OCR Text |
Show MEXICAN RAILROADS. There are two sides to this matter of enterprise in constructing railroads in Mexico, and developing the resources of that neighbor country with American capital. We are all the while to keep in mind the fact that the Mexican Government does not pretend to pay the annual interest on its foreign indebtedness; how then are we to expect it to pay its promised cash subsidies for every mile of the thousands of miles of railroads which are being built. Mexico is a revolutionary, not a stable state. When the payment of these railroad subsidies becomes burdensome we may expect organized resistance to the government, with every chance of its being overthrown. Then the Mexicans are by nature a jealous people, and are likely to look with growing disfavor upon the ownership and operation of the channels of intercourse in their country by foreign corporations. How long before they would rise and overturn the government that was responsible for the fact, and then seize the property thus created by foreign capital. The enterprise that leads capital to invest in risks that are really so great although it has to be acknowledged that they are of such ultimate importance and value to civilization, is worthy of all admiration, and generally does not fail to receive it. But that is an altogether different thing from putting money which is not capital, because it cannot afford to be risked, into such remote and always uncertain enterprises. No one ought to be led by the example of others into putting his money in such stakes unless he feels just as able to lose it as those do whom he follows. And, as a rule, the latter have the control in their own hands, and can manage to get out in any case without any heavy loss; whereas the smaller investors are without any power whatever over their investments, and must inevitably lose all if anything. The only safe rule for all persons to follow, who are not capitalists, is to keep their savings close at home.-Massachusetts Ploughman. |