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THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

all the employes, except government servants, and pays two- thirds of the taxes. He receives an income from the hotels and other sources, and consequently is able to control the cur- rency at par, apart from the regulations by the government. The

inference seems to be that popular sover- eignty has failed in the field of the cur- rency, just as we often hear it held that it must also fail in the greater repub- lic outside.

By owning all the industries, Mr. George is also able to check the rise of millionaires. He can prevent the merely shrewd and unscru- pulous from accum- ulating wealth as against the industri- ous and honest. He

does this by letting the contracts, not merely on the basis of the strict competitive system, as was done in 1896 by the gov- ernment, but by awarding them to the more deserving in his private estimation. Thus, by monopolizing private property, he quietly controls the lives of the citizens regardless of the complete self-government vouchsafed to them. In this a more ideal justice is measured out, though, of course, in so far, the government has become a benevolent despotism rather than a democracy. This, too, has made the Republic less fascinating and less exciting than it was under the political and commercial contests of 1896, and outsiders might wish these competitive conditions had been retained, in order to see what sort of an ideal

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