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THE LANDED LORDS.
MFN WHO CHARGE OTHERS FOR
THE PRIVILEGE OF LIVING.
I
ihv i.nmiiorti Ci»»« in Growing in it*
Holding* and Power; the I.andle»» j
4 Ihmh llan Lost Its Independence 1 Half !
of the American People Homeless.
George Montford Simonson, writing
in Mummy's for Augtisl, describes the
remarkable growth of the great landed
estates in America and discusses the
cause of the movement and its possible
meaning for good or ill. We have a
landed aristocracy, and a correlated
class called the proletariat, or landless
class. The latter class now number
over half of the 70,000,000 of our popu¬
lation. The landlord class is growing
In Its holdings and power, the land¬
less class has lost its independence.
We recently referred to Lord Scully,
the alien rack renter, who, with rents
from his original purchase of 100,000
acres in Illinois In the ‘50’s, has been
increasing bis holdings until he now
owns in addition an entire county in
Kansas, 42,000 acres In Gage county,
Nebraska, 30,000 in Nuckolls county,
and other large tracts. In this arti¬
cle, using Mr. Simonson for authority,
we will call attention to soma other
landed gentry.
The Vanderbilt family is naturally
taking the lead in grasping the basis
of all power and authority, the land.
George W. Vanderbilt, the youngest of
William H. Vanderbilt’s sons, “is mak¬
ing of Baltimore, near Asheville, North
Carolina, one of the most remarkable
mansions. This Vanderbilt has bought.
30,000 acres there, land that made
many hiiih; 1 farms, and has put up a
mansion, the foundation of which cost
$100,000. The top of a mountain was
leveled off to make the site, and im¬
mense quantities of rich soil for the
gardens were transported by rail
from distant valleys and river bottoms.
A temporary railroad was constructed
to convey building material to the site
of the mansion. This vast Vanderbilt
estate Is to lie devoted to tree culture
and a game preserve. The raising of
wild deer and foxes is more important
than the rearing of men.
John Jacob Astor has a similar es¬
tate in. Florida.
Still greater In extent is the manor
of Dr. William Seward Webb (whose
wife was the William II. Vanderbilt’s
daughter) In the Adirondacks, an es¬
tate of 153,000 acres, Including part of
two counties. Of this amount 112,000
acres has been incorporated by Dr.
Webb under the name of the Nehasane
Park Association, as the manager of
the estate says, “in order to facilitate
the perpetual holding In a solid body
of so much of this land as Dr. Webb
should finally decide it desirable to
devote permanently to the purpose of
a Mid'll private tli rk and game ^preserve.”
cfx jrrU'ite will bo fenced (to
confine huge game. moose, elk .md
deer having already been placed in the
enclosure for breeding purposes, with
a view to the final stocking of the
whole park. (Let men die; let millions
of families be homeless; but provide
the rich a range to breed wild animals,
that they and the English dukes and
marquises who come to trade names for
fortunes may have the fun of shooting
t hem.)
Dr. Webb lias also one of the finest
country seats in America on the east
side of Lake Champlain, it contains
30,500 acres, and twenty-eight small
farms, homes, were absorbed to form
this single family estate,
M. McK. Twombly, another son-in
l.nv of William H. Vanderbilt, has an
• •state adjoining Webb's in the Adiron¬
dacks which contains about 100,000
acres, besides a splendid country seat
at Madison. N. J., containing several
hundred acres of ground.
Austin Corbin, president of the Long
Island railroad, has a vast estate in
New Hampshire, containing 26,000
acres. The declared object of farming
this great game preserve is “to pro
vide a living book on natural history
for the instruction of his son.” How
fine a thing it would he for the whole
United States to be bought up by mil
llonaires and converted into private
parks to furnish shooting and Instruc
tion for their sons in natural history!
Corbin has had thirty miles of barbed
wire fence placed around his park, at
a cost of $70,000. and has placed within
reindeer from Labrador, wild boars
from Germany, moose from Montana,
while elk from the northwest. deer
from the Maine forests, partridges from
Virginia and hares from Belgium. A
Uerd of American bison which Corbin
had previously kept on his 600 acre
farm on l«ong Island he has also taken
to his New Hampshire preserve.
The William Walter Phelps estate at
Tea Net k Ridge. New Jersey, own
prises 15,000 acres and extends from
the Hackensack river to the Hudson,
where it overlooks the northern boun
dary of New York city. The home
stead is a series of connected cottages
with gables and peaked roofs of quaint
design. Sixteen miles of drives cross
and recross the estate. There arc five
miles of tree lined avenues in a single
stretch, and over 200.000 large trees.
16 majority of which were replanted.
William Rockefeller of the Standard
Oil trust has started out to beat all
others in private park and game pre
serve. It is ou the Pocantico Hills.
is said that twenty years' labor will bo
required to complete the Standard Oil
magnate’s plans for making the finest
private park in the United States
not in the > world house.
Hock wood $ 1.500,000, but
very mucr more is ■ spent upon an
elaborate scheme o dseap garden
The prop- ri v xtemis from the
river sre t h HS rout
ns and
jn
the One residen lit
$200,000 was torn down because it in¬
terfered with the view. A million dol¬
lars has already been spent upon the
grounds under Frederick Law Olm
*■ ead’s direction.
Adjoining this estate is that of John
D. Rockefeller, The brothers are next
joor neighbors, but their houses are two
miles and a half apart. John D. Rocke¬
feller also owns an extensive and or
nate place near Cleveland, called For
eet Hill.
Frederick W. Vanderbilt has recently
bought six hundred acres on the Hud¬
son, near Avde Park, formerly the Wal¬
ter Langdo i estate, Clarence Dens
more has a manor at Stahtsburgh on
the Hudson; Archibald Rogers’ lordly
demesne is called Crumwold Hall; John
Jacob Astor’s Ferncliff contains 800
acres, in the same region, and James
Roosevelt’s scat is known as Spring
wood.
Governor Morton, twenty times a mil¬
lionaire, has a celebrated place near
New York called Hllerslie, where a
thousand acres are under artistic culti
vation. His barn is 500 feet long and
cost nearly a million dollars.
The late Gay Gould’s country seat
contains a thousand acres. With its
marble mansion it cost over a million
dollars. George Gould has a notable
summer seat at Furlough Lodge, in the
Catskills with 2,300 acres of mountain
forest. Part of this Is inclosed in a
fence of thirty-two strands of barbed
wire, within which are preserved herds
of elk and deer besides quantities of
pheasants and other small game.
But it is a weariness to describe and
read of the American millionaires’ pal
aces, pleasure grounds and game pro
serves. It would take pages and pages
of print, and hours and hours of read¬
ing to tell of all. Volumes might also
he written describing the summer pal
aees and merely ornamental parks of
Tuxedo, Lenox, Newport, Saratoga,
Lake George and the Thousand Islands.
Half and more of our American peo¬
ple homeless, and a class of millionaires
turning the country back into a wilder
II CHS where they can raise game to hunt
as they do in England. -Wealthmaker.
VOTE AS YOU PRAY.
Whitt, the Ballot Might Accomplish
Toward Answering Prayer.
When the next general election conics
1 expect to hear our general master
workman sound another bugle call,
commanding us, in the name of God
and humanity, to stop protesting; to
cense being protestants, rally at the
ballot box and there demand our rights.
Labor has the power, the votes, and
can obtain its rights whenever it will.
One year from next November we can
elect the president and vice-president,
every member of the lower house of
congress, all the state legislatures, thus
securing many United States senators.
We can change the method of electing
senators, or abolish the senate alto¬
gether. We can soon change the char¬
acter of file Supreme comt. > We,can
establish the Initiative and referendum.
We can settle the lano question, the
transportation and all other questions
in short order. We can burn up the
constitution and write a new one. We
can burn up all our present statute
books and pass new laws, based on
equity and justice, We can make this
government what our forefathers de¬
signed it .should be—“a government of
the people, by the people, and for the
people” instead of as now. a govern¬
ment of the moneycrats, by the money
crats and for the moneycrats only. We
can make it a land where all are "born
tree and equal." and where all have the
“right to life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness.”
The workingmen can do all this one
year from next November, if they only
will. They can now convert this very
hell on earth into the paradise of God.
They can answer their own prayers,
which so many of us have so often
prayed, “Our Father who art in Heaven,
hallowed be Thy name; Thy kingdom
come, Thy will be done on earth as it
is in Heaven." All this can 'be done
practically at the ballot-box. If the
moneycrats, the politicians, the federal
judges and office holdersalon't like it,
why, let them do the protesting. Let
turn protestants. When they get
tired of that, they may emigrate to
Russia, or go to Money Is and and s ait
a t °ol s Paradise.
But will workingmen sink their dif
ferencea for their own interests, stand
ing together at the polls like honest, in
telligent men. and supplement their
protest at the ballot-box? Will they? 1
guess not. They have not sense nor
brains enough for that. That is what
the capitalists sav about them, and cap
ttal knows labor better than labor
knows itself. You can always rely on
the capitalists standing together and
voting together at the polls. But then,
the rich man has a quart of brains, the
workingman less than a thimbleful.
The workingman will quarrel with his
fellow-workmen and divide his vote.
He will listen to the old-party politi
clan abuse the other party and talk
about his love for the dear workingman
and how he is dying to make some sac
rifioe for him. Rev. Thomas Hines, of
Trinity Church. Manistee. Mich,
——-
There is one thing which the leaders
of the two old parties never try to
explain £ince 1865. although blessed
with Abundant crops, debts have in
creased. money has appreciated in
value, but all the products of labor
have decreased \\ iita undeveloped re
sources'such as no otner country pos
esses, millions of men and women are
6. Iu the ruidst of plenty we are in
want.
If the democrats of Texas had been
competent to pass an anti-prize-fight
law that would have stood the tost
there would have been no necessity for
of the legislature at
a expense entv thousand do’br*.
F S OF AMERICAN PLUTOCRACY.
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American Millionaire—So, Duke, you v/ant my daughter’s hand in marriage?
The Duke—I would give name and honor through her hand.
American Millionaire—Have you scrofula? Are you dissipated? In other words, have you all th» contaminations
common to noble blood?
The Duke—I’m afflicted with scrofula, epilepsy; am dissipated, disreputable, and a scoundrel.
American Millionaire—Take hfer, then, and may heaven bless my children. —With apologies to Texas Siftings.
CURRENT COMMENT.
From th« World of Thought and the
Field of Action.
The Arizona Populist says: The
freight rate on wall paper from New
York to San Francisco in carloads is
60 cents per hundred pounds. From
same point to Phenlx, $3.86 per hun
( ]red. The freight rate on a letter from
Now Y'ork to San Francisco is 2 cents,
From same point to Phoenix is 2 cents,
One is under a system of private owner
ship, the other under public ownership.
The man who is able to ship^tn car¬
loads does it for 400 per cent less than
the poor devil who is not able to do so.
But the man who buys a millio n Up stage
stamps p<ys the sal
devil who buys one. Awful this
uublic ownership.
* * *
Carlisle’s recent speech at Boston
may serve one good purpose. He shows
clearly the administration policy, so
that the people may not be mistaken as
to the real position of the money power
as represented by the leaders of the
two old parties. They are for gold
monometallism, without the use of
either greenbacks or silver, all other
currency except gold to be issued by
the banks only. He Says gold can only
be obtained by the sale of bonds, still
he wants the greenback destroyed,
which would increase the demand for
gold and make It difficult for the gov
eminent to buy gold even with bonds.
I ^he rate of interest would be increased,
ns Carlisle sadly deplores the fact that
-interest rates are lower than ever be
f 0re "—and of course “idle capital”
■ w011 i d have an opportunity for “profit
a ble investment” in the bonds which
^ would be necessary for the govern
( f 0 issue in order to retire the
greenback^. It must be remembered
t jiat Carlisle is an authorized mouth
j,j e ce of the administration, and that
t jj e administration is the duly recog
n j ze d American agent of the Roths
fh ilds—and whatever Carlisle says goes,
The New York World, whose real
position on any Important question is
unknown, since it has been everything
by turns and nothing long, says: “The
worst sign of the times is the grip the
monopolists ave gettiug ou the press
especially in this neighborhood.
when a man like Prof. Bemis is de¬
nounced as an anarchist, it becomes al
most dangerous to call for the observ
ance G f the ten commandments.” The
world in its policy of being all things
to all men says a little on both sides of
this question, as well as others—but
sometimes tells the truth accidentally,
as it does in this case,
*
Calvin S. Brice, millionaire senator
f rom Ohio who was a poor boy and
%v ho had to hustle hard, to get a start
j n business, te’.ls how it makes a boy
w bo was born poor feel to handle and
control millions:
“There is no difference between
handling millions and handling cents.
h takes no more exercise of brain pow
er t 0 t { 0 great things than to do little
ones. I exercised just ns much thought
ou m y small operations as I do now on
my large ones, and it was fully as hard
j 0 succeed with the iittl as the big.
n j S much like driving a horse. You
ma y drive one worth $100 or one worth
$100,000. It makes no more muscle nor
care to drive one than the other.”
And here the capitalistic press has
been telling us poor clodhoppers, that
it requires brains to become a million
sire. Guess they mean gall.
Lansing. Mich., Special: Mrs -Jarat
C. V. Emery, wh had a national repu
ration ns a populist an-’ arm peaker.
died here yesterday, aged 57, She was
the author of “The Seven Financial
Conspiracies,” which reached a sale of
350,000 copies, largely in the west, and
“Imperialism in America,” with a sale
of 40,000 copies. She was a pioneer in
"Greenbaekism,” and has followed all
the different organizations of kindred
nature through their history. At the
time of her death she was a member of
the state populist committee and presi
dent of the department of labor and
capital of the National Woman’s
Temperance Union.
♦ * *
Perhaps there is nothing unusual in
the fact, but nevertheless we consider
it worthy of note, that the man who had
’rftpst to do at the general convention of
the Protestant Episcopal church was J.
Pierpont Morgan. He is also the gen¬
tleman who advises President Cleve
land when to issue bonds, and also "pro
tects” the United States treasury at the
ra te of nine million dollars a protect,
He is called the “financial Bismarck,”
the great central figure around which
the New York financial system re
volves.. It is but natural that he
should also control a branch of the
c hurch of Mammon, since there is none
g rea ter than he in the kingdom,
The great toady press makes quite a
sensation of the fact that President
Cleveland was guilty of a “breach of
etlquett e” 0 n account of having neg
lected the time . ho n 0r ed custom of being
present at the opening of the supreme
court, so that those dignitaries might
exchange the usual flatteries and con¬
ventionalities. The president was busy
fishing and forgot that the supreme
court was entitled to his august pres¬
ence, according to all the traditions and
superstitious of judicial formality. And
yet what should be expected of a presi¬
dent who has repudiated the principles
upon which his party was founded,
bonded his country t<f England, and
brought every department of govern¬
ment into disgrace by dictating its
whole policy. Why should Grover
trouble himself about a mere formality?
*
The great toady press makes quite a
aesthetical and self-appointed guard¬
ians of the race about the possible harm
of the cycle in producing a stooped gen¬
eration. I wonder that the great sym¬
pathy and solicitude of this class has
not been agitated into excitement be
fore, see.ing that men bend over plows
and spades and shovels and picks for
eight and ten hours a day, and have
been for centuries. Why has not the
expression of solicitude been spoken for
tailor, for shoemaker, and such callings,
whose whole lives have been in unnat
ural curvature of the spine? No fear of
these producing a generation of stooped
or hump-backed citizens, eh? If the
classes ' that live idle or uselessly active
‘ ives will get off the backs of the men
who work, and allow them to have
more hours to stand erect, by doing
their share of producing something. I
think the world can get along with the
ills of the wheel and be more erect—
and upright—than it now is. There is
much far-fetched anguish in this sud¬
den solicitude for the future genera¬
tion.—Appeal to Reason.
*
Apropos to the pugilistic contest agi
tation, a preacher at Hot Springs pub
lished the following challenge for a
preaching match to be held in the am
phitheater immediately after the pug
contest:
“As I am now informed that the Cor
bett-Fitzsimmons glove contest is a
fi se d thing for the 21st instant, I would
suggest that at its close all the
preachers of Hot Springs use the
COAL GOES UP AGAIN.
THE HIGHWAY ROBBERS AT
WORK ON THE PEOPLE.
The Strike of the ‘’Dangerous Classes” »
Against the Welfare of the People
Successfully Carried Out—How Long
Will the People Submit?
Within the last four weeks the price
of coal was raised by order of the coal
and railroad ring in the East about two
dollars a ton.
These pirates not only determine how
much the American people shall be
taxed to keep warm and save them¬
selves from freezing to death, but their
ring actually decrees the amount of
coal the people shall be permitted to
have, by regulating the “output.”
All the anthracite coal mines are in
five counties in Pennsylvania and six
coal and railroad companies absolutely
control the mines and the railroads
leading to them.
People owning coal lands in that re¬
gion cannot mine the coal because the
monopolies wiil not furnish them
switches and other shipping facilities.
As a result, these commercial pirates
can do just as they please and force the
price up beyond all reason.
The miners in the anthracite receive
about twenty cents a ton for mining
the coal, and people in the Dakotas pay
as high as $17 a ton for it.
In Milwaukee the price has been $4.75
and has now been raised by order of
the Eastern coal ring to $G.50, with a
prospect of an additional raise.
The coal kings in order to maintain
the price decide in their meetings how
much coal shall be mined in a year,
“regulating the output” they call it.
The annual output is about 55,000,000
tons and figuring the unjust extortion
of the ring at only three dollars a ton
on the average, which is certainly a
very low estimate, the “legal” robbery
amounts to
$150,000,000 A YEAR,
or nearly as much as the total amount
of tariff duties the government collects
each year.
That is the robbery on one commodi¬
ty only. Now figure it on all necessi¬
ties and then dear republican and dem¬
ocratic voter ask yourself how much
longer you are going to play cat’s paw
for the trusts, syndicates and other mo¬
nopolists.—Milwaukee Advance.
amphitheater for a prize preaching con
test. The preacher preaching the
closest and nearest to Jesus Christ to
carry off the stakes. Plebian as I am, I
will preach against any or all of them,
The pugilists, their manageis and ref
eree may act as judges. I would ask no
prize money for myself, but would
freely put up $25 to have the clerical
mill go off with these assumed vice-re
gents of the humble, unlettered Naza
rene. But no doubt they are all too
cowardly to give it a serious thought.
“THOMAS COOK.”
This suggests the idea that if all the
preachers of the country would do a
little more preaching, according to the
rules of Jesus of Nazareth, pugilism
would soon lose its popularity.
In the Raleign, N. C., silver conven¬
tion the following resolution proposed
is the one that met the greatest opposi¬
tion from the democrats;
“To this end we earnestly recom¬
mend to the voters that hereafter they
elect only such senators and representa¬
tives in congress as are sincerely in
favor of the principles hereinbefore ex¬
pressed and only such presidential
electors as will publicly declare on the
stump that they will vote for no man
for president or vice-president who is
not in favor of such principles, and
whose record and platform are guaran¬
tees that they will be faithfully execut
ed.”
The silver men in the old parties are
great on talk, but when it comes to
pledging themselves to vote for silver,
that is different.
* *
Dr. Parkhurst, the preacher purifier
of municipal politics, is opposed to dick¬
ering for the support of opposing parti¬
sans. From the standpoint of the in
dependent party in New York, he says;
“Gentlemen, there is no wisdom in
our discussing these matters unless we
can meet on one broad and generous
platform and consult together with an
eye that is single to the exigencies of
this city. Some of you are purchasable
by a judgeship; some of you by a city
clerkship; some of you estimate your
tender devotion to this city in terms of
Sunday beer. We are not running a
dickering business, gentlemen. Our
purpose is to deal with men who do not
want to go around tagged with a cost
mark. You will excuse us from further
attempts at mediation. The responsi
bility of failure would then distinctly
be seen to rest squarely upon the shoul
ders of politicians.”
In commenting on the recent treasury
report showing a surplus for the month
of September, the Batesville Guard
offers the following;
“But the gold reserve is being de
pleted and the indications are that an¬
other bond issue may be necessary to
replenish it. We shall then have the
remarkable spectacle of a government
whose receipts are larger than its ex
penditures going heavily in debt to bor
row gold, in order that the money-gam¬
blers of New York may draw it out
again and compel the issue of further
bonds •
The boasted “progress of civilization”
is cleverly described by a London paper
as follows;
“First comes the ‘pioneer’ with the
Gatling and the gallows; then comes
the ‘developer' with the rum bottle and
the Bible: then follows the ‘civilizer’
with the shoddy cotton, the glass beads
and the leethrer on the advantages of
industry; then comes the ‘exploiter’
with the steam plow and the heavy
horsewhip; and then the native gets his
nose on the grindstone—and keeps it
there.”
GOVERNMENT OWNERSHIP.
The Safety of the People the Supremo 1
Law.
“Freights and fares on the govern¬
ment road would be regulated so as
to pay a reasonable profit upon its ac¬
tual value, and a corresponding re¬
duction on other transcontinental roads
would necessarily result. The rights of
the government and of the public gen¬
erally, would be secured, and an enor¬
mous incubus would be lifted from the
people of the west. Imagination can
hardly realize the extent of the relief
that would thus be afforded to the hard
working and poverty oppressed farmers
of this territorial division of the coun¬
try, and to the people generally.
In the history of the human race
but one statesman, in a position of
authority, great enough to rise above
the immoderate prejudices by which
the interests of wealth and capital are
buttressed, has ever appeared. His
policy, though in conflict with what are
called sound financial principles, in
fact rescued Athens from the throes of
impending dissolution, and inaugur¬
ated the most happy and glorious part
of her history. It has been approved
by all historians; and by the Athenians
themselves it was justly regarded as
the cause of their subsequent prosperi¬
ty, and its adoption under the name of
the great Seisactheira (or “shaking of
fetters”) was ever afterwards com¬
memorated as a great anniversary. The
lesson that it teaches is that the safety
of the people is the supreme law, (Saius
Populi, Suprema Lex); and that, what¬
ever views we may entertain as to the
general expediency of the government’s
operating railroads, or other industrial
enterprises, they must give way to the
higher principle when necessity de¬
mands.
That, in the necessity of freeing the
people of the Trans-Mississippi states
f r0 m practical serfdom, the occasion is
now presented for the application of the
m axim, cannot be doubted. Nor can it
be doubted, if the government proves
equal to its manifest and imperative
duty, that the acquisition of the owner
s bi p 0 f the Union or Central Pacific
railroads by it, will be to us, as Solon’s
policy was to the Athenians, an oc
casion to be forever commemorated in
our history.”—American Law Review.
If He Were President.
Prof. Dobbyn, of the Progressive Age,
having suggested Ignatius Donnelly for
president, the “Sage of Nininger” re¬
plies as follows in his paper, The Repre¬
sentative;
“Ah'. If people only had the wisdom
to elect us president!
“Whew!!
“Five minutes after we took the oath,
of office we would recognize the Cuban
republic; in ten minutes we would order
all the silver bullion in the treasury
coined into dollars; in fifteen minutes
we would convene congress to remone
tize silver; in half an hour we would
order Wall street fenced in, white¬
washed and deodorized; and in one hour
John Bull would be seen gathering up
his ‘duds' and skedaddling out of this
afflicted country.
“We would ‘make a spoon or spoil a
horn.' Me would’
“But alas, professor, the fool people
haven’t got sense enough to do so sensi
ble a thing; and so we will continue to
edit the Representative and swear at
the environment.”
