THE MAKERS OF "CORNERS"IN FOOD PRODUCTS.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 359, 13 April 1889, Page 3

THE MAKERS OF "CORNERS" IN FOOD PRODUCTS.

An American journal called Life deservedly castigates the rapacious and heartless miscreants who use their financila powor to lob and plunder their fellows. The writer of the article says :—: — Here is a man whose millions aie so many that, by the most profligate ex travagance — if he were inclined to the oxcesses of more generous natures — he would be unable to endanger his financial security ; to whom additL nal wealth can bo of no more practical use than the same bulk of wastb paper, who deliberately concocts a scheme to use that wealth so as to bring- ruin and suffering upon as many people in as many walks of life as he can by any ingenuity compass in his meshes, and all to add a few more useless millions to an enormous fortune that ho only utilizes for mischief. To accompli&h this benevolent purpose, ho, early in the summer, begins secretly to purchase all of that most important food staple, wheat, that he can lay his covetous hands upon. So deep-laid is this scheme, so vast is his wealth, and so large his commercial experience, that he is enabled to socure entire control of the cereal upon which the nation so largely depends for its food for the ne>'t few weeks. And now his sport begins. Tho first 'to feel the ofTects of his machinations are his business associates, men with whom he has held friendly relations, whom he meets daily in the streets and in the places of trade. They have sold wheat short for delivery within a certain time, and knowing when that time expires, the arch conspirator withdraws the grain fiom the market, and so forces a tremendous increase in price. The speculators have got to fill their orders, or else go to ruin, and the conspirator calmly looks on as they bid his goods up far beyond their value, and counts his daily gains by ohe millions. If the mischief wrought by the arch conspiratoi only stopped at that point, it would be brutal enough But it does not stop here. The millers begin to run short of wheat wherewith to mako their ilour, and the bakers run short of the flour wherewith their bread must be made. There is plenty of wheat to feed the people, but tho conspirator &till controls it at the ruinous advance in price he has brought about. The baker is obliged to pay the exhorbitant price for his flour, and the small baker, whobakes for the poor, must pay the mosb, since he purchases in smaller quantities, and is unable to keep a stock on hand. And this is the second cruel result : In both city and country, where the very poor live in wretchedness and squalor, where bread is largely the food supply and money is hardest to get, the price of bread goes up two or three cents per loaf, or else the loaf is leducod in weight from three to four ounces. Many who come for bread go home without it, or purchase stale crusts to satisfy their hunger, and the hunger of innocent children and helpless invalids in the tenement houses. Hundreds and thousands of men and women and children suffer a daily deprivation in order that one man may add to his millions. But it should be borne in mind that the conspirator has brought about these results by strictly legal means, and that he has violatod no commercial statutes. He has only taken advantage of tho opportunities he posses&ed to rob his tellow-men without giving the law any hold upon him. He has caused more actual misery and suffering in one week than all the criminals in the country in a year, and yet his honour is untainted and his reputation unsmirched. There are plenty of men who admire him for his very callousness and indifference to others in carrying out a great scheme. If he had climbed into the window ofoneof the grain speculators at night, and stolen his watch, the conspirator would be disgraced forever, and yet it is difficult to discover any greater degree of moral depiavity in obtaining the same speculator's money by legalised hook and crook, and yielding him no return for it. After all, however, the grain thief is little, if any, worse than the other capitalistic rascals of his time. The man who wrecks a railroad and beggars its stockholders for hi 3 own gain is considered an able financier, and he generally belongs to a church.