People's Pilot, Volume 6, Number 19, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 October 1896 — FOREIGN CAPITAL. [ARTICLE]

FOREIGN CAPITAL.

The Amount Invested In the United States. We have time and again warned the American people that Great Britain is rapidly becoming master of this country through loans and purchases, but the pepole seem to ignore the fact because the old political parties that hold them in thrall ignore it. But it is a serious question for Americans nevertheless, and we scoff and deride the boasted patriotism that can look upon it with indifference. A few weeks ago we published a list of lands held by foreign nobles and syndicates, which was of itself enough to waken even a dying patriotism. We are now able from a recent issue of tl»e New York World to give thecash value of British holdings in the United States as follows: 80nd551,250,000,000 Mines 150,000,000 Gas light companies .... 50,000,000 Electric light companies. 50,000,000 Breweries 35,000,000 Stockyards .... 20,000,000 Cotton mills 20,000,000 Flour mills 10,000,000 Dressed beef companies.. 10,000,00(5 Rolling mills 10,000,000 Distilleries 5,000,000 Grain elevators 5,000,000 Sash and door factories... 5,000,600 Leather goods factories.. 5,000,000 Food produce companies. 4,000,000 Paper mills 3,500,000 Ship yards 3,500,000 Potteries 3,000,000 Varnish works 2,400,000 Rubber mills .2,000,000 Miscellaneous .... ».... 50,000,000 Real estate 1,500,000,000 Total $3,193,500,000

The World declares, and truly, that figures of such an amount can scarcely be appreciated. It is thirty times greater than the amount ordinarily in the United States treasury. It is four times as large as the sum total of the nation’s immediate resources as shown by the official report of the secretary of the treasury at the end of the last fiscal year. At the end of the civil frar the nation’s debt was $2,773,000,000, or $400,000,000 less than what the British now own in the United States. To-day, with the national debt fallen to about $1,500,000,000, the British could pay it twice over by taking out of the American pocket what belongs to them.