The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1898-03-09
TRUSTS, THEIR CAUSES AND THE
REMEDY,
By Hon. Marion Butler. United States
Senator From North Carolina.

Trusts are cancers-industrial cancers
on the body polite. They are eating
cancers; they are spreading cancers;
they are fatal to the prosperity and life
of the republic. Everybody admits this;
everybody is opposed to trusts; yet
trusts continue to thrive and prosper.
and to multiply each day. Why is this?
Because the voters have been deceived
and mislad about the causes that pro-
duce trusts and the true remedy to root
them up and crush them out.
A few years ago the Republicans
passed an antitrust law which they
said would remedy the evil. 1t did not
The Democratic party denounced the
Republican antitrust law as sham and
a fraud, and charged that the Republi-
cans never intended to pass a law that
would be effective. The Democratic
party under the Cleveland regime came
into power. The Cleveland Democrats
proceeded to pass an antitrust law of
their own, which they claimed would
remove and eradicate the evil 1t has
not done so. Today the Republican anti
trust law and the so-called Democratic
antitrust law are both on the statute
book side by side, and In full force. Yet
trusts continue to grow and prosper and
multiply in numbers as never before.
What is the matter? The truth is that
neither of these so-called antitrust laws
contain the true remedy. Neither of
them is directed at the causes that pro-
duce trusts.
The so-oalled Democratic and Republi-
can antitrust laws now on the statute
book are Ineffective; first, because the
evil laws now in existence and in full
force, which inevitably produce trusts,
are not repealed; next, because the So
called antitrust laws are not directed
at any of the fundamental conditions
that foster and promote the existence of
trusts. A statute declaring that water
shall not run downhill would be inef-
fective unless the statute should repeal
the law Of gravitation. To state it an
other way the attempt to remove and
cure the industrial cancers called trusts
with the so-called antitrust laws is as
futile and foolish as it would be for a
physician to attempt to heal a cancer
growing out of blood-poison by an appli-
cation of salves. The only cure for such
a cancer is a constitutional tonic that
will remove the blood-poison from the
system. DR.. Cleveland and DR.. Sherman
have each been applying their antitrust
salveS to the industrial cancers on the
body polite for years, while the disease
has increased and the patient has grown
sicker with each application. Today the
whole nation is sick nigh unto death
with chronic and constitutional dis
ease, the complication of trusts that in
fest our industrial system. These trusts
can never be broken up until the causes
that produce trusts are removed.
What, then, are these causesr
First, we must see what trust is. A
trust is a scheme or device to establish
a complete monopoly of any line of bust
ness. Whenever any number of individ-
uals organize themselves into corpora
ton and get complete monopoly of any
line of business, so that they can crush
out all kinds of competition and regulate
absolutely the price of not only the
manufactured articles sold to the public,
h,,t oil oofo io1
the producers to make the articles, then
we have a typical modern trust. But the
all-important question is: how can any
corporation get a complete monopoly Of
possible for such a monopoly-such
trust-to be organized and maintained?
Are not the thousands of people in
certain line of business more powerful
than one syndicate or corporation in the
same business? Are not seventy mil
lions of people more powerful than a
half-dozen Of that number? They are if
they have equal opportunities. Then
how is 1t possible for very small num-
Der of men to drive out of business and
crush their thousands Of competitors, Sc
cure complete monopoly, and maintain
it in the face of the remainder of the
nation? There is but one way in which
1t can possibly be done: the monopolists
must first get control of the instruments
of commerce. Those who control the in
struments of commerce can of course
control commerce itself, can destroy all
competition, and can put any kind of
business and every business into trust
at will
Now what are the instruments of COM
merce? They are three in number.
The first is money-the measure of
values, the medium of exchange-which
is vital element in every business
transaction. Money Is the life-b blood of
commerce, and business stagnates and
congests when the supply is cornered, or
when the quantity in circulation does
not increase with the increase of popu-
lation and business, just as the human
body grows weak from congestion or loss
of blood.
The second great instrument of COM
merce is transportation. Cheap trans
portation that can be used on like terms
by ALL is an essential factor of business