of the curfew bells would have starved to death had it to compete with
those who were then working the lobby, while it was splitting hairs over
the Constitution and accepting the "stuff" that would do it "the most
good." No class of property shows the justice, and therefore the need,
of Confiscation as much as railroads. No class of property has done as
much toward absorbing and transferring the whole country into the hands
of a comparatively few men as railroads. But when Confiscation gets
through with these monarchs of all they survey, the town or section
through which these railroads run will not find themselves like a sucked
orange by the wayside.

Taking the Southern Pacific Railroad, we find that it runs through
Madera County, California, but it is doubtful if ten cents worth of its
securities are owned there. Madera County, then, has property within her
borders that earns an income, not one cent of which goes to the county
where it was earned.[1] The property is there, but the income from it is
taken elsewhere. This is the one great flaw in our present economic
life, and is the very root of our present troubles.

The income from property is taken from the locality where it was earned.
And the farmer's wagon sinks to the hubs for want of money to build good
roads. And the laborer is robbed of the income that his labor earned,
and he sinks his manhood at the soup-house door. We repeat it: The great
defect in our economic life is the taking of the income from the locality
where it was earned, and from the laborer, the source of of it all. This
does not mean that the laborer must spend his income or wages where it
was made. It does not mean that the income from property must be spent
in the particular locality where the property is located. It does not
mean, in short, that there shall be any restrictions placed upon the
individual in any way outside of limiting him to the ownership of