Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 42, no. 1066: August 18, 1888

Text version:

August IS. 1888 Record and Guide. 1017 Dn^TEO TO f^E^L EsvME. BuiLoif/c -Af^cKitectji^e .Household DEGOftATlori. BUsirJESs A^^D Themes of GeHer^I 1;Jte[\est >> ESTABLISHED ^«y^RPH^r-i^ 1868. PRICE, PER YEAR IN ADVANCE, SIX HOLLARS. Published every Saturday. TELEPHONE, - - - JOHN 370. Commimieations should be addressed to C. W. SWEET, 191 Broadway. /. T. LINDSEY, Business Manager. Vol. XLII. AUGUST 18, 1888. No. 1,066 Now Ready—The Index to the Conveyances and Projected Buildings published in The Record and Guide during the first six months of the current year. The Index fs printed on extra heavy paper, and, as usual, includes New York and Kings Counties, and is the most exhaustive ever xiuUished. The labor and expense connected with the work has become so formidable that a charge of iifty cents is made for this issue, as announced in these columns on January 21st last. Subscribers requiring copies should send in their orders at once. The stock market during the past week has shown how largely it is a weather market. With the coming of one or two cool days on Monday and Tuesday quotations ca.me to a halt, and as the fears of an eai-ly frost to the injury of the corn crop increased, just in that proportion began the quotations of stocks to decrease, until there lias set in quite a respectable reaction. Of course when it is considered that an early frost means a probable corn crop of ouly 1,700,000,000 bushels against one of over 9,100,000,000 busliels with no frost before the middle of September, the differences in the value of which will amount to a round $175,000,000 to trade, it is no wonder that timid holders in Wall street would try to market a por¬ tion of their holdings and wait further developments of the weather. General business throughout the West in the dry goods line has been very good for the past four weeks, but through the East it has been very quiet. Stocks of cotton goods are accumulating in first hands in many kinds, wlule print cloths, the most standard of all goods, show a notable scarcity, with prices very firm. Our wheat crop will not be up to the average. Indeed, it maybe less than 400,000,000 of bushels. Bradstreet's say 370,000,000, and as we eat up and use for seed some 300,000,000, it follows tliat we will not have much for export. Tliis looks like high prices for wheat and flour during the coming year. But, after all, our most important crops are bay, coru and oats, because they are animal food, and our cattle, hogs aud lard—tliat is. provisions generally— ai'e of vastly more value than wheat or even cotton, Wheat, of course, gives directly more busmess to the raikoads. Only 6 per cent, of our corn crop ever leaves the locations where it is grown. But it forms an important item of freight in the form of cattle, lard, whiskey, ghicose and the like. It is stated as a curious fact, tbat were all the railroads in the United States doubled iu capacity they could not transport all our corn crop, even if they worked every minute of the day carrying that cereal exchisively. divorce, those concerning commercial paper and those affecting comity between tbo States ami tbo o.ttradition of criminals. The organization is called tbe National Bar Association. There is another body, tiie American Bar Association, M'hich has been eleven years in existence and w liicb has the same genera! objects in view. It is a curious fact that tlie profession which profits so largely by the confusion in our laws should be the one which seems most anx¬ ious to ha\-e them unified. It will be recalled that it was the law¬ yers who made the most ado about our absurd laws relating to tbe transfer of real property, but somehow no progress has been made in that direction. Can it be that the active interest of the lawyers is to prevent this necessary legislation, rather tban to help it? Of course, the most straigiitforward way of unifying our mar¬ riage and commercial laws would be by amendments to the Consti¬ tution of the United States, giving Congress authority to pass laws operative in all the States. Under our present system a woman is a mistress in one State and a lawful wife in another, and childi-en are legitimate in Illinois who are bastards in tbe State of New York. This, of course, leads to entanglements as to inheritances and titles, to tlie benefit of no one but the lawyers. Then tlie various State laws relating to debts and their collection are in a condition of the wildest chaos. It is impossible for the most industrious lawyer or the most careful merchant to keep track of the multiform enact¬ ments relating to debts. All this is an obstruction to trade, and shows the folly of insisting on local self-government in matters so vital and natural as Interstate commerce. Should tbe corn crop turn out even reasonably well, we shall cer¬ tainly have a prosperous fall business. This will help President Cleveland's chances for re-election. We have pointed out from time to time the lack of interest in this Presidential canvass. Col. Brice, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, is deplor¬ ing the apathy amongst the Democratic leaders; but it does not seem as if the Republicans are mucli more energetic. The Demo¬ cratic war horses are apathetic because they fear, if Mr. Cleveland is re-elected, that he will revert to his civil service heresies, as they regard them, and there wiil consequently be no offices for the faith¬ ful. Should Benjamin Harrison be cliosen, however, there is no doubt at ai! but what tens of thousands of Democratic office-holders would be replaced by active Republicans. This state of feeling on both sides may lead to more active personal interest on the part of the Republican " outs." It is hard to gues& as to the result of the pending Presidential election. A national convention of lawyers was held at Cleveland recently, and its proceedings ought to have attracted widespread attention. Its composition and objects are thus described : It is formed of delegates from State and local bar associations, and its leading object is to promote the unification, so far as practicable, of the la-ws of the various States which relate to matters in which the people of fhp country Jiave a common interest, such as those relating to marriage and ■'■ ■ 'I. '. 1..... .... ■'■■"' Years ago. The Record and Goide proposed that a national con¬ vention should meet on the hundredth anniversary of the adoption of our present Constitution, in order to revise that instrument and put it in harmony with the existing condition of affairs. But noth¬ ing ever came of it. It is found practicaUy impossible to alter our fundamental law, although many parts of it are obsolete and other parts were getting more unworkable every year. This Cleve¬ land convention of lawyers proposes that a codified series of laws relating to marriages, divorces, inheritances, debts and their col¬ lection, should be hawked about from one State Legislature to another, with a view to getting some uniform methods of procedm'e on all these important matters tliroughout the Union. But what a roundabout way thia is of securing State action, when a national law, if Congress had authority to pass one, would be so much more efficient. It seems the countiy has been mistaken respecting the iron out¬ put. It has been supposed that there was a heavy falling off in pro¬ duction and consumption compared with the last year. It is true that there has been a decrease in the demand for, aud the produc¬ tion of, steel rails. The first half of tliis year775,261 tons only were produced against 1,144,080 tons in the corresponding half of 1887. But this does not tell the whole story, for we produced 3,383,503 tons of irou for 1888, compared with 3,415,003 tons for 1887, a loss only of 32,707 tons. In other words, the general iron industries of the coun¬ try consumed more iron tills year than last, and almost made up for tlie lieavy falUng-oft' in steel rails. We shall build a great many miles of raib-oad tliis year, but it will not be in tlie West, as the scene of building activity has clianged to the South and the Pacific coast. Those who believe tlie u'on trade is the key to the industi-ial situation will argue from these facts that the era of prosperity ie not yet over._______ A pipe line is now being built from Lima, Ohio, to Chicago, and it will he completed early next year. Tlie carrying capacity of tbe pipe will he 1,000 barrels an hour, and it will supply Chicago witli 8,000,000 barrels a yeai". This is equivalentto 3,000,000 tons of coal. Tbe oil of Oliio is not of much value as an illuminant, but it will take tlie place of coai for manufacturing purposes, as it is vei7 mucii ciieaper and cleaner. If this Chicago experiment succeeds, pipe lines to carry oil will be built in many different di¬ rections. Wliat with its coal, petroleum and natural gas, the re¬ gion extending west to the Mississipjii from the Pennsylvania oil fields promises to become the greatest manufacturing region in the country. New England will be at a disadvantage, as it has neitlier gas or oil and no coal nearer than Pennsylvania. It is worthy of note tliat notwithstanding the discovery and use of natural gas for manufacturing purposes the demand for coal has not decreased. On the contrary, the output and consumption of both anthracite and bituminous coal steadily and largely increases. An idiot, named Pliilips, who called himself a geologist, supplied the papers with a yarn recently, to the effect that natural gas would not last over a couple of yeai's longer, and tliat tiie numerous fac¬ tories which depended on it would be forced to go back to coal as a motive power. He was foUowed by another fool, who says he is a Heidelberg professor, and who declares tha earth ia teeming with gas. There is so much of it, he says, in the neighbor¬ hood of Fjnlay, Oliio, that there is a strong protw,bility t^t tow.ii