Men and Things

by Henry A. Atkinson

A good illustration of this business situation would be that you as owner of a house worth $4,000 should make or form a cooperative housekeeping company and sell shares in this new company, basing the value of the total amount of shares upon the $4,000 that the house is worth. You could sell forty shares each for $100. This would be perfectly legitimate and a good business transaction, because at any time every share would have back of it one-fortieth of the total value of the house. But suppose instead of selling forty shares, you should capitalize your house at $40,000 and sell 400 shares at $100 a piece, instead of the forty shares. The extra valuation would be known as watered stock, because there would be no real value attached to it. You would be selling something that neither you nor anybody else possessed.

It is said that the term watered stock came from the practise of one of the early financiers who brought cattle from the West to sell in the New York market when New York was a very small city. He drove the cattle a long distance on the last day, and then gave them salt the night before arrival, so that they were inordinately thirsty. Just before they were sold and weighed he would let them drink all the water they wanted, so that the man who bought them was paying for a great deal of water in addition to the actual amount of beef he received. The result of this financial device known as watered stock has been disastrous for many of our railway companies, and the plight of the United States railroads has been a scandal for years.

Regulating the Railroads. The legislature of nearly every state has tried to remedy the railway situation. The commissions in the various states have frequently found themselves in each other’s way. The Interstate Commerce Commission appointed by the United States government for the purpose of regulating railroads is one of the most efficient bodies in the entire government and has rendered remarkable services. The citizens of the United States are individualists and believe strongly in letting each business adjust its own difficulties as best it can. With the growth of the world commerce without, and the development of the country’s trade within, however, many men are coming to believe that the only way out of difficulties is through a larger degree of government control, tending finally to government ownership of all the means of transportation. The strongest argument in favor of government ownership is the success of the Interstate Commerce Commission. During the last ten years there has come about a very radical change in the relations existing between the various railways and the general public. During the period between 1850 and 1900 the railways were masters of the situation; and the financiers who built and operated them were despots, more or less benevolent or the opposite according to their personal temperaments. The railway presidents during that period really regarded their roads as private property to be managed as they saw fit. This theory built up a great railroad system in the country, but the theory is not big enough to meet the new national demands that are put upon the common carriers of the day. The railroads are now pleading with the public to recognize them as public institutions primarily interested in serving the people.

Press Illustrating Service.

In New York harbor and on other waterways, living upon the canal-boats and barges, are the families of the workers.

Railroads and Churches. The railroad situation is too complicated for us to attempt a solution of it in a church study class. It will demand years of experimentation and a degree of personal service on the part of the best and ablest men of our nation. What the church can and must do is to try to estimate the value of the principles that are involved in the railroad development and management. This can be done by following the story of the railroad as told by the writers in the public magazines of the last ten years. The history of our railroad legislation is also available for us in the records of the Interstate Commerce Commission. Each study group should write to Washington and get the literature issued by this commission. Much of it will be found to be dry reading, being largely a compilation of statistics; and these statistics dealing in figures so large that they mean very little to us. The recommendations, however, and the conclusions are of practical value and will be found to be extremely helpful in the wise and just conclusion regarding our attitude toward the railroad as a national institution.

Other Means of Transportation. The work of the men engaged in transportation is not by any means confined to the workers on the railroads. In our cities there are thousands of men employed on the street-cars, elevated railroads, and subway railways. The interurban traction lines employ hundreds of thousands of men. A careful study has been made of the situation affecting these workers by the Department of Labor of the United States, and its report is based upon facts ascertained from actual conditions found in all the principal cities of the country. Without exception the street-car men, including conductors, motormen, linesmen, and ticket-sellers, are poorly paid. Many of the cities are paying the men much less than a living wage. What do you know about the conditions in the street-cars in your own city? Where do the men who operate these cars live? What about their families? A motorman on one of the elevated railway lines of Chicago shot himself a few years ago. The note he left said: “I have four children and it is impossible with the rising cost of living for me to maintain my home on $2.12 a day. I have a Life Insurance policy for $2,000 and this is worth more to my wife and children than I earn at present.” The street-car lines in most of our cities are owned and controlled by capitalists living in some other city, and they are operated, not for the benefit of the city, but simply for profits. The frequent strikes on the street-car lines are the direct result of this foolish policy of our cities of allowing themselves to be exploited by groups of business men who have no interest in the city, but hold toward it, its citizens, and its own workers, the attitude of a set of political and social freebooters. A few places only have attempted municipal ownership, and in these cases it has met with a large measure of success. The lines owned and operated by the San Francisco municipality have proved so successful that the business men are all enthusiastic over the policy.

Another group that aids in providing transportation is made up of the men on boats on the lakes, rivers, and canals; those who come to our shores from other nations traveling by sea in foreign boats; the sailors on our merchant marine; and the thousands of workers on the docks and lighters in our harbors. In connection with this great work, Andrew Furuseth, president of the International Seamen’s Union, stands out as a remarkable figure. He is a Scandinavian by birth, and worked his way up from the simple life of a sailor before the mast until he is now the best known sailor in all the world. Mr. Furuseth has a great heart, and has fought long and hard for his fellow workers; he might be rich to-day, but as head of the union he accepts only the pay of a first-class seaman and is literally giving his life for others. At a meeting of the City Club in Rochester which he addressed some years ago, one of the gentlemen present turned to his companion and said: “Just look at Furuseth. In every line of his face there is written a chapter of the tragedy and pathos of the men who go down to the sea in ships.”

The sailor has been practically a prisoner always. When he signed his work papers he put himself under the control of an absolute autocrat. Until recently the master of a ship at sea recognized no authority greater than himself, and when the boat landed at any port, no matter what the treatment might have been, the seaman could not desert, otherwise he would be arrested and imprisoned. Furuseth protested against this inhuman treatment, and through a long period of years kept demanding that seamen, “the last slaves” as he called them, be made free. Finally his efforts were successful and on March, 1915, there was approved by the Congress of the United States an Act which promotes the welfare of the American seaman in the merchant marine. It abolishes arrest and imprisonment for desertion, and it secured the abrogation of treaty provisions between the different nations which guaranteed that American sailors would be treated as felons if they deserted in a foreign port. It also provided additional safety at sea for all persons upon a boat; one of its provisions being that there shall be carried on every passenger-carrying steamer or sailing vessel enough life-boats so that each passenger and each man of the crew will have a seat and a chance for escape in case of an accident. It is interesting to note that this Act was passed as a direct result of the sinking of the Titanic.