GEORGE
GEORGE
such was the influence of the pamphlet that no
subsidies have since been granted to raih-oads in
California. The growth of poverty side by side
with the rapid strides in industrial progress as
witnessed by him in the east during his recent
visit attracted his attention and in 1871 he wrote
a pamphlet, " Our Land and Land Policy: Na-
tional and State," in which he first advocated
the raising of all revenue by placing the whole
burden of taxation upon the value of land, in-
cluding improvements; arguing that this value,
which the economists call "economic rent,"
springs entirely from the community at large
and should, therefore, go to the comnnmity for
common purposes. In 1872, with two partners,
he established the San Francisco Evening Post, the
first penny paper on the Pacific coast. The
venture proved a success and through money vol-
untarily loaned by .Senator John P. Jones, a web
perfecting press was purchased in Philadeljihia,
the first used in California. In August, 187.J,
the partners established a morning paper, the
Led'jPi; with an illustrated Sunday edition, also
a pioneer movement. The failure of the Bank
of California and a local panic affected the pros-
perity of the paper and Senator Jones's notes
becoming due, he took the paper and Mr. George
and his partners retired. He stumped the state
for Tilden and Hendricks in the campaign of
1876. Governor Irvin appointed him inspector
of gas meters which position he held, 1875-79.
He was through this office enabled to write his
celebrated book, " Progress and Poverty." In
1879 he sent the MS. of this book to New York,
but it was refused by every publishing house.
He then accepted the offer of his former part-
ner, William M. Hinton, to print an edition, Mr.
George assisting in its composition. The author's
edition, selling at 53.00 per cop}-, paid for the
plates, and the next year D. Appleton & Co. of
New York, printed an edition from the plates,
I)ringing it out in January, 1880. It at first had
little sale, but the newspapers at length noticing
it, the sales began to increase and in 1882, being
put in 20-cent library form in New York and in
six penny form in London, it had a run in both
countries that not only surpassed all other eco-
nomic works ever printed, but outstripped the
popular novels. This brought the author little
more than fame, however, as he had sacrificed
his copyright to the end of getting for the book
a wide reading. In the New Y'ork maj'oralty
campaign in 1886, Mr. George made a remarkable,
although unsuccessful canvass, receiving 68,000
votes, while Mr. Roosevelt received 60,436 and
Mr. Hewitt 90..5.i2. In 1881 Henry George went
to Great Britain as a special newspaper corre-
spondent and took an active part in the Land
League agitation, being arrested twice as a
" suspect " while in Ireland. He subsequently-
made several lecturing tours through Great
Britain. In 1887 he started a weekly newspaper,
the Standard, and in the fall of that year ran for
secretary of state in New York, but was defeated.
He advocated the adoption of the Australian bal-
lot system and found a firm disciple of his single
tax theories in Father McGlynn of St. Stephen's
R.C. church, whose friendship for the political
reformer cost McGlynn his parish and a tempo-
rary excommunication by Archbishop Corrigan,
but he was restored bj- the Pope, through the
influence of Monsignor SatoUi. Mr. George sup-
ported Grover Cleveland each time he ran for
the Presidency, and William J. Bryan in 1896.
In the political contest for mayor of Greater
New Y'ork Mr. George was again the candidate
of the laboring classes under the party name of
Jeffersonian Democrats. He carried on an ag-
gressive canvass which overtaxed his strength
and a few days before the election he died sud-
denly of apoplexy at his hotel. His son, Henry
George, Jr., was placed upon the ticket in his
stead, but he could not command his father's
probable vote. Mr. George's funeral was one of
the largest ever accorded to a private citizen and
the laboring classes were his conspicuous mourn-
ers. A public subscription for the widow being
opposed by her, a few friends and admirers of
the dead man privately made up and presented a
small fund; and a monument, designed by his
son Richard, was erected by the voluntary con-
tributions of other friends, through one of the
New York newspapers, over his grave on Ocean
Hill in Greenwood cemetery, N.Y^. It was un-
veiled on Decoration Day, May 30, 1898. His
published works include: Progress and Poverlii
(1879); 77(6 Irish Land Question (1881); -Sbera;
Prnhlems {\mi); Protection or Free TVade (1886);.
The Conditions of Labor: An Open Letter to Pope
Leo XI 11. (1891); A Perplexed Philosopher {1S92):
and The Science of Political Economy, which he
had practically finished at the time of his death,
and which was afterward published. Henry
George died in New Y'ork city, Oct. 29, 1897.
QEORQE, Henry, editor, was born in Sacra- mento, Cal., Nov. 3, 1862; son of Henrj- and Annie C. (Fox) George; and grandson of Richard Samuel Henry and Catharine Pratt (Vallance) George. He was educated in the public schools and when seventeen years old went to work as a printer. He was also amanuensis to his father, copying by hand almost the entire book manu- script of "Progress and Poverty." He was a reporter on the Brooklyn Eagle in 1881, and be came a staff editor and special correspondent at Washington and London, of New Y'ork and other newspapers. On the sudden death of his father, Oct. 29, 1897, during the progress of the Greater
