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GEORGE W. BERGE, EDITOR AND PUBLISHER
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Volume 17
Lincoln, Nebraska, May 4, 1905
Number 50
KNOCK OUT THE TRUST PROPS
Since the trusts by universal accord constitute the leading American
family, it is natural that great interest is taken in their ancestry. Results
of ardent genealogical research have been varied according to the prejudice
or preconception of the searcher. One whose preconceptions are long On
railroad reform and short on tariff reform traces trust parentage directly
to rate discrimination, and one familiar with the old, old story of tariff
iniquity puts the protective tariff at the , root of the genealogical tree.
Neither, however, is rights Industrial combinations are due to complex
causes springing from modern industrial conditions. Their origin is natural
and perhaps legitimate. Their oppressive spirit and effect are due directly
to greedy men.
But it is widely believed, and with good reason, that the hurtful power
of the trusts is due to illegitimate favors which they enjoy. The chief
of these favors are discriminative railroad rates and no less discriminative
protective tariffs.
In the hot chase to run down railroad discrimination there is a tendency
to lose the scent of tariff discrimination Indeed it is the special xare of
many of the tariff-protected trusts to divert public attention from that ques
tion by trying to turn it wholly toward the railroads.' They do this for ex
cellent reasons of their own. For example: The merchant marine commis
sion informs us that the cost of building steel vessels, is greater in this
than in some foreign countries because the steel trust charges the Jiome
builders 40 per cent more for steel than it charges the foreign builders.. t
The United States steel trust -at a certain time sold 100,000 tons of steel
plate, delivered at Belfast, for, $24 a ton, equal to $22 at tidewater, when
the American consumer had to pay the same trust $32 a ton at Pittsburg.
The Eastern makers of the Dingley tariff bill magnanimously allowed a
tariff of twenty-five cents a bushel on imports of wheat. Since there is
always a large export of wheat from this country, the world's market at
Liverpool fixes the price of the wheat crop, except as to a small difference in
freight. Only those farmers along the Canadian, line, therefore were bene
fitted by the tariff. . - . - -
But the millers' trust persuaded Secretary Shaw to so construe the
drawback provision of the wheat tariff clause, that the millers import Cana
dian wher.t practically free of duty. The tariff is remitted on all the flour
they export, whether it is made in whole or in part of imported wheat.
Now Senator Hansbrough of North Dakota professes to-believe in the
beneficence of the tariff system, but his constituents, whose chief business
Is wheat-growingr feel so outraged at this discrimination in favor of the
milling trust that he has been compelled to take up their cause, and in do
ing so he gives the secretary some very plain talk:
He assures the secretary in his latest contribution to the corre-
spondence on this subject that "statesmanship isn't based upon the code
of, the thimble rigger" and that. "legerdemain in law making or in law
construing .has ever been considered as a reprehensible factor." The
senator asks the secretary this specific question:
Tor what purpose was the duty on wheat imposed?"
Then he proceeds to answer it himself: .
"First, for the protection of the American grain grower; second, for
revenue with which Jo pay governmental expenses. . .
"Manufacturers of flour are practically the sole importers. Occa
sionally the American farmer buys a few busnels of Canadian wheat
for seed; and while he pays a duty of 25 cents a bushel the miller under
the most violent executive construction of the statute pays one-quarter
of 1 per cent a bushel. According to the cheerful policy of your depart-.
ment the miller is to certify that he uses imported wheat in his exported
flour. You do not nor you can't know whether he does so or not. Hence
my statement: that your department is engaged in a fantastic and un
constitutional scheme of tariff revision." ,
In the first place all the farmers of the country bear the burden of the
tariff tax on manufactures, while very few of them could be benefitted by the
sop of the tariff on grain. In the second place by a discriminating construc
tion of the farmers' part of the tariff they are deprived of the little protection
it might afford them. . -
.At best farmers get the very little end of the tariff benefit, but they
are "construed" out of that mite, even. There is no doubt that the pro
tective riff and discriminative railroad rates are the two principal props
of the monopolistic trusts, and that if both were knocked out they would
fall or, at least, would wobble so as to encourage the competition which
would put an end to them.
The railroad rate evil is a complex growth of many years which, like a
cancer, is very diffcult to cure. The tariff trust prop is purely artificial,
having been set up by statute; and it can be knocked out by the simple
process of repealing the statute.,
: The difficult and perhaps tedious work of uprooting the railroad dis
crimination prop must go on7 but the tariff prop can and ought to be
knocked out in the very early meantime.
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THE TEAMSTERS' STRIKE
Ti,a o-fon foamcforo' otHlrA In Chirnen has been ' Innreasine in
portions and force during the week, and each succeeding day brings added
danger of serious loss of life and property.
But more important than these specific dangers is the illustration which
the strike affords of the intensity and harshness of industrial relations and
conditions, and particularly of the crude inadequacy of our industrial means ,
and methods of dealing with such .differences. This Chicago tragedy for
the strike is nothing less shows us that we are a great deal farther from
high civilization and perfected social Institutions than our characteristic
self-complacency, to say nothing of our brag and bluster, indicates and
deceptively leads us to believe. These perennial labor strifes spring direct
ly from, actual injustice and injury, or else from a sense of them, which is
about the same thing a condition which excites both pity and alarm.
Nevertheless social amelioration and equity, in such measure as we
have them, have come through stress and strife, and it Is some consola
tion to reflect that the very continuity and intensity of this class strife
indicates that improvement in social condition is the more rapid.
, While we must not lose sight of the fact that as a satisfactory solvent
of social ; injustice- and suffering we musJLJjk fraternal
sentiment, yet a tolerable degree of general social comfort and justice and
a reasonable rate of progress can be maintained only by constant strug
gle. There never was a time in the history of human society when it was
so generally a battlefield as it is today. This is because a keener and
wldetintelligence than has ever existed before apprehends better than
ever be?6Tewhat is due to society and affords the greater power to win it.
Present social" strife Is therefore, on the whole, encouraging rather than
discouraging. v .
V , IF THE BANKERS MEAN BUSINESS?
The bankers of the Republican valley, at their annual meeting recently,
Indulged themselves in a few hot speeches and some stirring resolutions
against the trusts. This Is very sudden. And still, why not? In the great
struggle of the people against the trusts, the bankers really1 ought to line up
on the people's side. The bankers are by the very nature of their business
very close to the people. The people are indebted to the bankers for bor
rowed money, and the bankers are indebted to the people for deposits; and
so there is a close relation as well as a mutual obligation between them. And
now if the bankers are really going to join the people in their fight against
the trusts, let us examine the situation in a practical way and see what
would be the very first practical step for the bankers to take.
- There are a great many trusts. ,
Which one shall we fight first? Why, the one that is doing us the most
harm of course. . -,:
Well, the trust that, is hurtine us the most here in Nebraska is the rail
road trust. This railroad trust not only forces heavy extortion on our com
modities when we ship, but forces a wicked and heart-breaking discrimina
tion on us when we ride. It compels some of us to pay not only for our own
rides but for the rides of others who are able to pay for themselves.
This railroad trust not only forces extortion and discrimination on us
in business, but it organizes all the other trusts and monopolies into a great
political trust, which bosses our politics, controls our congressmen, our
United States senators, our state legislators, our state officers, dethrones
our constitution, and robs us of self-government.
. f This is what the railroad trust is doing to us here In Nebraska.
It hits us the hardest blow when it takes away from us the privilege of
self-government. , ,
; Until we get back self-government, so that we can select for ourselves
