The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1889-05-17
THE TRUSTS INVESTIGATION.

The committee of the New York state
senate which has been so long investigat-
ing the "trust" problem has at last made
its reports-there being two, one from
the majority and one from the minority.
The "trust" problem is a big one, and
perhaps there is not in the result of the
committees work a great amount Of sat
isfaction. There is this much to be said
for it, however, it has made many in
vestigations of the various best known
trusts, that it has sought TO arrive at con-
illusions by induction and not to make
facts conform to predetermined theories,
and that the majority and minority re-
ports, between them, present both sides
with apparent candor and undoubted
clearness, and that the presentations on
both sides will help educate the people.
The majority and the minority, agree
as to the fact that the English common
law was hostile to all combinations to in
crease the prices of the necessities of
life; but the majority report holds that
combinations are the only known and
existing remedy for the excessive COM
petitions of our time, and that We have
outgrown the conditions under which
the common law against combinations
came into existence, while the minority
report holds that eat the present time 1t
is clearly impossible to obtain any legis-
lation more favorable to the interests of
the people than is the common law, as
the same was declared by Judge Barrett
in his opinion in the action brought by
the Attorney General against the North
River Sugar Refining Company"
The majority report, on the other
hand, finds reasons for the existence of
trusts in the fact that "the history of the
copper trust or syndicate, the sugar
trust, the standard oil trust, the Ameri-
can cotton oil trust, the combination of
railroads to fix the rates of freight and
passenger transportation, all prove be-
yond question or dispute that comblna-
ton grows out of and is a natural devel-
opment of competition, and that IN many
cases it is the only means left to the
competitors to escape absolute ruin"
Both reports agree that no immediate
legislation is needed to deal with exist
ing trusts. The majority report takes
the ground that "the right of combina-
ton among capitalists, manufacturers OF
common carriers for every purpose con.
sistent with the public welfare should
not be unnecessarily restrained. But
the severest penalties should be pre-.
scrlbed and enforced land unless en-.
forced they should not be prescribed)
for every attempt at combination the
end and purpose of which is an unjust
monopoly, or of unduly enhancing the
price of any commodity"
The minority report holds that "the
principles of the common law seem ade,
quate in the main for the protection o.
the citizens against these great combin'
atoms so long as the enforcement and
Interpretation of the laws are intrusted
to officers themselves incapable of being
influenced by improper motives. If in
the future the monster aggregations o.
wealth which now prove so potent, both
in the state and nation, in preventing
legislation directed against their selfish
and dangerous methods shall prove
equally successful in retaining admin
strative officials and in substituting the
Bench itself, the only remedy rests with
the sovereign people, whose patience
may eventually be tried too far"