People's Pilot, Volume 5, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 February 1896 — A $4,000,000,000 BALL [ARTICLE]

A $4,000,000,000 BALL

IN A •3.000,000 PALACE. WITH 4,000,000 IN THE COLO. Krtfflw Thouud Dollar Diamond* Shine and Ollaten Around » hSO.OM Fountain Opening of Wandorblir* An exchange says: “Last week Cor-, nelius Vanderbilt’s new residence was opened at Newport with a ball. The palace cost $3,000,000. More than 200 ehoice guests gathered around the $50,000 fountain by the grand stairway. It is estimated that these 200 guests represented $4,000,000,000, and if that does not entitle them to be termed the ‘creme of the creme,’ simmed milk ought to be good enough for most people.” The Atlanta Constitution commenting on this says: "There is a touch of ill nature in these comments. Ours is a country for all classes, the rich and the poor, all colors and races. A billion dollar bail is just as much in keeping with the spirit of our institutions and the tone of our society as any gathering would be. It is a good thing for the people at large that the rich are pleasure seekers, and their extravagance is in many ways a blessing. “The Vanderbilt ball turned an immense sum of money loose, and it directly and indirectly benefited thousands of tradesmen and toilers. Every state in the union would be better off if it had Vanderbilts building palaces, giving balls and scattering millions of cash in every direction. This is the way to look at it.” The Richmond, Va., Star replies: “We do not believe that a billion dollar ball is in ‘keeping with the spirit of our institutions.’ A billion dollar ball represents thousands of homeless and destitute people, made so by the robbery of the owners of the billion dollars. Their holdings are representative not alone of wrecked homes, but of crazed minds, despoiled virtues, of prisohs and poorhouses, of thieves and felons. They are representative of hundreds who were well-to-do to-day and to-morrow are homeless through the scheming and rascality of those who watered and manipulated the stockß of railroads and mines and other properties, which were turned over from the hands of the many into those of a few rascals who knew

the outs and ins of thievery, and often became the possessors of great properties without the expenditure of any money. No, the billion dollar ball is not in keeping with the ‘spirit of our institutions,’ unless cheating, stealing, and lying are in keeping with the spirit of our institutions. , “We deny most emphatically that every state in the union would be the better off for having a few Vanderbilts. For every Vanderbilt that every state should have would have to count its hundreds and thousands of idle and homelesss and the few millions they turned loose would not restore those who have been robbed and ruined to their own. “Tramps and paupers were unknown to this country until the millionaire made his appearance. With the coming of the millionaire has come the increase of crime, of tramps, of paupers, of idleness and anarchy. For many years this country moved steadily forward and the people were prosperous in the largest sense of prosperity without the presence of a single man with a million. With the coming of the millionaire have come all the ills that are known to the body politic. As the millionaire increases his wealth the people and the government have become poorer, until today we are told that but for the generous action and liberality of a few domestic and foreign millionaires our government would be without credit in foreign countries. When the government kneels at the feet of the millionaire it is no wonder that one part of the people uncover their heads and shout their praises while another and feebler part of the people are ridden over and trampled underfoot.”

There is another feature of this “spirit of our institutions.” About the same * time that Christ was born, and lay sleeping in a manger, the shepherds had a presentiment, and held a mass meeting, and started out to find relief; and that made Herod so mad that he killed all the boys under two years that he could And. While this billion dollar debauchery, one of the most profligate carousals that this nation has ever seen, unless it was a congressional orgie in a “Washington bazaar” or a presidential inauguration ball, l,sj()0 tramps held a mass meeting in Kansas—another proper presentation of the “spirit of our institutions.” It was a very quiet and orderly' meeting, with no special provision for the debauchery of women, no parade of drunkenness; and the Arkansas river took the place of the $50,000 fountain, the earth was the carpet and God’s blue sky was the covering. These were the representatives of the producers (owners) of that three billions upon which the thieves were rioting. And congress sits idly by, while the nation is plundered, more openly than when the British red coats marched overland to burn down the capitol at Washington.—Pueblo Independent. According to Mulhall there is just $1,040 in money and property for every man, woman and child in this country. Now if these 200 persons who attended Vanderbilt’s ball had $4,000,000,000 then there must be 3,046,184 persons who are paupers, or a much larger number who have much less than $1,040. In other words nearly four million paupers must exist in order that a four billion dollar ball may be given.. If, as the Constitution wishes, we had a few Vanderbilts and billion dollar balls in every state what would be the result? There are 45 states. Now a few billion dollar ballO would not leave a cent for the rest of

the people, as the nation*! wealth is hat $70,000,000,<M. It In easy to see from this that the Constitution did not know what it was talking about There are many more people who believe millionaires can be made without making paupers. It can’t he done. There is not enough money and property to go around.

No man every honestly made $1,000,000. Many persons must be robbed enable a man to get a million dollars Here is the pace. There is SI,OOO per capita. To make SIO,OOO one must make 10 paupers; to make SIOO,OOO, 100 paupers must be made: to accumulate $1,000,000 necessitates the reduction of 1,000 persons to beggary. This rule is as Inexorable as the laws of nature. Two men can not own the same dollar at the same time. Mrs. Vanderbilt wears a diamond worth $45,000. The annual report of the coroner of New York shows that 4.500 women are buried in pottter’s field every year. If there were not 4,500 paupers Mrs. Vanderbilt could not wear a $45,000 diamond. But we have overlooked something—production. If a man produce a million dollars he has not made one pauper and would certainly be a blessing to any community. But how much of the wealth of this country is in the hands of those who produced it? Practically none. The farmers of the agricultural states have produced billions of dollars worth of agricultural products in the last 25 years and are poorer to-day than they were in 1874. The same is true of all other productive industries. Millions of dollars are only aggregated into the hands of one perscm by robbery railway robbery, Standard Oil trust robbery, national bank robbery, interest robbery, rent robbery, and other robberies too numerous to mention. Some day the people will have sense enough to stop this, but how long will it take the people to see these things? Come now, old boy, get a wiggle on yourself and help us along. Are you doing your share? If not, try and do it. Be a man or get out of the way.