January, 1937
THE K I NG ' S BUS I NESS
IO
The Death Struggle of Two Tyrannies By LOUIS S. BAUMAN* Long Beach, California T W O tyrannies are at each other’s throats today, and their struggle unto death is shaking all the kingdoms of men. One is the tyranny of the unregenerate Some will deny the exactness of Senator Capper’s state ment; but certain it is that the world never has seen, nor may we ever expect to see again such “ heaped treas ure” as we have seen in the last twenty years. •
" h a v e - n o t s and the other is the tyranny of the unregen erate "haves."' Between these two tyrannies, freedom lies bleeding and dying. This war between the' two tyrannies was foretold by the Apostle James nineteen centuries ago (cf. Jas. 5 :8 ). T h e T y r a n n y of t h e R ich The apostle does not fall into the fatal proletarian error of decrying wealth. He knows that “ folly is set in great dignity, and the rich sit in low place” (Eccl. 10:6). Nevertheless, he foresees that on the eye of “ the coming of the Lord,” the rich will have failed monumentally in the fundamental duties of wealth. The Apostle Paul in structed Timothy thus: “ Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not high-minded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, . . . That they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute” (1 Tim. 6:17, 18). James previsions the hour when rich men shall “ have heaped treasure together for the last days” (Jas. 5 :3 ). And how they have done it! One hundred years ago, the richest man in the United States was Stephen Girard of Philadelphia. He was worth $5,000,000! If, today, either Rockefeller, Ford, or Morgan should accidentally drop that amount through a hole in his pocket, he would scarcely miss it a nickel’s worth! Think this over: If Adam had been placed on a salary of $50,000 a year when he began to take care of the Garden of Eden, and, besides, if he had had all his running expenses paid in full so that each year he could have laid by in a treasure chest the entire $50,000, and if Adam were still living, he would not now possess as much as John D . Rockefeller gave away. And John D. Rockefeller never once hurt himself or his financial standing through giving! His great fortune prac tically remained intact. And what can be said as to the the vastness of John D . Rockefeller’s wealth can be said of the “ heaps” accumulated by Ford, Harriman, Morgan, Mellon, and others. Not only have these last days seen such “ heaped treasure” as the world never before witnessed, but they have seen also the treasure heaps heaped together, heaps upon heaps. The result? Great corporations have been formed— one controlling the sugar markets of the world; another, the steel; another, the meat; another, the oil; another, the railroads; another this, and another that — until all the necessities as well as the luxuries of life are controlled by “ heaped treasure.” Senator Arthur Capper, of Kansas, says: It may not be quite statistically true, but it is literally true nevertheless, that already 10 per cent of the people of this country own or control 90 per cent of its wealth . . . Monopolies, mergers, combinations, chain stores and chain banks, holding companies and interlocking director ates, unbridled speculation on the stock and commodity exchange, tax-exempt bonds—these are the means through which the 10 per cent have obtained and are holding 90 per cent of the wealth and sources of wealth in this country. *Paftor, First Brethren Church.
It is not the fact that individuals and corporations have built these unprecedented treasure heaps that brings upon them the day of the Lord with its judgments, but rather it is the nonuse and the wrong use of these treasure heaps. Garments that are used are not moth-eaten. Gold and silver in circulation do not rust. The condemnation of the rich lies in this: “ The profit of the earth is for all” (Eccl. 5 :9 ). And the rich, being the stewards of the profit of the earth, all too often grow selfish. Like the “ certain rich man” of whom our Lord speaks, instead of making righteous use of the wealth entrusted to them by the Overseer of heaven and earth, they pull down their barns and build greater, saying: “ Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry” (Lk. 12:19). The greatest folly that the rich ever committed was committed a few years ago, when the great depression came. Instead of opening their storehouses and keeping up the music of the saw and the hammer, instead of keeping the mills grinding and the wheels rolling on the rails, they jammed their heaps of treasure into bank vaults, and let governmental power step in to do what they should have done. The moth in their garments and the rust on their dollars are the damnation of the rich. Again, the last-day miseries of the rich will come upon them because “ Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter.” The follies of the rich are well known. The folly of Caesar’s feast upon humming-birds’ tongues has been equaled in our day, in other forms. The folly of Louis X V I who had a horde of men to crack ice on a hot summer’s day that he might enjoy a ride in his sleigh, though the poor all about him were praying for a bit of ice to cool their fevered brows, is not without equal folly in our generation. After the sleigh-ride came the deluge. The melted ice later turned to rivulets of blood, through which the maddened populace of Paris waded while carry ing aloft the heads of the rich upon their pikes, crying, "Bread! Bread! Blood! Blood!" The writer vividly recalls a New Year’s bacchanal years ago in the rathskeller of a prominent hotel in one of the cities of New York. He saw the rich come in with their bejeweled females— jewels being the major part of their apparel. He recalls their drunken orgy as they drank their champagne with boisterous hilarity, smashing exquisite cut glass for their silly amusement, and lighting their females’ cigarettes with burning twenty-dollar bills! He also re calls picking up a paper the next morning that told that the police had found a babe dead upon its frozen mother’s breast, with a bit of blood still in its mouth which it had drawn from a starving mother’s breast. W e also recall that, not so many years ago, a Southern California woman rode to the East with a special car attached to her train for the comfort of her manicured dogs— her palatial train whirling past the misery of little children eking out a [ Continued on page 12]
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