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SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 37. 



erty, through the distribution of corporate 

 shares, will lessen strife, develop skill, re- 

 duce cost, increase production and promote 

 the equitable distribution of wealth, which, 

 it must never be forgotten, is the chief end 

 of the social organization." 



The equitable distribution of wealth 

 which Mr. Hewitt speaks of is the aim of 

 aU honest political economists of all schools. 

 They only differ as to the means through 

 which it is to be brought about, and they 

 differ vastly in their apprehension of what 

 is the existing state of things. The chief 

 difl&culty of the socialist writers and such 

 men as Henry George and Mr. Zahm is 

 that they do not see clearly the existing 

 facts. Seeing the vast wealth of a few in- 

 dividuals, they preach the dictum the ' rich 

 are growing richer and the poor are grow- 

 ing poorer,' the last half of which is a stu- 

 pendous economic falsehood, equalled only 

 by the dictum of the anarchists that ' pro- 

 perty is robbery.' Innumerable facts can 

 be adduced to show that the statement that 

 the poor are growing poorer is a falsehood. 

 Statistics prove beyond all question that in 

 all the civilized world the wages of labor 

 have tended, ever since the extensive use 

 of the steam engine, say, since 1850, to in- 

 crease, and the cost of living to decrease. 

 Statistics of savings banks, of building as- 

 sociations, of life insurance companies, of 

 fraternal assessment life insurance associa- 

 tions, of the ownership of small houses and 

 small farms, of the reduction of mortgages 

 on farms, all show that not only is there 

 a vast increase in the wealth of the Nation 

 as a whole, but that this wealth is being 

 more widely distributed than ever before. 

 A magazine article recently said that more 

 than one-half of the entire population of 

 New England, including men, women and 

 children, are depositors in the savings banks, 

 the average amount to the credit of a de- 

 positor being $363. It says of the deposi- 

 tors : " If it were possible to prove what is 



apparent to the eye of any one who watches 

 the customers of these banks, it would be 

 found that very much the largest part of 

 them are the women and children. The 

 aggregate deposits in the savings banks in 

 New England is $774,000,000. In New 

 York State alone it is $644,000,000.". In 

 the little town in which I live, Passaic, N. J., 

 containing 18,000 inhabitants, a consider- 

 able part of the popnlation are Poles, Bohe- 

 mians, Hungarians and other natives of 

 southern Europe. They are recent immi- 

 grants, working in mills; yet one of the two 

 savings banks in the citj^ has 2,500 deposi- 

 tors, the deposits amounting to nearly $400,- 

 000; and in addition these same foreigners 

 last year sent to Europe, in the shape of 

 drafts issued by this same bank, not less 

 than $50,000. 



Place the statements just made concerning 

 savings banks against those made by Mr. 

 Zahm — viz., that the human family is di- 

 vided into two opposing camps; that we 

 have two inimical forces standing face to 

 face: on one side the modern State with its 

 army and its police ; on the other socialism 

 and organized labor. How can we reconcile 

 these two apparently conflicting views of 

 the existing status? Why, very easUy. 

 Mr. Zahm's two opposing camps exist: on 

 one side the socialists, on the other side the 

 police ; but his eyes were blinded when he 

 said that the whole human family is divided 

 into two opposing camps. He failed to see 

 the vast majority of the people who belong 

 to neither one camp nor the other, who are 

 the savings bank depositors, the owners of 

 small homes, albeit with small mortgages 

 on them, who are members of building as- 

 sociations and fraternal life insurance socie- 

 ties. The grandest fact in the economic 

 history of this age is the great increase ia 

 the number of the people in comfortable cir- 

 cumstances who once were numbered among 

 the poor. The increase in the middle class 

 goes along with a great decrease in the 



