•42 TRANSACTIONS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. [YoL. TI. 





tunity by one man, and he must accumulate wealth whether he desires 

 to do so or not. The supply of petroleum in the United States is 

 controlled by the Standard Oil Company, which owns many of the wells 

 and can dictate terms of distribution of the product of many others. 

 The Standard Oil Company, therefore, are in a position to levy a toll on 

 all the oil that goes into use, and even a moderate toll soon accumulates. 

 This is the main source of Mr. Rockefeller's wealth, though since he has 

 been placed in so advantageous a position he makes money rapidly in 

 other ways also. Money accumulated by one man in his lifetime would 

 not remain long in one man's hands after his death if it were not that he 

 is able before he dies to say how it shall be disposed of Cornelius 

 Vanderbilt left the bulk of his wealth to his son, and his son left it to his 

 grandson, who is now one of the most wealthy of the millionaires. But 

 for this power of post-mortem conveyance each mass of accumulated 

 wealth would soon disolve and pass into a number of hands, instead of 

 being controlled by one. That in the main it is economically desirable to 

 avoid extremes in the matter of wealth is quite certain. The sociological 

 conditions of the community are improved by having a large number of 

 moderately wealthy persons rather than by having a few enormously 

 wealthy in the midst of a mass of poor people. If great accumulations 

 of wealth are due chiefly to monopoly of opportunity and ^.o post-mortem 

 control of accumulations, it is obvious the remedy must be two-fold. 

 The monopoly must be broken up and the succession to property must be 

 regulated. The former can best be secured by the single tax on oppor- 

 tunity, and the latter by the succession tax on bequests or inheritance. 

 If the Standard Oil Company were forced to pay over a large share of 

 their monopolistic gains to the community in reduction of, or substitu- 

 tion for, other taxation, Mr. Rockefeller would never have possessed so 

 much wealth. If the younger Vanderbilts had each in succession been 

 required to pay a heavy succession tax each would have been just as 

 well ofif in all important respects as he is now, and the community would 

 have been better off than it is now, or might have been. It is not 

 necessary here to defend the principle of either a monopoly tax or a 

 succession tax. In my opinion each is defensible on the ground of 

 justice, and also on the ground of expediency. My object is simply to 

 call attention to the relation which these two forms of taxation bear to 

 the great economic questions which grow out of the accumulation of 

 capital in the hands of a few individuals, leaving millions cf others the 

 poorer for tr.eir wealth. 



