The Sore Spot of Civilization,

Waikato Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 2012, 30 May 1885, Page 6 (Supplement)

The Sore Spot of Civilization,

The univeraality of gambling, under the head of speculation, says the San l'rancisco Bulletin, i8 one of the noteworthy features of the times. The implements and symbols of the old method have disappeared. There are no longer the secluded room, the table covered with green baizo, the chips, the dice-boxea, and the attendant croupiers. On the f ape the transaction now i 3 decorous and businesslike. The player enters the gorgeous office of the broker, selects the stock on which to make his venture, draws his cheque for the neoeasary amount and departs. A clergyman can go through these forms without staining the oloth he wear 3. There is at the moment an air of intense respectability about a proceeding which, in faot, ia a desperate gamble with loaded dioe or stocked cards. The selling of n thing for delivery at a future time; or dealing in futures, lies at the bottom of the old system. The game is not the same in nil cities. In San Francisco for a long time the gamble was in mines. It was continued until it caused the most widespread disasters. The real mining was done in the pockets of the oredulous investors. The most active operations were on the mother lode of deposits in the banks, in which there was no element of uncertainty. So widespread was the ruin created that it is now the general opinion that no greater misfortune oould befall u<3 than the discovery of -another bonanza. The business has almost "petered" out. But we have taken to wheat and grain gambling instead. The latter has always been the distinguishing feature of the gambling peculiar to Chicago. Wheat and grain lire there supplemented by pork. New York operates in rail road, telegraph, and more recently, oil stocks. It tried the mining dbdge after it was practically kicked out of this city, hut with indifferent success. In London the element of uncertainty necessary in gambling is found in foreign bonds. This is probably the highest game of the whole lot. The dealers are diplomats, generals and rulera. New treaties, new combinations, popular disturbances, rumors j>l wars are the tools. They take the place of the cards and the wheel. Coming baok over the rode above travelled, railroad and bank presidents are the dealers in New York. Cookod-up statistics and meteorological surmises form the babis in Chicago. With us it ueed to be cross outs and winzes, until the diamond drill begau to grow too much into the form of the rake of the dealer, with which he hauls in the coin. The whole business, wherever it is practised, reposes on a foundation of misrepresentation,* about foreign complications, of the results of battles, about railroad combinations and earnings, about the damage done to cereals und about everything calculated to .elevate or depress the gamble. Nothing is now more surprising than the immense mass of that kind of fabrication that is founl in circulation. Falsehoods are sometimes encountered, that at a distance are supposed to be merely gratuitous. But if they could be traced to their source, it would at once be seen that they were concocted for a purpose. Selling futures of all kinds has become such a widespread and common business, that the utmost difficulty i? experienced in the efforts to read current events, so great is the distortion of every fact, political, industrial, and commercial, that can in any way be bent to the purpose of speculation. We read sometimes of the strong passion for gambling among the less progressive races. 'But civilisation has not much to boast of in that behalf. Everything runs to gambling now, but with stakes of the most stupendous character. Millions are hazarded on what may be denominated a turn of the oard. Society will in turn be forced to protect itself from this demoralising tendency. So rough is the gambling that other people's money is always preferred by the operator. Appropriation of funds by bank presidents, oashiers and coDiidenti.il clerks generally grows .apace. In every case of embezzlement that comes up stocks are alleged ns the cause. The plea is heard around the world as regularly .as the bent of British drums. It is mado in .all markets, from San Francisco to London. There will be no improvement so long as that exouse is supposed to separate the case from vulgar theft. What society is going to do to remove this cancel no one can foreoast. That it will have to do something is Beyond question. Selling things for future delivery, as already stated, is the principle upon which gambling everywhere is based. But if a man who has a bond of a national government, stock in a railway or other corporation, wheat on hand, raised or purchased by himself, must deliver when he Bella, there oould be no speculation. He can in that case make money only by his superior knowledge and sagacity. But when ho buys or sella for dehvpry in the future he takes in the element of uncertainty always found in time. In addition, by combination, he oan often depress or raise the market so as to pocket all the money of his dupes. It ought not to be difficult to strike down a system of that bind with a law. But the people are not ripe for such a measure yet. The proof is that such transactions are still supposed to be respectable. Men are not tabooed who keep bucket-shops. Tne air of roapeotability which tho business wears has not yob been dissipated. When etock-garub ling begins to retreat to dark corner i, ;ib it must, or wrecking will becomo a pumanent rule of civilization, law caa be applied with effect.