Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1889-08-01

soon the entire salt manufacture of the
country will be in the hands of a single
company. The price will then be al
most certain to advance. Salt is one
Of the necessaries of life. 1t has usu-
ally been plenty and cheap. In the
hands of trust the poor of the coun-
try will be forced to contribute out of
their poverty to add to the wealth of
the rich. There iS no reason why this
should be so except as the rich use the
power their riches give them to bring
about this result. 1t is claimed that a
combination of capital means economy
of production and management. This
may be so, but the benefits are to ac-
crue to the capitalists and not to the
public. The creation of fictitious stock
upon which dividends must be paid is
a scheme for absorbing all that can be
saved by operating on large SCALE
A movement has been set on foot tow
ards railroad trust. The banks have
been s'felt of little to see how they
incline with reference to offering aid.
Such trust might give more uniform
rates and prevent so much cutting by
competing lines, but in such matters it
is always safe to assume one thing, and
that is that the public will pay for all
it gets in the way Of accommodation or
advance by this method. The English
capitalists have been seeking to gain
control of our beer business by buying
up all our large breweries. This seems
to be day when every interest that
affects the people is falling into the con-
troll of few men who propose to make
themselves immensely wealthy at the
expense of the public. In the mean
time many products outside the range of
these trusts, and upon which farmers
depend as a source of income are de-
clining in price. The dairy business
does not pay the cost of running, and
is continued by thousands of men only
because they cannot readily turn to 9th
er occupations or modes Of farm labor
Thus it comes about that the things
farmers must buy are tending upward,
the price of what they produce and
must sell is tending downward. II is
a matter of surprise that the number of
abandoned farms does not increase in
stead of decline, and if this system of
trusts so recently organized is pushed
to a great development this will be the
result. Is there any remedy? How are
we to break up these trusts or avoid
their worst tendencies There are
some things in the use of which people
can economize, and break up trusts in
them by letting them alone. Sugar has
reached price that is diminishing its
and should il rise another
notch the amount consumed will be cut
down immensely. 1t is not easy to
economize much on salt, unless our
dairymen choose the fashionable way
Of sailing butter. As to beer it makes
no particular difference to us what the
price is as we shall go without all the
same. The present purpose seems to
be to form trusts in almost everything
that the people must have. 1t looks
ike grand scheme of extortion on the
part of few against the many. 1t is
ike putting the public into wise and
urning the screw just little at a time.
Some think there is no use in wiggling,
hat there is nothing to do but to grin
md bear it. Our impression is that :
he people viii take the matter in hand ,
md break up these trusts by legislation. l
There must be some way to reach them {
nd check their power for evil. The
lew State OF Washington proposes to
axe the bull by the horns and insert in
er Constitution clause forbidding
heir formation. The courts have al a
eady taken hold of the sugar trust, but !
othing that relieves the public has yet
cen carried out. We see in all these :,
rusts tendency towards the forma-
ion of that state of society that Edward a
Iellamy has SO graphically described v
d Looking Backward. 1t may be 2
hat the solution of the questions that :;
ow vex us which he there gives, is the n