St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-01-08

passed the antitrust law. aimed oStensi-
bly, at those great aggregalions of cap
ital which have made close monopoles
or the great lines of industry in this
country. the workingmen OF the country
little suspe cted that law pretentiOusly
and apparently passed in the interests
or the mass would be converted into an
instrument in the hands of their enp-
ployers to deprive them Of the only
means left them of resisting reductions
OF wages or of maintaining their rights
as citizens of this free republic. And
yet they have seen that same act be-
come the tool of their employers. and
used to punish men who had combined
to secure themselves against reductions
of wages.
The decision of the federal court In
Michigan was their first intimatiOn that
this sword had more than one edge.
More recently they have seen an eXten-
sion of the application of this law to
them in the case of the Northern Pacific
road. whose officers. in the mere appre-
hension of strike, procured sweep
ing injunction prohibiting all OF the
employees of thar road from so acting as
to Interfere with its operations. They
had no day In court; they were not
cited 10 show cause why such all order
should not issue; but an injunction,
peremptOrY in its terms, prohibited
them from making the only effective
protest against what they considered a
very unjust and arbitrary reduction of
to ol~ rNf Ia I,rk
them.
In all the years since the enactment
or that law no single trust OF all of the
hundreds of them in the nation .ha s
been brought to bar, and the attorney
general of the United States plainly in
Inmates that az to the trusts the law is
imperative. if not unconstitutional.
Certain is that no attempt was made
by the administration under which the
law was enacted to enforce it, and we
can only believe that this is due to the
fact that Mr.. Olney's predecessor agreed
with him in regard to the futility of the
law. The edge OF this two-edged sword
that is turned toward the monOpolies is
harmlessly blunt.
workingmen of Illinois who sought to
meet the conspiracy Of the bosSes-who
formed an association for the purpose
of fixing the wages of their working
men-Dy the passage of all act prohibit
ing such associations and Furnishing
them as consplracies. No action was
ever brought or maintained against the
fhni
ued; while the only instance in which
the law was ever enforced was in the
Indictment and conviction of working
men who had combined for the purpose
OF maintaining their wages or prevent
ing any reduction of them.
These are striking illustrations of the
operation of all sociallstic or paternal
legislation. Where it does not fall still
born, to remain dead letter upon the
statutes, as it does in the majority of,
caseS.it is more apt to return to plague
its inventors than it is to carry out the
purposes of its enactment. What work.
ing men need, as all citizens need,is more
liberty, less restriction, less regulations;
more Independence, less depend,
ence upon the government; more man.
hood, less supineness. There is wisdom
i'll the old fable of the WAGNER who
called upon Jupiter to help him lift his
wagon out of the mud, and to whom
Jupiter replied: The gods help them
who help themselves" The working
men of the country can serve them
selves no better than by joining in a
crusade whose sole purpose shall be the
repeal. not the enactment of laws. ,.
81 --zs.s----- IGn sis Il