Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

The Record and guide: v. 38, no. 967: September 25, 1886

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September S5, 1888 The Record and Guide. 1169 THE RECORD AND GUIDE, Published every Saturday. 1©1 Broadv7av, IST. '^. Our Telephone Call is.....JOHN 370. TERMS: ONE TEiR» in adyance, SII DOLLARS. CJommtmications should "be addressed to C. W. SWEET, 191 Broadway. J. T. LINDSEY, Business Manager. Vol. XXXVIII. SEPTEMBER 35, 1886. No. 967. Only a few weeks ago the stock market was very dull, notwith¬ standing the great improvement in the business of the country; but a marvellous change has recently taken place. The proposed reorganization of the Reading Company has been made the excuse for a rampant bull speculation, not only in the coal stocks but in the Vanderbilts, as well as in miscellaneous securities. In 1880 and 1881 it was not unusual for eight and nine hundred thousand shares to be bought and sold in one day; but since the reaction, which commenced in the siimmer of 1881, the market fell off until ^50 to 300,000 shares was considered a good average day's business. During the past ^veek the transactions have suddenly increased to between six and seven hundred thousand shares on the regular Stock Exchange and some 200,000 shares in the Consolidated Board, thus making a total equal to the "boom" years when speculation was at fever heat. The conditions all seem favorable for an advance iu stock values, for the business of the country is on a healthy basis, and producers are making fair profits in trade; but, of course, speculative Wall street will work the .situation for all it is worth, and more too. The fever will be followed by a chill further along, and the lambs will be shorn again as of yore. three days for the judges to deliberate over 'the matter, and their plain duty was either to award the cup to the Galatea or order a new race. The conduct of our yachting people in this matter will excite some sharp criticism on the other side of the water. Still we believe that the Mayflower or the Puritan are swifter racing machines than is the English yacht. But the latter is a comfort¬ able sea-going boat, which its American competitors are not. AU this may sound unpatriotic, but it is well to keep the facts in mind irrespective of national partialities. There are symptoms of a land speculation not far ahead. The sale of Twenty-sixth Ward Brooklyn property brought excellent prices, and it looks as though the people who have made money in retail trade are disposed to invest their savings in vacant lots. A cycle of speculation never ends until there is furore in real estate. Here it would be well to bear in mind that there is uQver speculation in improved property. People sometimes pay more for houses than they are worth, and builders overdo construction at certain times and in particular regions; but when the i)ublic speculate wildly, as they did in 1837, and from 1868 to 1871, the dealings are invariably in unimproved property. This speculative fever has got to come sometime, and perhaps it ia nearer than many of us realize. According to Lord Salisbury the Tory panacea for pacifying Ireland is to encourage peasant proprietorship in that now unhappy country. Instead of Home Rule, which means a Parlia- ment'on College Green, Dublin, the government will give tenants and farm laborers homes of their own; that is, the government will buy out the interests of the landlord and transfer them to the Irish people under easy conditions. If the Salisbury government has strength to carry out this proposition, and at the same time inaugurate county local government for the whole United King¬ dom, we believe it would not only settle the Irish question but would in addition furnish a basis for an agreement between Cham¬ berlain and the English Radicals and the Tories to settle the land question in England, Scotland and Wales. There is great doubt, however, whether Lord Salisbury will be able to carry out his programme. Governor Hill has been attending the agricultural county fairs, and has made numerous speeches to the farmers of a non-political character. He has, however, emphasized one point which is worthy of comment. He says that real estate bears too large a portion of the State and ciiy taxation, while corporate wealth and personal property in a great measure escapes all public burdens. He says this inequality ought to be corrected by the Legislature. Taxation for public uses should bear equally on all property. It is not fair that the owner of a house or farm should contribute more to the public treasury than the owner of stocks, bonds, or shares in profit¬ able corporations. It is notorious that the Goulds, Vanderbilts, Sages and the millionaires, whose wealth is represented by securi¬ ties, contribute very little to the State and city treasuries, while everyone who owns real estate is forced to walk up to the tax ofiice and do his share in keeping the machinery of the government agoing. Tiie statement of this fact by Governor Hill has been called demagogism, but it is nothing of the sort—it is an undeniable fact; the difficulty in the way is how to correct the evil. If the State should tax corporations and personal property, men of large means would transfer their operations to Boston, Philadelphia, or other cities where taxation of personal property is also almost unknown. The true solution of this difficulty would be the imposition of an income tax by Congress. This would bear equally upon all parts of t'j.e Union and would be the fairest method of collecting a revenue to support the general government. Our army, navy, policemen and courts exist for the purpose of protecting life and property ; for seeing that the peace is kept and that justice is done. It is simply monstrous that the great capitalists of the country should escape all public burdens as they do now. The tariff imposts bear as hardly on the man whose income is $1,000 a year as it does on Jay Gould or any of the Vanderbilts, for it is a tax on clothing and the necessaries of life, of which the average cleik uses as much as the richest millionaire. Lord Randolph ChurchiU has given notice of his intention, when Parliament reassembles, to bring in a bill facilitating the transfer of land and reducing the charges for doing so. It will be remem¬ bered that Lord Cairn's act provided a means whereby land could be transferred in England cheaply, securely and expeditiously, but the provisions of the law were permissive and not mandatory. The lawyers took advantage of this fact to advise their investing clients to pay no attention to the law; hence the monstrous charges and endless complications of the English land system continues to this day. But the system has become intolerable, and it now looks as if Great Britain would have reform in its land laws before any of.the States in this Union. ---------•--------- Has our yacht club and the press generally treated Lieutenant Henn and the Galatea with generosity or even justice? In the two trials for the America's cup the conditions were all unfavor¬ able to tbe British yacht, and her defeat was a foregone conclusion. Thejj surely that award of the Newport cup to the Mayflower was Rich men themselves should be willing to bear their share of the public burdens. There is a dangerous spirit abroad among the working classes; and while some of their grievances are imaginary, the fact that they are taxed out of all proportion to tiie burdens laid on the rich cannot be disputed. The labor demagogues should not have this argument against the capitalist class, whose vast accumulations of personal property are now untaxed. Every real estate owner must naturally sympathize with a movement to dis¬ tribute the public burdens equally among all citizens. This in a time, it should be remembered, when there is a talk of a graduated income tax, which we certainly do not advocate, but which may be imposed if the owners of personal property conspire to continue the Immunity from taxation they have so long enjoyed. Peter B. Sweeney has had himself interviewed by the Herald on the subject of the impending war in Europe. He agrees substan¬ tially with what has eo often appeared in these columns. Europe is armed to the teeth, and the coming war'will be the most destruc¬ tive known to history. The hosts of Xerxes dwindle into insignifi¬ cance compared with the monster armies which every nation will put into the field in the coming contest. I'eace, in the opinion of Mr. Sweeney, depends upon the frail lives of two old men, Kaiser Wilhelm and Prince Bismarck. Our own; opinion has been that Bismarck is eager to fight, and that it is the German Emperor who is the real peace preserver. Mr. Sweeney also warns the American people that if a war takes place our unprotected sea-coast is certain to be attacked by some needy power which will take advantage of our naval weakness and plunder our leading cities. But it seems to be impossible to make our people see this, and so we have before us a certainty of national humiliation and grievous waste of treasure, all due to our insane national egotism. The question of the Treasury surplus is attracting a good deal of attention throughout the country, and it is beginning to dawn on many of our public men that the view so often taken by The Record and Guide is tbe correct one.. We say the surplus should be spent on works of unquestioned public improvement. Politi¬ cians, however, have a terror of the newspaper idiots who howl •' job " whenever it is proposed to spend the public money for public not quite the thing. The Galatea sailed six miles further and made uses. Mr. Nemrao, formerly chief of the Government Statistical ly#|;sjtim.l?^wasrul©d^toj]^R teoha^^^^ feul, Ife tools some J Bureau, is out in a fiensibl© l«ttey urg% tfeis aisj)OBltlon of oUr