496 MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



to exist at Lowell and elsewhere in Massachusetts.* To prevent association, pains 

 and penalties are devised, and thus, if a thousand people desire to create a shop 

 at which money may be exchanged for securities, or a factory at which cotton 

 may be converted into cloth, it is held to be necessary that each of the Ihouxand, 

 having an interest of ^100) and entitled to claim, at the most, a dividend of six 

 or eight dollars per annum, shall be responsible for all the debts of the concern, 

 because entitled to receive the thousayidth part of t lie profits, although the whole 

 capital, amounting to $100,000, must be sunk before any creditor can lose a dol- 

 lar. Prudent men know that a well-managed bank, or factory, cannot, on an 

 average, divide more than 7 or 8 per cent. ; they know that tiiey can obtain six 

 per cent, on mortgage, without responsibility of any kind ; and they likewise 

 know that mortgages on city property are more readily realized, and the interest 

 thereon more punctually paid than on country mortgages ; and thus everything 

 tends to the transfer of capital to the cities — whereas if legislators could but open 

 their eyes to the fact that men understand their own business, and are more com- 

 petent to determine for themselves the proper mode of trading Avith each other 

 than their representatives at Harrisburgare to do it for them, the farmer's capital 

 that now goes to Philadelphia for the purchase of bank stock or mortgages would 

 remain at home, benefiting those who desire to borrow ; and, in a much greater 

 degree than at present, those who are able to lend. A large portion of the State 

 is at this moment deprived of all the advantages that would result from the es- 

 tablishment of places for the exchange of money and securities for each other, 

 and the owner of capital is compelled to intrust it to the management of people 

 at a distance, when he would prefer to keep it at home, while his neighbor's farm 

 or work-shop is unproductive because unable to obtain occasional small loans to 

 enable him to purchase stock, lime, &c., or to make improvements that are 

 needed. 



What is here said of Pennsylvania is equally true of most of the States south 

 and west, all of which seem disposed to vie with each other in imposing re- 

 straints on the trade in money, the most important of all trades, and equaling in 

 amount all others put together; as every exchange of commodities is made at a 

 money price, and involves the necessity of a contract for the delivery of its 

 equivalent in money. 



You ask why land in Maryland, Virginia and South Carolina has so little 

 value when compared with that of England or of France. To obtain an answer 

 to this question we must first determine what is the cause of value in land. Of 

 itself it certainly has none, as can be seen in the fact that thousands and tens 

 of thousands of acres of the most fertile lands in Texas have been given to indi- 

 viduals on condition of settlement, and that when partially settled they could not 

 be exchanged for half as much as they had cost. Such was the case with those 

 granted to William Penn, and to all others of the early settlers of these United 

 States. The lands of Iowa and Wisconsin have, in part, attained a value of SI 25 

 per acre because of a great expenditure of capital in the formation of roads and ca- 

 nals leading from the lakes to market, but they are in many cases dearer, fertile 

 as they are, at that price, than lands in Pennsylvania or ]New-York at $.80 to $100 

 per acre. Clear and inclose them, and give them roads and canals, and they will 

 gradually acquire farther value, rising Avith the growth of wealth and population, 

 but never equal in amount to that of the labor that has been expended upon them 



* " Lowell, F^h. ?4, 1847. — Hon. A. Stkwart : Dear Sir — Your fnvor ofllie ISlti inst. is received, and I 

 am happy to furnish you such facts and iiiforniution as 1 jiossess tonchins; the subject of your inquiiies. It 

 ifl R fact that hands who work in our mills are, many of them, stockholders. It is Ihe case to a greater or 

 less extent in all o>ir companies here. In the Middlesex (woolen) there is about $(iO,0(tO of its stock owned 

 by men who work in their mills. In the Merrimack yard there are thirty men who own slock, say about 

 860,000. 'J'here'are several who own in the concern under my charge. The stock of iherc companies, as 

 a general thing, is held in small sums, tay a few thousand dollars each. It is constantly in the market for 

 Bal(!. and any person can purchase who has the means. It is corr^idered n desirable investment for widows 

 and orphrms, and clergymen, because tluy receive the luMniit of the sagacity and skill of the best business 

 men of the country. 'I'hese corporations, with their liundreds of stockholders are much more democratic, 

 far easier of access to men of small means, than the association of individuals as co-partners. It is associated 

 wealth, accessible to any person who has the amount of one shaie, wliich may be SlOO or $1,000, as the 

 l,egislature that grants the act of incorporation may judge proper. Whit is there in k!I I'lia that lu; ka like 

 monopoly or tuvor to the rich cai)itidi8l ( With my hundred or thou.-^and i^ollnrs I can purchnte a shnre 

 which will give mc the Baine per cunt, on my one share, that my rich neighbor who has hft hundred shares 

 receives. 



" There is nothing about it exclusive. The man of very small means is enabled to invest and realize a 

 benefit from wealth and skill which he could obtain in no other way. Yours, veiy truly, U. H.MITLETT." 



(lOie) 



