obeying what amounts to being a single volition, has its heart in Wall
Street, and pervades every corner of the Union. No matter what price is
in question, whether it be the price of meat, or coal, or cotton cloth,
or of railway transportation, or of insurance, or of discounts, the
inquirer will find the price to be, in essence, a monopoly or fixed
price; and if he will follow his investigation to the end, he will also
find that the first cause in the complex chain of cause and effect which
created the monopoly in that mysterious energy which is enthroned on the
Hudson.

The presence of monopolistic prices in trade is not always a result of
conscious agreement; more frequently, perhaps, it is automatic, and is
an effect of the concentration of capital in a point where competition
ceases, as when all the capital engaged in a trade belongs to a single
owner. Supposing ownership to be enough restricted, combination is
easier and more profitable than competition; therefore combination,
conscious or unconscious, supplants competition. The inference from the
evidence is that, in the United States, capital has reached, or is
rapidly reaching, this point of concentration; and if this be true,
competition cannot be enforced by legislation. But, assuming that
competition could still be enforced by law, the only effect would be to
make the mass of capital more homogeneous by eliminating still further
such of the weaker capitalists as have survived. Ultimately, unless
indeed society is to dissolve and capital migrate elsewhere, all the
present phenomena would be intensified. Nor would free trade, probably,
have more than a very transitory effect. In no department of trade is
competition freer than in the Atlantic passenger service, and yet in no
trade is there a stricter monopoly price.

The same acceleration of the social movement which has caused this