The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1892-03-10

| He is man of the people and Tor the
people, and his heart is evidently in
the right place as the following speech
recently delivered by him in the Ma
tional House of Representatives goes
to show. If Mr.. Rayner can be in
strumental in breaking up and putting
a check to the formation and perpetu-
alton of trusts, combines and monop-
olies of all kinds, he will deserve and
receive the plaudits of the whole coun-
try. He has gone to work i'll the right
direction and with a vengeance. In
the speech alluded to he said:
/" 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 pre-
venting the formation of combines
which it was the very purpose of the
law to eradicate. They still flourish,
they still bloom they still are accumu-
lating in every commercial center of
the country; they still defy the law
and mandates and the JURISDICTION of
the courts, and they still, with arrogant
and defiant threats, uphold their pro-
positions, execute their purposes and
accomplish their objects without the
| slightest fear of punishment or slightest
concern about any encroachment upon
their prerogatlve.
| "Thcse are SO powerful, Mr.. Speak
er, and SO influential that the Legis-
| latures of the States seem to tremble
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 it's 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 uncontradicted statement upon
reliable authority that syndicate of
capitalists in the city of Detroit have
monopolized four-fifths, of all lumber
lands in the great lumber state of
Michigan when we know that COM
blne of this character owns every salt |
mine upon the American continent
and Controls the entire output of the
American market when not a ton of
steel or copper can be purchased ex-
cept by paying the enormous tribute
that is exacted by the monopolies that
command the supply and regulate the
price wher, in the city of New York,
sugar trust with its franchises dis
Solved and its charter forfeited dictates
In commanding terms at every home
and fireside of the American consumer
the price of an article of absolute
necessity; when the whole system of
the Geographic communication between
100000 of people is virtually in
the hands of one man, SO that the
electric current that is ignited on the |
coast of Maine flashes 1850 miles to
the ocean and in the whole circuit of |
its transmission never crosses a wire
that is not the property of the Western
union-1 say that when we realize
these things the question naturally
reCurS How long will free people |
submit to their continuance?
alt is not question, Mr.. Speaker,
between capital and labor. The man
who raises such an issue is an enemy
of our institutions. 1t is contest of
honest business industry against these
monopolies. A few years ago an in
dividual with limited resources could
by thrift and industry gradually adj
vance his way to the front. To-day
these colossal trusts, inflated with con-
centrated capital, come marching along
and bankrupt and crush him to the
earth.
CHOW if they accomplished any
good whatever l would be in favor
of Withdrawing all opposition to them. |
If by combining the resources of capt.
tai they lowered the prices of con-
sumption if by creating new enter
prises they enlarged the field of en-
ployment; if they contributed in any
manner to the welfare or prosperity
of the country, l would say Let them
advance with steady steps and plant
their acquisitions in every common
wealth over the undisputed territory
OF the Union,' but they do none of
these things. They raise prices, they
lower wages, they limit production,
they contract the demand for labor.
They throttle competition, they mono
police the wealth of the land. they
withdraw it from the channels of circu-
lation and they do worse than this.
They bride and corrupt the powers
that oppose them. They buy their
way to favor and position, and when
they are driven from one state, they
obtain their franchise in another and |
then return with insolence to pursue
their avocation in the state from which |
they were banished.
.When l look around in my own
state and in other places and find |
whenever an enterprise is started that |
comes in conflict with these trusts, |
that their rapaclty is never appeased |
as long as there is spark of vitality |
left in any competitor who crosses their
path, can not permit this onoOrtupitv