Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1892-02-25
RArSoR ON TRUss,s.
Which, Inflated With Concentrated Capt.
tai, Crush Out Honest Industry.

Congressman Raynor of Maryland,
who is preparing bill that he thinks
will fulfil the requirements of Federal |
legislation TO control trusts and COM
binations, woke up the House of Repre-
sentatives Tuesday week by speech in |
which he arraigned the giant monopolies
as follows:
"Mr. Speaker, neither the interstate
commerce law nor the act known as the
Sherman act, which was passed at the
last session of Congress, have had the
slightest appreciable effect in preventing
the formation OF the combines which it
was the very purpose of the law to eradi-
cate. They still flourish, they still bloom;
they still are accommodating in every
commercial centre of the country; they
still defy the law and the mandates and
the jurisdiction of the courts, and they
still, with arrogant and defiant threats,
uphold their proposition, execute their
purposes and accomplish their objects
without the slightest fear of punish
ment or the slightest concern about any
encroachment upon their prerogative.
"These combinations are so powerful,
Mr.. Speaker, and so influential that the
| legislatures of the states seem to iremble
at their presence, and in this Congress
of the United States we have sat by
with folded hands and permitted them
with an iron heel to trample on the
| rights of the people. When we know
that the Standard Oil Company, men,
toned in the minority report of this
committee, throttling competition in
every state of the Union, pays to-day
an annual dividend to its stockholders
five times as large as the whole capital
stock originally invested in this enter
prise; when we read of the great Read
ing railroad combination to control the
entire coal output; when we see the I'M
contradicted statement upon reliable
authority that q syndicate of capitalists
in the city of Detroit have monopolized
four-tifths of all the lumber lands in
the great lumber state of Michigan;
when we know that combine of this
character owns every salt mine
upon the American continent and
controls the entire output of the Ameri.
can market; when not ton of steel or
copper can be purchased except by pay.
ing the enormous tribute that is exacted
by the monopolies that command the
supply and regulate the price; when, in
the city of New York, sugar trust
with its franchises dissolved and its
charter forfeited dictates in command.
ing terms at every home and fireside Of
the American consumer the price of al
!, article of absolute necessity; when tn,
: whole system of Geographic commune
cation between 60,0O0,000 Of people i:
virtually in the hands of one man, 81
that the electric current that is ignitec
on the coast Of Maine flashes $500 mile
y to the ocean and in the whole circuit O
its transmission never crosses wiz,
that is not the property of the Western
Union-I say that when we realize thes
things the question naturally recurs
g How long will a free people submit t,
! their continuance
!, at is not question, Mr.. Speaker
between capital and labor, The ma
:, who raises such an issue is an enemy o
!, our institutions. 1t is contest of homes
!. business industry against these monopo
p lies. A few years ago an individual wit
limited resources could by thrift and in
dustry gradually advance his way t
q q the front. To-day these colossal trust
: inflated with concentrated capital, com
:, marching along and bankrupt and crus
:, him to the earth"