April 28, 1888





Record   and   Guide.





623





De/ojeO P J^l Estate , BuiLDif/o AficKiTEtrruKE ,Housei(olii DEBORATiotJ.
BifsifJESs Mb Themes of GeiJeraL 1;jt£i\est





>\              P5TABUSHED-W1







1868.





PRICE, PER VEAR IIV ADVANCE, SIX DOLLARS.

Published every Saturday.
TELEPHONE,          -          .          -          JOHN   370.

Communications should be addressed to

C.W. SWEET, 191   Broadway.
J. T. LINDSEY, Business Manager,





Vol. XLI.





APRIL 28, 1888.





No. 1,050





To insureprompt compliance to their request, subscribers ordering
their address changed must be careful to send us the old address as

■well as the new one.

---------•———

The stock market is booming. Everything on the list is going up
and the speculators are Iiaving a carnival. This has been due to the
policy of the administi-ation in spending the surplus on bond
purchases. It seems the Treasury has determined to wipe
■out from sixty to eighty million of tbe public debt, and that 'without
■withdrawing tlie sixty million of government money uow in the
-bank vaults, free of interest. Of com-se the canceling of govern¬
ment bonds sets free just as much money, wliich must be reinvested
in other securities. Tliis stimulates the buying of raih-oad bonds
:and the better class of stocks. The whole list of speculative prop-
lerties are, under the circumstances, a purcliase. Then there are
other things wliich help. Check to railroad and house building, as
w^ell as to manufacturing, because of the tariff debate, puts a stop
to the outflow of money into industrial enterprises, and as a conse¬
quence funds accumulate in the money centres of the country.
The money reserve tn om- national banks is more than double what
it was this time last year, and the accumulations are getting larger
week by week. There is a plethora .of money in Europe also, and
the rates of interest are steadily cheapening. Then the reduction
in the interest on the British Consols is displacing capital aud forc¬
ing even conservative investors to take their chances in the general
securities market. All these influences help speculation in the New
York Stock Exchange, so we will probably see liigher prices for
some little time to come.





Generally an advance in stock values is regarded as a good omen
for the trade of the country, but we think the policy of our gov¬
ernment is a mistaken one. The administi-ation is making a
"coruer" ou tlie securities held by rich corporations and milhou-
aires. It is giving a present of the government mouey to the
exceptionally wealthy class who own government securities aud
railway bonds, aud it thus leads to unwholesome speculation in all
manner of corporate wild cats. Real estate, it will be noticed, is
dull and very slow of sale. EuUders are not happy, for they get no
uew orders aud find it almost imiiossible to sell the houses they have
on hand. Manufacturers are curtailing their productions and the
u-on and metal trade is stagnant. How different affairs vv ould have
beeu if the surplus iu the Ti-easury was used productively. That is,
if it had beeu spent on public buildings which are so much needed in
all parta of the Uuiou ; on river aud harbor improvements, sea-coast
defenses, and the rehabiUtation of our merchant marine. This way
of spending our money would have started up our iron mills, given
life to our dock-yards, added to our foreign commerce, and fur¬
nished employment to hundi'eds of thousands of workingmen in
improving our waterways aud tbe liarbors along our coasts aud the
lakes. But uo, the administration dehberately stai-ts a fresh specu¬
lation in Wall street, and helps the classes without respect to the
maaseg out of the public Treasury,





Both political parties are makmg shocking bad records for them¬
selves. In this State the Democrats bave struck hands with the
hquor interest. They favor free trade in rum selling and will not
vote to charge anything against the saloons which cost our citizens
so much in the way of almshouses, prisons and hospitals. Tlien the
Democrats are unanimously opposing the election la'w reform which
would tend so much to purify our political contests. The Republi¬
cans seem to be unable to take advantage of the mistakes of theu-
opponents. PracticaUy they favor our present objectionable tariff
which fosters private monopolies aud lays unnecessary bm'deus
upou all who consume manufactui-ed goods. As a party they do
not take ground in favor of spending the public money for public
objects, such as river and harbor improvements, the creation of a
navy and a merchant marine. Government paternalism is justi¬
fiable if the eud sought is the advantage of the community. But
the Repubhcans favor the use of the government to foster private
corporate interests at the expense of the community.    Both parties





are hopelessly wrong on the question of civil service reform. The
Democrats have forced Presideut Cleveland to abandon the position
he took during the flrst two years of his administration, wliile the
Republicans have giveu uo guarantee that should they get into
power they would not hand over the spoils to their retainers. The
political outlook is anytliing but reassuring.





The Dominion of Canada will spend this year a million and a half
of dollars for sea-coasfc defenses. This is equivalent to about twenty -
two million dollars should the United States make corresponding
expenditure for a similar object. Canada is also to expend ^ three
million dollars for improving its rivers aud harbors, equal to nearly
fifty million of dollars if similai- work was done in the United States,
Yet here we are afraid to appropriate less thau twenty million
dollara for river aud harbor improvements, when the government
engineers say that it would be wise to spend one hundred aud sixty
million per annum for several years to come. Such an expenditure
would repay us fiftyfold in gi'ving us facihties for transacting the
internal and external commerce of the country. But our provincial
New York press, wliOe clamoring for money to deepen Buttermilk
Channel as well as the water in oui- lower harbor, keeps up its captious
criticism of some of the minor details ofthe river and harbor bill.
Yet the editors know that the appropriations are as ridiculoualy inad¬
equate for the whole country as they are for New York harbor. We
ought to spend at least six million a year hereabouts instead of tbe
eight hundred thousau'^l which is the limit of the present river and
harbor bill. Not a word is said in condemnation of the bonus given
by government to the rich by bond purchases, nor is attention called
to the swindling pension bill, appropriating some eighty miUion more
dollars for the benefit of claim agenta aud bounty'' jumping " frauds.
By the eud of the next year we wiU have spent some nine hundred
million dollars on pensions, more than one-half of which is down¬
right waste and robbery.

—_—-a----------

The news from the winter wheat fields is very bad. The prospect
is that we will have uot more thau half the usual yield. Wheat is
up seven cents a bushel and our exports have almost stopped. But
although the spring is late the least promising winter wheat fields
can be ploughed up and replanted with spring seeds. Then opera¬
tors remember that we were wholly deceived as to the cotton yield
of last year. Even after the crop was gathered, the government
statistician estimated it at less than 6,400,000 bales. Tins led to a
bull movement and a great deal of cotton was unloaded on foreign
and domestic spinners and speculators at from oue to two ceuts a
pound more than it was worth ; for it now tui-us out we wiU have
nearly 7,000,000 bales of last year's crop. Ellison, the famous
EngUsh expert, is certain it -will not be less than 6,900,000 bales.
This difference between 500,000 and 600,000 bales means that we
are better off by between $25,000,000 aud $30,000,000 more than we
supposed we were at the beginniug of tiiis year. We may have the
same story to teU of the wheat crop tlus year.





The recommendations made by the Real Estate Exchange
Committee respecting rapid transit contain some good points.
They favor the original cable scheme, which proposed to give our
citizens a swifter means of surface transit than borsecars; alao
transverse and cross-town roads, as well as one fare from auy oue
part of the city to any other part. Our local press opposed and
ridiculed this cable system which, if adopted, would liave been a
great convenience and saving of time to oui- citizens. Of course
auy company which secured tliis valuable pri-rilege should pay a
good share of its gross receipts into the city ti-easm-y. The com¬
mittee is also quite right in saying that rapid ti-ansit in this city
requires four tracks, two for express trains and two for frequent
stops. Their objection to undergi-ound roads with opeu cuts is well
taken. They should also oppose any dark tunnel road as objection¬
able on the score of health and comfort. They might have gone
farther and favored the Aarcade road under Broadway as weU as the
further utihzing of om- elevated road system. The latter should be
extended to our principal ferries, and express trains should be
provided for on our 2d, 3d and Gth avenuea,

-----—•----------

~ The Panama Canal enterprise seems to have taken a new lease of
life in France. The government will authorize the lottery loan to
raise money, and the funds needed to complete the work will be
forthcoming. We have always believed that this canal would be
constructed, notwithstanding the discouraging statements iu regard
to it which have appeared in the American press. Undoubtedly the
canal will cost an enormous sum of money, far more than the orig¬
inal estimates, but this is geuerally tlie case with all engineering
enterprises. The English press was quite as bitterly opposed to the
Suez Caual as has been the American press to the Panama Canal.
But De Leasepa will succeed in the second enterprise as he did in
the first.





Jay Gould doubtless thought that he made a good point upon the
dissatisfied holders of the M. T. and R. securities when he proved
from the books that the proposed new board of directors owned