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THE NATIONAL SPIRIT OF SPECULATION:
ARE NOT OUR, FINANCIAL AND CORPORATE
MORALS MERELY THE OUTGROWTH OF
THE MORAL SENSE OF THE AMERICAN
PEOPLE? BY THE EDITOR
   "We are going to have in this Republic a standard of financial and
corporate morals that will square witk the moral sense of the American
people in their private conduct; and we are going to have it at any
cost."-The World's Work.
HERE is food for serious thought in the statement
quoted above from an able editorial on the present
industrial and financial situation in this country;
for it conveys so exactly the view of the honest citizen,
the man who applauds and encourages every fresh
move in the unremitting investigation and Prosecution
             of those of our great monopolies whose methods of
overpowering their competitors will certainly bear looking into.
Vet is it a view that goes suffciently beneath the surface to ask the
question: is it true that the bulk of the people have a higher moral
sense than is expressed in the state of affairs revealed in insurance
and trust companies and politics under the search-light of investiga-
tion ? Is it not rather true that the whole social structure is per-
meated by influences that have their rise at the very foundation of
our national life ? As the growth of a nation is always from the
bottom, so the seeds of corruption and disintegration take root at
the. beginning in the great mass of the people, creating a national
idea of which the big events are but the result.
   Through the medium of the sensational journals--and also many
that are by no means sensational--we hear all about the scandals that
arise out of the reckless speculations of bank directors; the dis-
honest methods of insurance officials; the unlawful discrimination
by railroads in favor of certain large shippers; the tyranny of the
trusts, and the audacity of corrupt politicians in manipulating legis-
lation to serve their own ends.
   But do we ever take into consideration that all these obvious
evils are merely like the spreading branches of a tree, which derive
their life from hidden roots which we never stop to take into account ?
The average American citizen is usually a clean, honest man of
business. He reads in his paper, for instance, an exposure of scandal
!
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