THE 



POPULAR SCIENCE 

 MONTHLY. 



OCTOBER, 1886. 



THE DISTRIBUTION OF "WEALTH. 



By CHAKLES S. ASHLEY. 



ON a railroad-train one afternoon my conversation with a fellow- 

 traveler, a successful merchant, turned on the vast fortunes 

 which have been accumulated and transmitted during the present 

 generation. " Where is this thing going to end ? " said he. " Cor- 

 nelius Vanderbilt left his son William about $50,000,000 ; eight years 

 later William dies, and leaves $300,000,000. In the lifetime of his 

 sons this ought to increase to $600,000,000 ; * and in the lifetime of 

 their sons who can tell how much the Vanderbilt fortune will amount 

 to ? Legislation ought to put a stop to this business." He spoke very 

 earnestly, his face assuming a tense, stern expression, as if he were 

 confronting some personal enemy. Other persons in the car overheard 

 and testified their interest in the subject by joining us, some of whom 

 showed equal or greater vehemence in what was called the cause of 

 labor ; and the general sympathy seemed to be with the remarks I 

 have quoted. 



These persons, if I mistake not, may be said to represent a very 

 general sentiment existing in this country a sentiment almost com- 

 pletely pervading the laboring masses f and certain other special 

 classes, such as the clergy and the women, and prevailing less exten- 

 sively among our professional and merchant classes and our scholars. 

 Newspapers advocating progressively severe income-taxes, the com- 

 pulsory division of property at the death of the owner in ways insuring 

 diffusion, the assumption of state control of telegraph lines, and the 

 regulation of other corporations in such a manner as to insure a mini- 



* These figures, uttered in actual conversation, are of course inaccurate. 



f " The Toilers throw Theory and Sophistry to the Dogs, and take the Settlement of 

 the Question into their own Hands." (Heading in " Toledo News " (labor paper), March 

 13, 1886.) 



vor,. xxix. 46 



