundly unjust and abnormal principle of
dividogenesure, which further and further underrates the value of human
labor energy and overrates the value of mechanical forces in favor of
the wealthy. 2. The too high percentages for loans and capital, which
deprive mortgagors of the fruits of their labor and cause the losses of
property. 3. Abnormal excess of selling prices over cost of production,
and lowering prices on raw materials. 4. Different frauds and extortions
carried on by means of “watering-stock” and so on. All these and other
unjustifiable means are freely used by monopolies and combinations
against the general well-being of the United States people who are
constantly robbed and speculated upon by a very few members of the
nation.

As an example of the stock-watering by railroad monopolies, I introduce
here the exact paragraphs of Dr. Spahr who, after representing the table
of figures of stocks and bonds and the cost of railroads to original
investors, says:

“It should be observed, however, that the sum upon which the public is
paying interest is not the total capitalization of the railroads, nor
even the stocks and bonds not [SN: EXTORTION FROM THE PUBLIC.] held by
other railroads, but rather the sum upon which five per cent net is
realized by the roads. This sum in 1890 was $6,627,000,000.[164] Not
from the standpoint of socialism, but from the standpoint of common
morality, which condemns as robbery both the refusal of the public to
pay interest upon capital actually lent it, and the compelling of the
public to pay interest on capital never lent it, _the two thousand and
odd millions of railroad capital representing no investment_[165] is
simply capitalized extortion.

“But not even the fruits of this extortion have gone to the original
investors. The expenditures of railroads and the dividends they declare
[SN: DIRECTORS OF THE HIGHWAYS.] have been so largely in the hands of
loosely controlled directors, that railroad construction, railroad
purchases, and railroad speculation have all served as means to divert
the property of the stockholders on the outside, into the pockets of the
managers on the inside. Nearly all the profits of this extortion from
the public have passed into the hands of a comparatively few men
intrusted with the management of the public highways.”[166] These
passages simply indicate another way of extortion from the public of the
wealth it creates.

In addition to these crooked ways of concentrating all that the public
has and all it produces, [SN: THE TAXES.] let us examine the amounts of
the direct and indirect taxes paid by the wealthy and the poor during
the same time of seven years. Upon this subject Dr. Spahr speaks as
follows:

“When we consider only the revenues actually received by the government
the conclusion inevitably [SN: THE PROPORTIONS OF INDIRECT TAXES.]
reached is that the wealthy class pays less than one-tenth of the
indirect taxes, the well-to-do class less than one-quarter and the
relatively poorer classes more than two-thirds. The table summing up the
incidence of these taxes in 1890 would stand as follows:

+-------------------+---------------+----------------+-------------+
| Class of Incomes. | Total Incomes | Total Property | National |
| | in Dollars. | in Dollars. | Taxes +
| | | | in Dollars. |
+-------------------+---------------+----------------+-------------+
| $5,000 and over | 3,110,000,000 | 35,500,000,000 | 35,000,000 |
| $5,000 to $1,200 | 2,890,000,000 | 21,500,000,000 | 85,000,000 |
| Under $1,200 | 4,800,000,000 | 9,000,000,000 | 260,000,000 |
+-------------------+---------------+----------------+-------------+

+-------------------+---------------------+
| Class of Incomes. | Taxation to |
| +---------+-----------+
| | Income. | Property. |
+-------------------+---------+-----------+
| $5,000 and over | .01 | .001 |
| $5,000 to $1,200 | .03 | .004 |
| Under $1,200 | .05 | .028 |
+-------------------+---------+-----------+

The above table of indirect taxes indicates that the poorer classes
(including the homeless and landless) which had only little over
$9,000,000,000 worth of the aggregate wealth, paid more than twice as
much of these taxes as did the well-to-do and the wealthy classes taken
together. Dr. Spahr, therefore, adds:

“In the domain of direct taxation such injustice would not be tolerated
one month, [SN: THE INDIRECT TAXES PAID.] but in the domain of indirect
taxation it is endured year after year.”[167] So that, enduring similar
injustice seven years—from 1891 to 1897 inclusive, the increased number
of families paid the totals of indirect taxes approximately as follows:

Table of Indirect Taxes Paid, 1891-7.

The fact that the total revenue, including customs, etc., received by
the government in the seven years amounted to $2,319,179,059,[168]
indicates, that while the population has increased, the indirect taxes
seem to have decreased by $340,820,941 below [SN: THE TAXATION MOST
UNJUST TO THE POOR.] the amount which would be required by the rates
paid in 1890. This diminution would average about $48,688,705 in each
successive year, and may be due to the passage of the Wilson Bill.
Although Dr. Spahr says that this bill has not materially changed the
situation, because the poorer classes, as we see, have paid $639,179,057
more for the support of the government than did the well-to-do and the
wealthy classes together. He therefore adds that “our system of national
taxation remains in proportion to its weight the most unjust to poorer
classes of any now tolerated in any popularly governed country.”[169] Of
course, “the situation was the most unjust,” when the families worth
$5,000 and under were smaller in numbers and when they owned over
$9,000,000,000 worth of collective wealth. But the injustice now
surpasses all degrees of comparison, because these families increased by
about 1,565,158, even without counting the families worth $5,000 and
over whose wealth must have been reduced below the worth of $5,000.

As to the distribution of local taxes in the year 1890, these were paid
as follows:

TABLE OF LOCAL TAXES PAID.

Families with incomes of $5,000 and over $220,000,000
Families with incomes of $5,000 to $1,200 170,000,000
Families with incomes of under $1,200 125,000,000[170]

From this table it is clear that the local taxation is not so unjustly
imposed upon the poorer families as the indirect taxation [SN: LOCAL
TAXATION IS LESS UNJUST.] is.[171] Yet judging from the facts that the
above table represents gross incomes, and that the poorer classes lose
all the wealth they produce in favor of monopolies and combinations, the
injustice against these classes cannot again be regarded other than a
profound injustice. For, having been paid seven years—from 1891 to 1897
inclusive—these taxes amount to as follows:

Table of Local Taxes Paid.

As to these taxes Dr. Spahr says that “from the incomes less than $1,200
less than three per cent is taken; from the incomes above $5,000 seven
per cent is taken. Nevertheless, even these relatively [SN: THE TOTALS
OF TAXES PAID IN SEVEN YEARS.] humane burdens rest twice as heavily upon
the property of the poorer classes as upon the property of the rich.
When these local taxes are joined with the national, the aggregate tax
is one-twelfth of the income of every class. There is no exemption of
wages. All the resourceless individuals,[172] even the absolute slaves
of dividogenesure, who divide the results of their labor with the
wealthy, are compelled to pay taxes from their wages. And “the
wealthiest class is taxed less than one per cent on its property,” says
Dr. C. B. Spahr, “while the mass of the people are taxed more than four
per cent on theirs.”[173] Consequently we see that the 1,695,117
families whose wealth, at the end of 1897, aggregated to $79,325,000,000
worth, paid $3,455,963,952 of the national and local taxes. While the
12,755,310 families whose aggregate wealth, at the same time, was
reduced to about $7,000,000,000 worth, also paid $2,354,179,059 of these
taxes, though these families could not have any net income at all.

Whatever might be the gross income of the 12,755,310 increased families
under the network of imposition spread by the combines, they could not
have any net income [SN: THE PROPERTYLESS IN 1897.] at all, because at
the end of 1897 these families represented about 63,150,136 individuals
of a multiple expenditure in every individual case. And as these
families include about 7,832,640 propertyless families which represented
about 38,785,279 homeless individuals, each of which in addition to his
multiple expenditure, is obliged to pay rent for shelter and to pay for
permission to labor, the multiple expenditure of every one of these,
therefore, surpasses that of each individual of the remainder of the
population.

It would, however, be wrong to suppose that we had only 7,832,640
propertyless families at the end of the period. For beside these
families there were thousands of the mortgagor [SN: NOT ALL THE
PROPERTYLESS COUNTED YET.] families in the beginning of 1891 which held
the last pieces of the mortgaged property. And they could not but lose
the very last under the heavy pressure of the combines and of the
taxation, thus becoming propertyless, too, though we are unable at
present to ascertain their number. Yet we may be sure of the fact, that
the more propertyless families we have, the more house and farm rent
they must pay to the wealthy; and hence the more rapid the concentration
of the wealth and more extensive slavery of dividogenesure must be
caused thereby.

It would also be groundless to think that the years 1898 and 1899 have
altered the firmly established [SN: THE YEARS AFTER 1897.] machinery of
concentration of the national wealth. No, the concentration of wealth in
these two years has undoubtedly been more rapid than in any two previous
years. For the trusts, etc., have been more active, and have obtained
greater net incomes on account of the war than in any two years before.
While in addition to the [SN: THE TAXES INCREASED.] more rapid
concentration of wealth by the combines, the war revenue caused a great
increase in the rates of the indirect taxes, etc. And since “these taxes
were imposed by Congress, under the Revenue Act approved June 13, 1898,”
both the propertied and the propertyless people continue to pay them up
to date as a drain additional to the other losses in favor of the
wealthy few.

It should also be remembered that, remaining unabated, the more rapid
concentration of wealth [SN: INCREASE OF THE CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH AND
RIGHTS.] and of property rights to-day, produces a still more rapid
concentration of wealth and of rights to-morrow, because increased and
concentrated wealth consolidates into interest-bearing property—the rate
of interest being derived from the growing population which by hunger,
thirst, and other forces is compelled to work for the mighty few. And
what will be the consequence?

According to Mr. J. K. Upton, special agent of the Eleventh Census, “the
estimated increase of wealth from 1880 to 1890 was 49 per cent. A
proportionate increase from 1890 to 1900 would indicate wealth of nearly
$100,000,000,000 at the beginning of the twentieth century,”[174] say,
at the end of 1901. And if the present situation continue, it will not
be difficult to guess the time when nearly the whole nation would
consist of desperate slaves of dividogenesure, and of about 1,000,000
masters distributing places of employment at will—in accordance with the
highest efficiency and profitableness of the employed—for the cheapest
remuneration favorable to a few multimillionaires.

As exposed in this work, the situation precludes the entertaining of any
better view, however desirable it may be. For the following estimates of
the increase of the people prove that the situation has even been worse
than here represented.

“PRESENT POPULATION OF THE
UNITED STATES.”

“According to estimates made for the World Almanac by the governors of
the States and Territories for 1900,”[175] exclusive of Alaska and the
Indian Territory, the “grand total, January 1, 1900, is 79,354,444
individuals.”

It is quite probable that the average family will now be at the most 4.9
members each.[176] If it is so, then we have about 16,194,581 families
in the nation. And, disregarding [SN: THE PROPERTYLESS IN 1900 A GREAT
NATION.] again those that were sure of losing the last pieces of their
mortgaged property, we should now have about 8,958,437 families without
real property, which would represent 43,896,342 propertyless individuals
of multiple expenditure in every case. So that, paying monthly rent at
$9.50 each, these homeless families must pay $1,021,261,198 for the year
1900 alone. But if we [SN: RENT WILL BE PAID.] admit the regular
increase of the farm tenant families, we may now have about 1,941,745 of
them occupying rentable lands at the averages of acres and of rent
previously stated, the total rent of all the tenants of farms and homes
would, therefore, reach $1,526,114,903 for one year. And the rent will
be higher the next year, although new rentable houses and flats are
built by the speculators every year.

For, with the active monopolies and combinations concentrating a greater
amount of national wealth than the people can produce, the increase of
population causes [SN: IMPOSSIBILITY OF ACQUIRING PROPERTY.] utter
inability of about 65,000,000 of individuals to acquire property.[177]
And this very inability causes a constant rise in the average land and
house rent. So that, if some years ago the average house rent was $9.50
a month per family of nearly 5 members, it may now be above $11 every
month. The 8,958,437 tenant families would, therefore, pay over
$1,687,367,389 of farm and house rent to the few owners of cities,
towns, and of lands in one year.

Thence, the phenomenal net incomes of the omnipotent afford the ample
reasons for defending by all means in their power the present situation
of the nation’s toiling for the few.

Finally, as long as the concentration of wealth in the private
monopolies, trusts and combinations not only absorbs all the yearly
increase of wealth produced by the nation, but absorbs the wealth
formerly [SN: IT IS A QUESTION OF TIME ONLY.] owned by the people, it
does not make a difference whether these combinations raise or lower the
high prices of utilities which they speculate in upon the market, the
whole wealth and the entire rights for wealth must sooner or later be
concentrated in the hands of a very few families, because all the means
of concentration are within their hands. Consequently, it is not a
question whether these all pervading combinations are beneficent or
malificent in their character, as in either case they work out the same
evil result. But the question is only a question of time: how long
before the people with all their superior productivity and phenomenal
increase of wealth will have neither wealth nor property, nor rights,
nor sufficient means for existence? How long before they all shall in
all details be absolutely dependent upon the very few speculators, whose
unbounded fortunes the tens of millions of workers are constantly
compelled to increase? See Appendix II.

Again, this concentration of wealth can neither be hindered by raising
the prices of the raw materials and products, nor even by the [SN:
REFORM IS NECESSARY.] raising of wages, nor by lowering the prices of
consumable utilities, nor by lowering the present rents, because the
rate of concentration of wealth now surpasses all degrees of change
which may be effected by such regulation, while the net profits from the
nation’s energy and labor are ultimately derived only by the few, who
are becoming fewer.

The millions of individuals must therefore free themselves from the
delusive hopes of some day becoming rich; for the strong tendency, as we
have seen, is to deprive [SN: VAIN HOPES OF THE PEOPLE.] every one of
his proper food and of the satisfaction of other increasing needs. In
order to become free from the economic bondage and slavery of
dividogenesure, it is necessary that the distribution of wealth should
be made to bring about more equal results, and that the present means of
the concentration of wealth should work in favor of all the people
engaged in the numerous spheres of human activity. See Appendix III.

And it is again to be hoped that the present parents in the United
States would in nowise hesitate to provide some better conditions of
life for their children in the far and near future.

APPENDIX.

Percentages and numbers of families in the United States in 1890, under
owned and rented homes and farms, were represented by Dr. C. B. Spahr as
follows:

[Families Identified with Farms and Homes.]

----------------------+--------+-----------+-------+----------+---------
Owned: |Percent.| Numbers. |Rented | Percent. | Numbers.
----------------------+--------+-----------+-------+----------+---------
In cities above | | | | |
100,000 population: | | | | |
Homes owned | 22.83 | 444,879 |Rented:| 77.17 |1,503,955
In cities from 8,000 | | | | |
to 100,000: | | | | |
Homes owned | 35.96 | 629,092 |Rented:| 64.04 |1,120,487
Outside such | | | | |
cities: | | | | |
Homes owned | 43.78 | 1,849,700 |Rented:| 56.22 |2,374,860
Farms owned | 65.92 | 3,142,746 |Rented:| 34.08 |1,624,433
----------------------+--------+-----------+-------+----------+---------
Totals and averages | | | | |
(for all) owned[178] | 47.80 |*6,066,417 |Rented:| 52.20 |6,623,735
----------------------+--------+-----------+-------+----------+---------

Footnote 178:

As we have seen on p. 116 that 1,696,670 families out of the total of
the owning ones* in 1890, were in debt, having their properties under
mortgage. And only 4,369,747 families out of 12,690,152 in the United
States were free owners of wealth. Compare the above totals with
statistical averages on p. 79. See Dr. Spahr’s “Present Distribution
of Wealth in the United States,” 1896, p. 53.

II.

DEFINITIONS OF TRUSTS AND MONOPOLIES.

“A trust,” as defined by a committee of the New York State Legislature,
“is a combination” aiming “to destroy competition and to restrain trade
through the stockholders therein combining with other corporations of
stockholders to form a joint stock company of corporations, in effect
renouncing the powers of such several corporations, and placing all
powers in the hands of trustees.” The general purposes and effects among
them are “to control the supply of commodities and necessities; to
destroy the very possibility of competition; to regulate the quality of
all commodities; and to keep the cost to the consumer at prices far
beyond their fair and equitable value.”[179] Further, “Trust is” an
acting scheme “where, by a device of trusteeship, various corporations
practically form one monopoly without losing their separate
corporateness. The novel characteristic of such a trust is not in its
being a monopoly, but the way in which the monopoly is attained.”[179]

Mr. Charles W. Baker in his _Monopolies and the People_, says:

“A trust is a combination to restrain competition among producers,
formed by placing the various producing properties (mills, factories,
etc.) in the hands of a board of trustees, who are empowered to direct
the operations of production and sale, as if the properties were all
under a single ownership and management.”[180]

MONOPOLY IN PRIVATE HANDS.

“A monopoly in industry may be defined as the control of some natural
agent, of some line of business, or of some advantage over existing or
possible competitors, by which greater profits can be secured than other
competitors can make.”[181]

All these definitions indicate that the private monopolies and
combinations have one and the same purpose or end in view: It is to find
such devices and means and to establish such organization of business
activity, which will enable the organizers and managers to obtain from
the people the greatest profits for the least cost, thus concentrating
the people’s wealth in a few hands without paying anything to the people
in return.

III.

On the contrary, a monopoly of the government or of municipality may be
defined as a system of controlling the natural or artificial agencies of
public service and utility at such a cost to the public served, which
will merely cover all expenses necessary (to construct and) to keep
these agencies in the best serviceable and available condition or state,
thus leaving no room for the unjust concentration of the people’s wealth
in any private hands.

INDEX.

Average: rate per cent on debt, 123, 124;
average wealth of the rich, the well-to-do, the middle, and of the
poor classes, 28, 29;
of over 27-millions, 51, 52;
average, for homes in debt, 113;
for farms in debt, 111, 112;
differences in averages of different authorities, 38;
—rents, see: Rent.

Blocks illustrating comparison of individual wealth, 50.

Bread-winners by C. D. Wright, 85.

Capita: per capita wealth, 27, 38;
per capita debt, 122, 123.

Capital: aids to increase production of wealth, 55-57;
concentration of capital increased, 140, 155.

Cities: per cent of the homeless in, 80;
cities’ families in debt, 114, 115;
large cities’ families in debt, 114, 115;
cities belong to 24 and 14 per cent of their population, 118, 132.

Comparison of the poor and the rich by dollars’ worth, 7, 8;
comparison in tables, 42;
of the family-groups, 39;
of the U. S. with France at the time of Revolution, 16;
with Rome, 17;
by Crosby Hon. Ino. Reciprocal comparison of the middle classes of
two tables, 39.

Concentration: of wealth in higher spheres, 153;
of employees, 155, 156;
1st table of concentrated wealth, 150;
2d and final table of, 169;
explanation of this concentration, 170;
concentration of wealth increases, 180, 181;
concentration of wealth greater than the total increase of it, 170,
171.

Consumers’ opinion on remuneration of capital and laborers, 97, 98;
do not know the bases of justice and rights, 98, 99.

Debt: on farms, 111, 112;
on homes, 113;
increase of, 1880-89, 119-122;
increase of public debt, 167;
total debt on acres and lots in 1890, 121, 124-5;
percentages of families in debt in cities, 114, 115;
debt of the U. S., states, counties, school districts, etc., foot
note, 126;
of New York, foot note, 134;
amounts of, on real estate, 121;
per capita, 122;
extinguished debt, 12.68%, 122;
interest charge against debt, 124;
combined interest charge against families’ debt, 125, 126.

Distribution of wealth: 1st table, 28;
1st R. table, 29;
2d table, 32;
2d R. table, 36;
2d Right table, 45;
1st and 2d tables, 47. Table I, 6;
diagrams for conclusions of Mr. Holmes, 5;
diagrams for conclusions of Mr. Shearman, 12;
Table II;
conclusions of Mr. Shearman, 12;
diagrams for conclusions of Dr. Spahr, 20;
double table III for these diagrams, 21;
conclusions of Dr. Spahr, 18;
conclusions of Geo. K. Holmes, 5, 6.

Dividogenesure: definition and origin of, 70;
divides people into classes, 71;
its tacit power of enslaving the people or expelling into the sphere
of charities, 72;
it enforces idleness, 73;
is the main cause of misery, 74;
is sister of primogeniture, 74;
is a pernicious principle, 74;
its favorites without moral responsibility, 75;
is a system of slavery distinct from any other slavery, 75, 76;
the propertyless are special victims of it, 92, 103-4;
is a foundation of iniquity, 87, 88;
implies degrees of hardship against its dependents, 117, 74;
its hardship according to the rates of gain from each employed
individual, 103-4;
its rates are not wages, but pure losses, 106;
differs from primogeniture, 131;
future of the nation under dividogenesure, 106-7, 181.

Energy: human energy embodied in objects, 98;
crystallized in articles, 99;
human energy concentrates into the hands of speculators, 99, 100.

Extortion: from the public by excess of selling prices over cost of
production, 158, 159;
by mining monopolies, 161;
by stock-watering, 173, 174.

Families: groups compared, 39, 42;
basis of family-worth, 39, 41, 42;
statistics of—occupying farms and homes, 79,—hire farms, 81,—hire
homes, 81, 82;
farm families in debt, 111, 112;
home-families in debt, 113;
table of farm and home families, 116;
one million of rich families, 92, 103-4;
dividends of the million families, 103, 104 and 138-9;
one million (families) masters, 181-2;
263,380 families of the well-to-do class included into the average
of the poor of the 2d table, 32;
exposed by comparisons, 39, 42;
surplus million families found in the tenant group, 2d table, 32,
34, 35.

Farms: acreage of, 148;
rent per acre, 148-9;
acreage for the increased population, 164-5;
rent, 165;
increase of rented farms, 166;
percentage of incumbered farms, 166, 167;
farms in France, 49.

Future of the nation (possible), 106-7.

Gainful pursuits, persons engaged in, 91-2.

Galileo signed Jesuit Verdict, 16.

Germany, Berlin, 48, 49.

Great Britain, distribution of private property, 48, 49.

Herron, George (Professor dismissed from the Iowa College), 107.

Holmes, G. K. U. S. Census Expert on Mortgage Statistics, 6, 14, 15,
24;
not partisan, 33, 35.

Holmes, G. H., view on mortgages, 132.

House-Scarb defined, 8.

Income: daily income from the poor, 138-9;
gross incomes of the workers decreased, 143;
net incomes of many trusts omitted, 151-2;
net incomes of the owners of the central parts of cities, 152-3;
net incomes of the manufacture and mechanical trades, 157-8;
net incomes of the mining monopolies, 161;
total net incomes of the natural, mortgagee, rentable house, and
land monopolies, 150;
total net incomes of all monopolies, etc., table, 169;
excess of the incomes over the total increase of wealth, 169, 170-1.

Inventions: as aid to human energy, 85, 86;
they are blessing and curse, 86;
inventors were a blessing to humanity, 98.

Landowners of England, Scotland, Holland and of Germany, 56.

Logical Premises, 5;
logical premises of life, 25.

Losses: special of the wage-earners, 157;
special of the farmers, 160;
special of the miners, 161;
loss of the previous wealth by the people, 171;
total loss of wealth in 7 years by the U. S. people, 170.

Mayo Smith, Prof., compares French proprietorship of land with that of
England, 49.

Monopolies: definitions of, Appendix II and III;
profits of the mortgagee, 145;
profits of the natural, 101, 145-6;
profits of monopolies of the rentable homes, 146-7;
profits of rentable lands, 149;
the total net incomes of 4 classes of monopolies, 150;
grand total of the total net incomes of the monopolies and
combinations, 169;
explanation of the net incomes of the monopolies, 170-1.
See: Incomes, the excess of.

Mortgages: statistics of, 111;
development of, 119;
significance of, 128;
semi-optimistic views on, 128;
view of Mr. E. Atkinson on, 128-132;
of Mr. G. H. Holmes, 132;
view of Rev. Wm. D. P. Bliss, Editor of Enc. of Soc. Reform, 133;
Semi-pessimistic views: view of Mr. J. P. Dunn, Jr., Burden of Debt,
134;
losses of property by foreclosure, an example, 135, 136;
view of Mr. D. R. Goodloe, 136.
See: Debt.

Mulhall, Mr., comparison of farmers of different countries, 93.

Napoleon Bonaparte, 107-8.

Poor: grow absolutely poorer, 172.

Population: in families, 18;
in individuals, 5, 12;
increase of in 1897, 163, 164, 165;
in 1900, 182.

Primogeniture, Great Britain and Japan, 70, 74, 136.

Productivity of the Americans: on farm, 93;
in industry, 94, 95, 96.

Propertyless: “Less than half the nation,” 18;
“tenants,” group 1st, 2d table, 32;
causes of the increase of the propertyless, 52;
propertyless is a resourceless man of multiple expenditure,
61-68-71;
he is a source of multiple income for many propertied, 68;
without employment, 69;
pay rent or are expelled, 77-78;
unseen forces compel him to be a slave, 76;
more than half the population, 82;
made the nation in 1865, 85;
could build and inhabit 33 most populous cities, 83, 84;
have nothing to hope for, 86-7;
number of in 1897, 179;
number of in 1900, 182.

Rates of interest are higher against the poor debtors, 127-8.
See: Debt.

Real estate indebtedness, 121.
See: Debt.

Rent: house rent per family, 147;
house rent on farms, 149;
rent paid for homes and farms by increased population, 164-5;
average house rent, 147;
for farms, 148-9;
totals of rent paid, table, 169;
according to Dr. Spahr for 1890, house and office, 152-3;
rent for 1900, 182-3-4.

Resources: of the propertied, 53-60;
of the propertyless, 61, 64-5;
a semi-resourced man, 68.

Rich: comparison of, 42;
deeper reasons why the rich grow absolutely richer, 172-3.
See: Distribution.

Rome, mistress of the world, 17.

Shearman, Tho. G., conclusions of, 11, 12, 24, 32;
his basis of averages differ, 38;
one average covers 89.4% of the entire population, 40.

Spahr, C. B., Dr. conclusions of, 18, 20, 24;
table, 28, 31.
See: Taxes.

Statistics of wealth, by J. K. Upton, special agent of the 11th
census, 27, 181.
See: Mortgages.

Steam power: increase of, 57.

Taxes: proportions of national taxes, 175;
indirect taxes paid, 176;
decrease of national taxes, 176;
unjust to the poor, 176;
local taxes: proportions of, 176;
local taxes less unjust to the poor, 177;
local taxes paid, 178;
the poor pay taxes on gross incomes, 179;
total taxes paid by the rich and the poor, 178, 179;
taxes increased by the war, 180-1.

Tenants of farms and homes, 32;
the correct number of, table, 36.
See: Propertyless.

Trusts: definitions of, Appendix II;
development of, 154-156;
incomes of some trusts omitted, 151-2;
trusts more active, 180;
the view of Henry Brown, Associate Justice of the U. S. Supreme
Court on trusts, 162.

Wages: economic doctrine of the rate of, 141;
wages would be twice as low, 141;
artificially kept up, 142;
reports on the fall of wages, 142-3.

Waite, F. C., special agent of the 11th census in charge of True
Wealth: ascertained the earnings of the natural monopolies for
1890, 99, 101.

Wealth: table of, 27;
accumulation of, 27;
True wealth, 99, 101;
land is the source of wealth, 54, 55;
average wealth per family, $5,125, table, 29, 47;
per capita, lower table, 27, 38, table, 51;
aggregates of wealth owned by different classes, 1st table, 29, 45;
wealth owned by individuals, table, 51;
chart, 50;
concentration of wealth, tables, 150, 169 (for 1897);
increase of wealth (for 1900), 181;
increase of in 7 years, 139, 140;
increased phenomenally, 140;
who profits by the increase of, 144-5;
concentration of in industries, 154;
largest fortunes of, increase most rapidly, Dr. Henderson, 172;
wealth reduced with the increased number of families, 171.
See: in the tax table, 178.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

FOOTNOTES:

Footnote 1:

Quoted from “The Public,” Number 69, July 29, 1899.

Footnote 2:

Louis Post, ibid.

Footnote 3:

His name cannot be here given.

Footnote 4:

This work will show the real causes of it and the rapid tendency
toward it.

Footnote 5:

Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 1435. Ed. by Rev. Wm. Bliss and
published in 1897 by Funk and Wagnalls Company, New York and London.

Footnote 6:

This 5 per cent includes personal, unproductive property of all sorts.

Footnote 7:

Mind that these statements are of one authority only, viz.: Mr. G. K.
Holmes.

Footnote 8:

House-scarb means: all domestic or household property that may be
carried on from one rentable house to another.

Footnote 9:

Dr. C. B. Spahr, Pres. Distribution of Wealth in the U. S. (1896), p.
69; published by Thos. Y. Crowell & Company, Boston.

Footnote 10:

Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 1388.

Footnote 11:

Ibidem, p. 1388.

Footnote 12:

This table gives you the exact equivalent of diagrams found on p. 12.

Footnote 13:

So far, we give honor to Mr. Holmes in advance.

Footnote 14:

One of the best authorities in statistics.

Footnote 15:

Reported in Binghamton Independent of Aug. 12, 1899.

Footnote 16:

“The Public,” Chicago, No. 74, Sept., 1899.

Footnote 17:

The diagrams and statistical tables supply the life contents for these
premises.

Footnote 18:

The exact statistics of the Eleventh Census, 1890, have given the
average at about 4.93 members to a family, which means that in each
100 families 93 have 5 and 7 have only 4 members. In 1880 this average
was 5.04, and in 1870, 5.09 members to a family.

Footnote 19:

Ibid., p. 69.—I italicize these conclusions. See Enc. of Soc. R., p.
1389.

Footnote 20:

Dr. C. B. Spahr, “The Present Distribution of Wealth in the U. S.,”
1896.

Footnote 21:

Whereas the general average of per capita wealth was $1,036.

Footnote 22:

Here, p. 6.

Footnote 23:

Here, p. 13.

Footnote 24:

Here, p. 21.

Footnote 25:

Here, see p. 18.

Footnote 26:

Dr. Spahr, “Present Distribution of Wealth in the United States,” p.
69.—Enc. of Soc. R., p. 1389.

Footnote 27:

Enc. of Soc. R., p. 1384.

Footnote 28:

C. D. Wright, “Atlantic Monthly,” Sept., 1897.

Footnote 29:

“Encyclopedia of Social Reform.” (p. 1388), 1897, by Rev. Wm. Bliss.

Footnote 30:

Dr. Spahr, “Present Distribution of Wealth in the U. S.,” p. 69, 1896,
who held each family at five members.

Footnote 31:

It should be borne in mind that, “Goods, wares, merchandise, utensils,
furniture, cattle, provisions, and every other species of personal
property, was included among the assets” representing wealth. Dr.
Spahr, Ib., p. 55.

Footnote 32:

Encyclopedia of Social Reform (publ. in 1897), p. 1388.

Footnote 33:

These totals have been summed up by me.

Footnote 34:

Table, p. 32, here.

Footnote 35:

Compare the total wealth of this table with that on p. 27.

Footnote 36:

Here, p. 13.

Footnote 37:

Atlantic Monthly, Sept. 1897.

Footnote 38:

See here, p. 18.

Footnote 39:

This is the restored group of the 1st table, p. 29.

Footnote 40:

3d group, p. 32 or 36.

Footnote 41:

See Diagrams, p. 12, and Table II, p. 13.

Footnote 42:

Compare these families in the 2d restored table, p. 36.

Footnote 43:

Compare the same families in the 1st restored table, p. 29.

Footnote 44:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1389.

Footnote 45:

Statistics and Sociology, p. 201-2.

Footnote 46:

Subtraction has been made on p. 36.

Footnote 47:

See table, p. 29.

Footnote 48:

The total number of immigrants entered into the United States from
1891 to 1897 inclusively was 2,854,834.—The World Almanac, 1899, p.
176.

Footnote 49:

Here, p. 18.—Dr. Spahr, “The Present Distribution of Wealth in the
United States,” p. 69.

Footnote 50:

Even the uncultivated land is a great source of income to its owner.
And if it were not so, the great landowners of England and Scotland
would not have owned fully 20,000,000 acres of the U. S. land. But now
five of them own it, and draw large incomes from it, while remaining
at home beyond the Atlantic. And the Holland syndicate and the German
syndicate could not have owned 7,000,000 acres of the U. S. land, if
it were not a source of income, even without special application of
any labor energy to it. But now the former syndicate owns 5,000,000
acres of grazing land in Western States; and the latter owns 2,000,000
acres of it in various States, as the “Up to Date, Coin’s Financial
School,” has indicated, pp. 108-118.

Footnote 51:

Chas. R. Henderson, D. D., “Social Elements,” p. 144.

Footnote 52:

Some one may of course prefer to live in another’s house, as they say,
not willing to pay taxes for his own property. But a just taxation can
never cause this trouble. The abnormity of taxation is shown here in
Chapter VI.

Footnote 53:

Land, Capital, Rentables, Salables are income-bearing properties.

Footnote 54:

“Encyclopedia of Social Reform,” p. 1389.

Footnote 55:

_Dividogenesure_ means: (As a class and as an individual, I am the
owner of land, of wealth and capital): Divide with me your sole
results of active energy upon my source of wealth, or else you may be
sure you have only the right to starve from drain by others without
this supply. [Latin: _divido_, divide, part, separate. Greek:
_genesis_, origin, source, creation, origination, production. Latin:
_ure_, (perish) by rust, by fire, by cold, wither, dry up, or starve
to death.]

Footnote 56:

Here, p. 32 or 36.

Footnote 57:

Dr. Warner, American Charities, pp. 178-9, Dr. T. Ely’s edition.

Footnote 58:

I italicized his words.

Footnote 59:

I italicized his words.

Footnote 60:

Dr. Warner, ibidem, p. 181.

Footnote 61:

Remember that these conclusions are moderate.

Footnote 62:

These owning families include the mortgagors.

Footnote 63:

Many of these home-owning families are in debt, and their homes serve
as securities for it.

Footnote 64:

Enc. of Soc. R., pp. 899-900.

Footnote 65:

He pays rent.

Footnote 66:

He pays rent and divides the results of his labor, p. 58-61.

Footnote 67:

See conclusion, p. 18.

Footnote 68:

Mr. Wright, “Atlantic Monthly” for September, 1897.

Footnote 69:

See his conclusions and my explanation of them, here, pp. 12, 13.

Footnote 70:

Compare for this the original tables, pp. 28, 32 and 51.

Footnote 71:

See 1st R. table, group 1st, p. 47, and as individuals, p. 51.

Footnote 72:

Mayo Smith, “Statistics and Sociology,” pp. 200, 201-2.

Footnote 73:

Mr. E. Atkinson, “The Distribution of Products,” p. 15.

Footnote 74:

Ib., p. 22.

Footnote 75:

Ed. Atkinson, ib. p. 27.

Footnote 76:

Ed. Atkinson, ib., pp. 77, 78. Also, Enc. of S. R., p. 1093.

Footnote 77:

“Socialism and Christianity,” p. 205. Also Enc. of Soc. R., p. 289.

Footnote 78:

Prof. John R. Commons, “Distribution of Wealth,” p. 258. Also, see
Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1102.

Footnote 79:

“Gross receipts less gross disbursements.”

Footnote 80:

Totals made up by me.

Footnote 81:

Compare the last two groups with the first two of the table, p. 28.
And compare the same groups of table, p. 51.

Footnote 82:

See this number and families, p. 92.

Footnote 83:

See tables, p. 36 or 45.

Footnote 84:

By the “other” monopolies, I mean some monopolies, companies, trusts
and combinations which have not been mentioned here at all, and many
of which deal with rentable houses in cities, and so on.

Footnote 85:

Prof. George Herron’s dismissal from the Iowa College is a striking
example, foreboding the nation’s near future. This professor was
forbidden by financial necessity to teach what is good for the
people.—“The Public,” Nov. 11, 1899, Chicago. “The Public” No. 115,
1900, has now on record four other professors similarly dealt with in
different colleges on grounds similar to that of Prof. G. Herron. One
of these four is President Henry Wade Rogers, of the Northwestern
University, at Evanston, Ill.

Footnote 86:

Artificial property again means all things that were created or
invented by man in the past or the present.

Footnote 87:

See the same number on p. 79.

Footnote 88:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 899.

Footnote 89:

This number contains 1,624,765 tenant farming families.

Footnote 90:

Remember that the tenant families are excluded here.

Footnote 91:

Lien means a legal claim on property which must be paid.

Footnote 92:

Remember that the 4,999,396 tenant families are excluded here.

Footnote 93:

These percentages are from the Official Bulletin, No. 98.

Footnote 94:

Dividogenesure is the stronger, the larger the per cent an employer
obtains from the results of the labor of every employee; and is the
weaker, the smaller the per cent he obtains from every one dependent
on him for life.

Footnote 95:

That is, the rate of making mortgages in 1880th year was 643,143, and
the yearly rate in 1889th year was 1,226,323 in one year.

Footnote 96:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 901.

Footnote 97:

Dr. Spahr, ib. p. 67.

Footnote 98:

All expressions under the inverted commas are from Bulletin.

Footnote 99:

Bulletin No. 71, Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 901.

Footnote 100:

Continuation, “On the debt in force against acres, $162,652,944; on
lots, $234,789,848,” is the yearly interest.

Footnote 101:

Here, p. 112.

Footnote 102:

Ib., p. 113.

Footnote 103:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 902. This interest charge is at the end of the
Extra Bulletin No. 71.

Footnote 104:

Yet, it should be remembered that we do not here deal with the debts
of Railroad Companies, Street Railway, Telegraph, Telephone and other
companies and corporations; nor do we deal with the U. S. debt of
$891,960,104; States, $228,997,389; Counties, $145,048,045;
Municipalities, $724,463,060; School districts, $36,701,948, which in
1890 made the grand total of $18,027,170,546 including the debt under
our consideration. But we deal with family-debtors, for whom debt is
equal to ruin. Whereas debt to the others is prosperity.

Footnote 105:

That is, if we divide them by the line of families worth $5,000 and
over, and families worth $5,000 and under; and the latter will include
the economic dependants.

Footnote 106:

Here, p. 119.

Footnote 107:

Here, p. 121.

Footnote 108:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 904, Edition of 1897.

Footnote 109:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 904.

Footnote 110:

Ib., p. 904.

Footnote 111:

Mr. Dunn could not have known at the time that some Eastern States
were even worse than the Western ones, and that “New York,” for
instance, “is” more “conspicuously prominent as having a real estate
mortgage indebtedness of $1,607,874,301, which is 26.71 per cent of
the total indebtedness on acres and lots in the United States.”

Footnote 112:

Here, pp. 91, 92, or Mayo Smith, Statistics and Sociology, p. 200.

Footnote 113:

As the rates of their gains show, pp. 104, 105.

Footnote 114:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1386.—Waldron, “Handbook on Currency or
Wealth.”

Footnote 115:

References: Enc. of Soc. R., see “Unemployment.” Dr. Spahr, “Present
Distribution of Wealth in U. S.” (1896).—J. R. Common’s “Distribution
of Wealth,” Enc. p. 1392.

Footnote 116:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1392.

Footnote 117:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1370.

Footnote 118:

Mr. and Mrs. Webb, “History of Trade Unionism,” p. 1 or 2.

Footnote 119:

“Introduction and Mutual Insurance,” vol. I, pp. 148-9, 150-1164.

Footnote 120:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, pp. 1370, 1373 and the Labor Reports.

Footnote 121:

Dr. Spahr, ib., pp. 116, 117.

Footnote 122:

The above 246,938 families could not be here classified among the
tenants of farms consisting of the 1,624,765 families, because after
losing their country properties, these homeless hurry on to crowd up
cities.

Footnote 123:

Dr. Spahr, ibid, p. 122-3.

Footnote 124:

As numerous inquiries convince me.

Footnote 125:

According to the U. S. Census of 1890, there were 4,564,641 farms
consisting of 623,218,619 acres of land, or an average of 136 acres to
a farm. World Almanac, 1899, p. 184.

Footnote 126:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, pp. 22, 23; also based on the census.

Footnote 127:

“Present Distribution of Wealth in the U. S.,” pp. 104, 105; (see
here: Appendix I.). The same: Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1385—table of
incomes, 1890.

Footnote 128:

Some one may suppose that some net earnings of the national banks
might overlap some net earnings of the mortgagee monopolies, since
mortgage profits are often obtained by banks. But such a supposition
cannot have a real ground here, because the national banks are
prohibited by the law of the United States to make investments in
mortgages; and because mortgages of real estate, being not easily
convertible securities for loans, would not be admissible by them. The
only exception made by the law for these banks is that, for a
necessary accommodation of their business, a mortgage may sometimes be
held as a security, collateral to some other which is more easily
convertible into currency. (See Revised Statutes, §5137. Prof.
Dunbar’s “Theory and Hist. of Banking,” p. 26.)

It is the non-national or State banks that often directly deal with
mortgages. But estimating their gross earnings at $200,000,000 for the
year 1890 (see p. 101), Mr. Waite evidently could not ascertain their
enormous net incomes, hence we leave them to be understood as surplus
above all our concluding totals of net incomes.

And whereas, the net incomes of the national banks decreased
$110,378,930 in the 7 years, those of the life insurance companies
increased $108,932,030 (World Almanac, 1900, p. 180, 184) and with the
help of the omitted net incomes of the gas companies (p. 101) more
than offset the loss, leaving our totals correct.

Footnote 129:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, 1897, pp. 1346-7; from “Philadelphia Times,” etc.

Footnote 130:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 104-5.

Footnote 131:

It was the gross income.

Footnote 132:

See the upper table, p. 42.

Footnote 133:

Table, p. 47.

Footnote 134:

Lower table, p. 42, 1st two groups.

Footnote 135:

Mr. Waldron, “Hand-book on Currency or Wealth,” pp. 106 and 107. See
also: Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1389.

Footnote 136:

See the statistical conclusions on the fall of wages, p. 134; also Dr.
Spahr’s “Present Distribution of Wealth,” etc., pp. 95-118.

Footnote 137:

“Present Distr. of Wealth in U. S.” (1896), pp. 104, 105, 112. Here,
pp. 140-143. “Average daily wages: 1873, $2.04; 1891, $1.69; urban
laborers.”

Footnote 138:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 104-5. Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1385.

Footnote 139:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 98, 104-5. Also: Statistics of Massachusetts
Bureau of Labor, 1890, p. 319.

Footnote 140:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., p. 104-5.

Footnote 141:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 116, 117.

Footnote 142:

Ibid., pp. 104, 105.

Footnote 143:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., p. 104-5.

Footnote 144:

World Almanac, 1899, pp. 200, 225.

Footnote 145:

Quoted from Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1347.

Footnote 146:

For 1897 is an approximate estimate of The World Almanac, 1899, p.
200, foot note.

Footnote 147:

It might be that some of these families paid house rents on farms
beside the land rent, as Dr. Spahr has shown; while some others might
pay simply house rents, and thus offset each other, making the above
sum correct.

Footnote 148:

“For a share in product” is an initial form of serfdom pure and
simple.

Footnote 149:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, pp. 606-7.

Footnote 150:

Also here, p. 125.

Footnote 151:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, pp. 606-7.

Footnote 152:

World Almanac, 1900, p. 174.

Footnote 153:

Here, see foot-note, p. 150.

Footnote 154:

Table of profits, here, p. 101.

Footnote 155:

Includes the increase of $310,001,619 by the railroad, telegraph and
telephone monopolies, p. 162.

Footnote 156:

Excludes net incomes of the artificial gas companies and those of the
non-national banks (beside mortgages) as not given in the table on p.
101. See foot note, pp. 150, 167, 168.

Footnote 157:

Includes the house rent on farms and that of the increased population,
pp. 149, 164.

Footnote 158:

Includes the rent of land paid by the increased populations, p. 165.

Footnote 159:

This amount of double taxes is calculated to have been fully paid for
7 years on the net incomes here stated, and on all the property these
trusts, etc., have had in the beginning of 1891 and after, according
to the tax rates to be here indicated.

Footnote 160:

Compare tables, here, on pp. 42 and 47.

Footnote 161:

Mr. Mallock’s “Classes and Masses” (1896.)

Footnote 162:

Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1392.

Footnote 163:

His work on “Social Elements,” p. 162.

Footnote 164:

“Statistics of Railways, 1890,” p. 58.

Footnote 165:

I italicized the words.

Footnote 166:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 41, 42. The total capitalization of railroads in
1890 was represented by $9,437,300,000, while the total investment
amounted to only $3,714,400,000. And Mr. Van Oss stated that “shares
now return at least 18 per cent per annum on the actual investment.”
Ibidem.

Footnote 167:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., p. 143. The total incomes in the table of taxes
above represented are gross incomes.

Footnote 168:

Statistics, World Almanac, 1899, p. 165.

Footnote 169:

Dr. Spahr, “Present Distribution of Wealth in the United States,” p.
143-4.

Footnote 170:

Ib., p. 156-7.

Footnote 171:

“Extra Census Bulletin No. 70” represents taxes on property $465,000,000
including corporations for 1890

Licenses, poll taxes, etc. (about) 50,000,000

------------

Total (the same as that contained above) $515,000,000

The Bulletin adds that “three-fourths of this tax falls upon the
relatively poorer classes.” Dr. Spahr, ibid., p. 156.

Footnote 172:

See here, pp. 64, 65, 68, 72.

Footnote 173:

Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 157, 158.

Footnote 174:

The World Almanac, 1899, p. 164. Mr. Upton, here, p. 27.

Footnote 175:

The World Almanac, 1900, p. 539.

Footnote 176:

This average would mean that in every 100 families 90 have 5 and 10
have only 4 members. See the decrease of family membership: foot note,
p. 18.

Footnote 177:

“It is interesting to remark that, while in 1893 the number of the
propertyless families reached over 7-millions, the national and local
Building and Loan Associations having net assets of over $450,000,000,
have,” in 25 years, “helped to secure” only “probably over 400,000
homes,” says Mr. Wright, U. S. Commissioner of Labor. The World
Almanac, 1899, p. 168; ib., 1900, p. 172. But that inability is
aggravated by the taxation unjust to the poor. See here, pp. 174-178.

Footnote 179:

Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 1346.

Footnote 180:

Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 1346.

Footnote 181:

Ibid., p. 888.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Transcriber’s note:

• Silently corrected obvious punctuation and capitalization errors.
Several unpaired double quotation marks were retained as they
occurred in the original text.

• Unless noted below, spelling and hyphenation are retained as in the
original.

• Footnotes have been renumbered and moved to the end of the book.

Other changes:

• Removed half-title page originally on first page
• Page 003: thousands of like opnions → thousands of like opinions
• Page 036: surplus milion families → surplus million families
• Page 039: distribution of weatlh → distribution of wealth
• Page 048: more wealth that → more wealth than
• Page 099: in possesion of others → in possession of others
• Page 108: Napoleon Boneparte → Napoleon Bonaparte
• Page 132: bound, by dividogensure → bound, by dividogenesure

• Page 163: In the table "Increase of Population" corrected the value
for percent of population in cities for the year 1880. Changed
from 2.57 to 22.57. The correct value was taken from page 18 of
the 1890 census
http://www2.census.gov/prod2/decennial/documents/1890d9-01.pdf pg
18

• Page 192: defintion and origin → definition and origin
• Page 193: not partizan → not partisan

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