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About The commoner. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-1923 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 23, 1907)
yvT&ptfiw&wH '- 9 ,$. AUGUST 23, 1907 v The Commoner A "Trust Busting" Administration Washington, D. C., August 19. The trust busting proclivities -of tho Roosevelt administra tion is the favorite theme of tho republican romancer. Judged by actual results, however, the "big stick" is really something of very doubt ful value. In tho first place the president in hunting for trust-busters has partaken liberally of talent that, judged by their antecedents, would not seem to warrant the assumption that they-would be so very apt to "run amuck." As attorney generals he has appointed suc cessively Knox, Moody and Bonaparte. The first was a trust attorney and is now a trust candidate for the presidency. The second was a good con servative congressman with a corporation prac tice and Is now on the United States supreme court bench. The third, represented at one time in one capacity or another, nearly all the public service corporations of Baltimore. He Is still the attorney general and is just at present grac ing the office by holding a controversy over au tomobile laws with Marshal Collins of Glen Echo. Of President Roosevelt's appointees to the department of. commerce and labor, the first, Cortolyou, dignified the office by making It a sort of collecting agency of large campaign con tributions from large corporations to finance Mr. Roosevelt's campaign In 1904. Mr. Cortel you Is now secretary of the treasury, In which position he has pleased President Roosevelt's alleged Wall Street enemies most mightily. They of the Exchange, it Is rumored, would be glad to see Mr. Cortelyou succeed President Roosevelt, and It Is also rumored that the pres ident Is not at all adverse to this program, if the Taft boom is punctured in its travels. The second" appointee as head of the department of commerce and labor was Metcalf, also a good conservative congressman and a lawyer with a corporation practice. He Is now doing what ho can to provoke war . with a friendly natf on by sending our navy to the Pacific coast, from whence he comes, and where his political for tunes are said to be tottering. The third In cumbent of the office Is Oscar Straus as yet untried. These are the president's sextet of itrust-busters. Bet us see what they have done in dealing with the criminal combinations that have violated tho federal law against conspir acies In restraint of trade. The following summary of the administra tion's anti-trust prosecutions Is based upon a careful investigation, made by a newspaper man unknown to your correspondent, and can easily be verified. First, a suit was brought to dls- solve the Standard Oil company of Ohio, which did not dissolve for years, and that when it did, it became the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, something stronger and more diabolical than ever before. The New Jersey company is. still doing business in the same old way despite expensive investigations and threats of fines. Then Wo had the bill filed by Mr. Knox to de stroy the Northern Securities merger. The su preme court gave the company an adverse de cision, causing it some slight trouble for a few years. But the people back of the combination, Hill and Morgan, were not touched by the find ing of the court. In fact th y made more money out of the scheme after Knox and the supremo court had given them some gratuitous adver tising than they did before. Of course the form of the merger was changed. But in substance It remained intact. Next came the prosecution of the beef trust and the immunity bath so clev erly applied to the packers by the president's tennis court pet, Mr. Garfield, The beef trust prosecution resulted in, the enactment of a fed eral law by which the people pay several million dollars to inspect the packers because of condl . tions for which the packers themselves are re sponsible. The steers which are rejected are charged up against the cattle raiser by the beef trust. -Thus the government pays several mil lion dollars yearly to see that the beef trust gets good cattle. In the meantime the trust is still doing business according to old methods, jls recent exposures show, giving short weights and raising prices. Then the terrible rebaters were haled into court, found guilty and sen tenced. Sentenced to what? To pay into court a small part of th loot taken illegally from the people. Rebating is still a fine art, and. widely practiced. Anybody who does not think so should 'read the decision of the inter-state com--' moree commission, No. 687, sanctioning tho re bates by which the grain trust exists. Then Mr. ' Moody started to dissolve the Standard OH Company of New Jorsey In a way unsuccessfully tried many years before by tho Ohio courts. And now' after suit has been pending slnco 1902, wo are told that the coal trust will bo prosecuted and the United States courts will dissolve tho mergers said to exist by which the railroads con trol the anthracite output. It will be as hard to do this, by mandate of court, as it was for George W. Perkins to dissolve tho merger that existed between him and himself In lfls two capacities as J. P. Morgan & Co., and as vice president of the New York Life. Tho anthra cite companies are the railroads that tap the coal fields of Pennsylvania, and the railroad companies are the owners of tho coal mines. They can not bo separated excoit intone way, and that is to put tho coal trust out of the rail road business, and tho railroads out of the coal business. This Is exactly what they havo dono In that Oklahoma constitution that our president says is so impossible and pernicious an instru ment. Briefly, the present much heralded trust busting methods of the Roosevelt administra tion have not been effective, If judged by re sults. There is not a big truot in existence at tho advent of the present administration that- is weaker because of anything tho administration has dono, and there are several trusts that are, actually stronger. The spirit may havo been willing, but the means the administration has employed have proved fujtlle. Like Pete, the White House bull pup, the administration's bark has been far worse than its bite. If corpora tions have violated the law, they have been fined, and in turn they have collected the fine out of the pockets of the people by raising their prices a fraction of a cent. Now the president threat ens to appoint receivers for naughty corpora tions. Why not appoint guardians for naughty burglars and highwaymen? Did tho adminis tration ever hear of the criminal, clause of the Sherman act by which heads , of corporations guilty of the crimes which all our so-far futile and expensive Investigations and court proceed ings have disclosed, can bo -sent td jail? Here is tho remedy. Why doesn't tho present ad ministration use it? Tho "big stick" is a thing of show after all. It is like tho sword of state carried before the English king at coronation ceremonies. It Is a large ugly looking weapon, but blunt and harmless, emblematic of mercy. The penalty of $29,240,000 imposed upon the" Standard Oil company by Judge KeneBaw M. Landis of Chicago is enough to make one gasp. Probably no such fine has been Imposed In the history of jurisprudence, but, after all, wbat does it mean? A newspaper correspondent who carried tho sad tidings to John D. Rocke feller on his private golf links at Cleveland says that the eminent head of the disciplined com pany merely smiled and went On playing his game with unshaken nerves. This seems rea sonable. Most people have acourC of last resort if injustice has been done them. At the risk of kbeing guilty of an Irish bull it may bo said that Mr. -Rockefeller has two courts of last resort. The sentence imposed by Judge Landis will go, of course, first to the federal court of appeals, thence" to the: United States supreme court. If it were anything save a complete mon opoly that had teen sentenced the judgment of the United States supreme court would end It, but If it b& admitted, what is rather doubtful, that that august tribunal will r.pprove in toto the Landis decision, Mr. Rockefeller and the Standard Oil company 1iave yet one more ap peal. All they havo to do "is to appeal, or rather to direct, their agents all over the United States to raise the price of oil one or two cents a gal lon and the people will pay the fine, while the authorities of the law will got the credit of hav ing Imposed It, In u rather obscure -newspaper yesterday I saw a cartoon which thoroughly expresses the facts In this case; which indeed sets them forth ''more clearly than any written word could do. The stern judge on the bench Is -fining the Standard Oil company uncounted millions. Mr. Rockefeller with that .smile of benevolence which he has of late cultivated and with his hand on the shoulder of a somewhat undersized and cringing figure responds, in effect: "It is ll right, judge this, gentleman will pay." The gentleman handing up his pocket book is labeled "The Consumer." In the end that is the result of all fines levied upon corporations that are purely monopolistic. They may pay for the moment, but they take it out of those who do business with them. It Is greatly to the credit of Judge Landis that in a judicial opinion he expressed regret that tho financial penalty was the ohlyj one ho could irapoMo. His decision should bo a matter of BorloiiB discussion in tho next congress. For if in an effort to destroy a monopoly by fines we moroly fine the people who already suffor from boing compelled to deal with tho monopoly it is clear that tho law is foolish, vain, and in effective.. Several publfc mon ranging from tho presldont of tho United States down, have been preaching tho doctrine that Uio way to destroy trusts, railroad discriminations, and other vio lations of free competition, was to put tho of fenders In jail. Not ono is yet in jail. It should bo tho business of tho Sixtieth congress to find out wlyr such is tho case, and if It is tho fault of tho law, to amond It, and If it is tho fault of those who are supposed to enforce the law, to force thorn out of public place. .'.' " WILLIS J, ABBOTT. Washington Letter Washington, D. C, August 19. Tho mys tery of the naval operations ordorcd by Uio administration becomes greater as tho orders are made public. It Is now announced that the Atlantic coast lsto bo stripped clean of battleships and cruisors. Not merely Is Ad miral Evans to be glvon sixteen battleships, but ho is to have sixteen armored and protected cruisors as well. Not moroly arc thoro ,to. bo no ships loft along tho Atlantic seaboard, but four armored cruisers now on tho Asiatic sta tion are to be sent across tho Pacific to join the colossal fleet at San Francisco. When all "" are gathered under one command Admiral Evans ' will be supremo over the greatest fighting fleet ever gathered together. What Is It all for? The silly littlo quarrel between a section of tho American press and a section of the Japanese press, which never ex tended to the responsible governments of the two countries, has long since died out. The diffi culty about Japanese schools In California con corning which the president remarked with character-lotto modoratlon that ho Would-onWrccth will of the government if it took all tho military and naval force at Its command, seems no longer to be acute. Even if it wore, sixteon battleships seom a rather powerful force to bring against stricken San Francisco. Is it to rehabilitate the political fortunes of Secretary of tho Navy Mot calf, That statesman did not havo high stand ing on tho Pacific coast when called to the cabinet, and six months ago had lost whatever popularity he had. Or Is It that the republican party on the Pacific coast is in such a dire state that It seems wjso for Its leader, who happens to bo commander-in-chief of the army and nayy of the United States, to send the whole navy thither that the sight of it may fire the Califor nia heart with enthusiasm? Everywhere the navy is popular. .Where ever a. small squadron is gathered people flo'ejk: to gaze upon it with pride. The most monstrous squadron or fleet the United States has ever seen visiting Pacific coast harbors one after an other will have a marked effect upon the politics of "that section. There arc disadvantages In being politician and oomraandor-in-chlof at 6nde, particularly when the country must pay tho price. That the victory of tariff revision, is the plainest message now on the political signboard can bo told by tho actions of members even of the republican party which is responsible for that iniquity. In Ohio Mr. Taft, the revisionist, has thus far beaten at every point Sonator For aker, who stands as the exponent of high, tariff ideas. In Iowa Governor Cummins practically drove Secretary Shaw, the standpatter,, out of public life and has forced even the wary Allison to say in his customary cautious manner that before so very long the tariff must be revised. Tho fight against monopoly in private hands, railroad extortions and aggressions and the rob ber tariff Is well under way. But will the peo ple commit Its leadership to the generals in that party which has been responsible for -all three evils. WILLIS J. ABBOTT. The government owes Mr. Rockefeller $92.70 for witness fees. In view of what Mr. Rockefeller gave In return for that amount of money we are inclined to believe he is keeping right in line with precedent. We get about that much oil for the same money. 't $ m 4 4 LVJ a2kiikij