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Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 68, no. 1749: September 21, 1901

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September 21, 1901. RECORD AND GUIDE. ESTABLISHED-^ J^RRpHa^^'SeS. *■ WoT^ TO mt CSTATI. 6UIl-0'^fe ^RafrTEeTURE .HOUSEHDID DEGOE^UlOd, Rifji-JF.ssAfJDThemesofGeiIeraI iKtERfST. PRICE PER YEAR IN ADVANCE SIX DOLLARS Published every Saturday Oommimloatdons ebould be addressed to C. W. SWEET, I4"16 Vesey Street, New YorK abled your company to carry its burden safely until tbe present, and the same policy should be its safeguard for the future." At the same time the report denies knowledge of combinations af¬ fecting the property. J, T. UNDSEY, Buainess Manager Telephone, Cortlandt 1S70 •Entered at the Post Office at New York. N. Y.. as second-class matter." Vol. LXVIII. SEPTEMBER 21,1901. No. 1749. IT may be doubted whether the funeral of any maa occupying an official position has called forth a more genuine expres¬ sion of grief on the part of his fellow-countrymen than that which was shown by the American people last Thursday, Their mourning was not hysterical and ostentatious; it was hushed, pervasive and profound. It was a tribute such as rarely falls to the lot of any man, whether living or dead. Doubtless, the peculiar circumstances of the late President's death contributed a great deal to the universality of this expression of g:-ief. It was felt by everybody that Mr. McKinley had in a sense died for bis fellow-countrymen, that it was the integrity and psrpetuity of their institutions more than the man himself, which the poor wretch had intended to injure. But beyond this the sincerity and depth of the popular feeling was even more a tribute, to the man himself^to the simplicity and kindliness of his life, and to the unpretentious dignity of his death. EVEN the most pessimistic must admit that the Stock Mar¬ ket as a rule has withstood the strain of recent events very well. The support has been equal to something more than repelling the attack and consequently prices are considerably laetter than they were a week ago. There is discrimination against industrials and a rather too pronounced favor of certain railroad issues to make the situation wholly satisfactory, but whatever this may imply, it must he admitted that the leaders of the market have not only held things well in hand, hut have also created such an appearance of strength as to give rise to a belief in a new upward movement about to take place, in rail¬ road issues especially. In support of this belief there are urged the assurances of President Roosevelt that he will continue un¬ broken the policy of his martyred predecessor, which has already done so much to encourage commercial activity; the relief the Treasury is affording lo the money market and the continued increase of railroad earnings, which is as gratifying as an indi¬ cation of the general activity and prosperity of the country as It Is of those of the railroads themselves. Another matter, which speculatively has more influence than all the othere put to¬ gether, is the belief that the "community of interest" policy of the raUroads is to be carried further so as to protect the profits of the properties and thereby give permanence to new values of the securities predicated upon them. What is puzzling most minds is where the basis of further value is to come from to jus¬ tify the predicted rise in prices. Notwithstanding the decline that has taken place since the spring, prices do not look low by any means, and experience suggests that if they are to be put higher it will be by sheer force of money and for the purpose of changing the shoulder .bearing the burden. The whole matter rests on the question: Are we to be as increasingly prosperous In the coming four years as we have been in the past? and in the consideration of whether or not this is too much to expept. ■\XT HILE unofficial reports ou dividend prospects are so rife * * and generous, it is interesting and valuable to com¬ pare them with official action and statement on the same point The St. Paul directors recently, in effect, declined to make good the promise of an increased dividend on the common stock of their road previously made on their behalf on "the Street," and the annual report of the directors of the M. K. & T, contains a statement that we would commend to the attention of all those who are so bullish on non-dividend stocks at present high prices which has wider application than simply to the property directly concerned. This statement is: "It is important that shareholders should realize that your company has practically no available capital excepting what it may earn in excess of its fixed charges, and that the judicious application of net earnings in the past to create facilities for conducting its business is all that has en- The Late President and His Successor. -j~ HE late President McKinley is sure of a peculiarly impor- i tant place in the history of this country—a place, second, perhaps in importance only to those of Washington and Lin¬ coln By this we do not mean that he was comparable to his great predecessors either in the nobleness of his character or in the scope and penetration of his intelligence. But it so hap¬ pened that like them he was elected to the Presidency at a crisis in our national affairs, when momentous and decisive action had to be taken, and permanent lines of policy laid down. Like them, also, he took what must be regarded as the right action-action which helped to arouse and consolidate American national spirit, and which started the American nation in the direction of in¬ creased efficiency, power and eminence. That Mr. McKinley would prove adequate to tnese great opportunities and respon¬ sibilities was as little to be anticipated as that Lincoln would prove adequate to his. Up to the time of his election he had stood for a somewhat narrow view of the time-honored, but an¬ tiquated American political and economic ideas; he had stood for the ideas that industrially and commercially the United States was and shouid be an independent and self-contained unit, and that politically they should timidly avoid any inter¬ national responsibilities. But, although previous to his elec¬ tion he had held along with the majority of his fellow-citizens' views of this description, they did not prevent him, when the opportunity came, from boldly committing his country to the policy of expansion beyond this continent, or with equal boldness from favoring at the proper moment a more elastic and liberal policy of commercial reciprocity. In consequence it was inevit¬ able that he should at times show apparent vacillation of pur¬ pose, which several years ago was known by worse names, but which is at present called open-mindedness. It is probable that the final historical verdict will find the later cnaracterization the truer, Mr, MeKinley's career was only one more instance, so numerous in American political life, of the dignifying and en¬ lightening effect of great office upon a nature essentially sound and upon an intelligence essentially direct and straightforward. Witt each successive year of office his policy became more con¬ sistent, his official utterances more definite and weighty, his in¬ fluence more powerful and his example more inspiring. He was fortunate to die at a period when the line of action to which he had comm.itted his country was prospering, and when he stood higher than ever before in the affection and esteem of his fel¬ low citizens. It is an extraordinary chance that he should be succeeded by a man, who more than any other American statesman repre¬ sents and has always represented a policy of American national expansion. When President Roosevelt declared so emphatically that he proposed to continue the line of action begun by his predecessor, he could make the promise, not only without violat¬ ing his convictions, but with the inner assurance that the policy he took over was at least a partial embodiment of some of his own most cherished views. This policy had been adopted by Mr. McKinley only after some hesitation and at the expense of an evident struggle with the logic of his earlier opinions; but the tendency to look outward, and to cpnsider the United States as a country, whose expansion would necessarily bring it into closer political and commercial relations with European states—this tendency has always had its most vigorous exponent in the per¬ son of the new President. His career shows a consistency in this regard, which is as unusual in American political life, and which is obviously at bottom merely the expression of an active and aggressive disposition. He has always believed in a strong national government and intense national feeling, aa the only effective basis of the perpetuity and growth of the American democracy; he selected as the subject of his most important historical work the story of the western expansionist movement; he has never believed in confining that movement to this con¬ tinent; although a good Republican, he has never been a rig¬ orous protectionist, and consequently can use without any com¬ punction his influence in favor of liberal reciprocity treaties. All this is known and is appreciated. It has had much to do with the cordial good feeling with which his assumption of the office has been greeted. The fear that he would pursue Mr. MeKin¬ ley's policy rather more aggressively than Mr. McKinley himself, and involve his country in unnecessary quarrels has been dis¬ sipated hy his behavior during the past week, as, indeed, It might have been dissipated by a consideration of his earlier career. President Roosevelt has something of the Happy War¬ rior about him, but he knows when to fight and when not to