The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1898-12-07
DEMOCRACY AND THE TRUSTS.

point when it shows that under the tie
publican system of taxation Mr. John ID,
Rockefeller. with an income of $4,000
900 a year, need not pay any more tax
than Il working man whose income Is
$500 year. The Republican system OF
taxation is based on expenditures. The
Democratic party believes that wealth
should bear it's just portion of the bur.
dens of taxation.
The enormous national expenditures in.
cident to the war and necessary 10 the
gigantic and ever-growing pension roll,
and to the support of the increased army
and navy is making and will make the
question of taxation a burning one here.
after That the men who, like Mr..
Rockefeller. are possessed of vast
walth, do not propose TO bear their due
portion of the tax burden, has been
made plain enough by the shameless Of
frontery with which they have lodged
the tax gatherer in the past, defying the
law and treating the courts and the
citizen with unconcealed contempt. This
attitude can not be concealed or atoned
by sporadic bursts of generosity TO
schools and charities. Not gifts but tax
is what the country asks off them.
This matter of the proper method of
taxation is bound to bring to the front
another issue that has been forcing itself
on public attention with increasing in
sistcncy for number of years: the is
sue of the trusts. That it has not be-
come an oyershadowing issue earlier is
due to the indiseriminate attack of shall
low demagogues on legitimate enter
prses and trusts alike, thereby dsaffect-
ing sensible and conservative men.
The Democratic party proposes to dis
criminate. 1t will draw the line sharply
between productive industries that build
up and the throat-cutting trusts that
tear down and rob. 1t will stand as the
friend of the one and the implacable
enemy of the other.
In this contest the Democratic party
should have and will have the hearty
rations that are striving to do an honest
business. They are endangered by the
trusts no less than the farmer and the
working man. Already certain lines of
productive industry are practically in the
hands of trusts, and they are waging a
merciess warfare against all who are
right of an American citizen to follow
whatsoever calling he may choose.
Let there be no confusion of trusts
and corporations. We have in this State
hundreds of corporations that are doing
much to build up the State and develop
its resources. They give employment TO
of working men. We need
hundreds moreI like them. Our corpora
tions, in the main, aim to make their
profits in the field of fair and open com
petition. The trust aims to make its
profits by crushing ont competition and
then fixing an arbitrarily high price for
its products, and an arbitrarily low price
for its raw materials and its labor.
AT the present rate of trust organiza-
ton and growth it is but Il matter of
n few years at the farthest when prac-
tically every line of industry will be con-
trolled by trust, competition will be
1 al. nI thn
pay whatever price the trust fixes for
and the laborer will take
whatever the trust chooses to pay for his
labor. That this is not exaggeration,
every thoughtful man will admit who
has followed the course of trusts for the
past few years. At present the tobacco
industry is rapidly passing into the hands
of a trust, the oil trade is absolutely con-
trolled by one; sugar much the same, and
steel and iron. Meantime the trust that
reaps the profits of industry shifts the
support of the government to the should
ers of the man who works for his living
and INDUCES in spectacular generosity to
prove the goodness of its heart.
In 1900 the Democratic party. which
alone has always sanely contended for
the interests of the citizen and the main
tenance of legitimate industry, will make
the fight ON trusts along with the fight
for 4 better system of finance. And the
American citizen and the promoter of
American industry will not fail to see
that the fight is their fight.
In the general apprehension of extern
al troubles as result of our expansion
policy and in the contemplation of the