Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1899-09-14
ssfSass iz Iasa

That means that It carries In It the
very heart OF the social question. The
|pithiest formula | coquld give Of the so-
cisl question Ton Its material sidel 81
this: it Is The struggle for the advantage
!es Of applied science and invention to-
Industry At bottom this Is the fight in
our great strikes. The coming contest in
our municipalities. Is accurately this:
who is to control the vast machinery
such as lighting and transportation?
This has come to be the deepest strug-
gle In trade unionism. Socialism itself
can not be better defined than by Its
attitude towards machinery.
Industrial organization on great
scale did not begin until after the civil
war, say 1867. Then. beginning with the
railroad, we had an outburst of vast or
CARNATIONS OF business machinery. At
this point trade unions began an en-
tirely new epoch in their history. They,
too, strike for organization on far
wider plane. More significant still, here,
too, are the beginnings of large farmers
alliances. Now another period of neces
sary reorganization is upon US. The
mechanism for this is the yet more stu
pendous combination we are consider
ing. 1t will do precisely what the great
machinery has always done: create pro-
found temporary disturbance. 1t will
shut hundreds of offices, and drop
thousands who We're working on the
displaced machine. But meantime the
new work has to be done under new
form, and when the REIMBURSEMENT
comes, more men and not fewer will be
required to do 1t.
Very few trusts will make 200 or 300
per cent profits. But nothing under
heaven will prevent the daring and sue
cessful from reaping unusual rewards
from the new ventures. If competition
plus legal regulation work now as they
have worked. however bunglingly, in
the past, nothing will long prevent the
consuming public from sharing the adj
vantages of the coming organizations.
When competition has reached such
terrible limits as it now has in many
phases in making and distributing
wealth, it is, according to our mood, the
climax of humor or pathos to talk too
loudly of universal economic independ-
ence. AS all may observe, it is for a
large percentage of small business men
a most hap-hazard and tottering inde-s
pendence. II is this heller SHELTER con-
dition that we have to compare with
what the new combination will eventu-
ally bring about.
TT is said of the trusts that they will
raise havoc with our politics. That this
lis far graver peril than any economic
one is too clear. Recognizing the mag
nitude of this danger and with no desire
to minimize it. I express this hope. The
trust that stays will bring the very
ablest men to the front. They will very
soon have to carry on business in an
atmosphere of public opinion thorough
~ alert and aroused upon these issues.
IT appears to me very unlikely that men
of first ability will so far fail In that
tact as to disregard and affront an
alarmed. suspicious and powerful pub
lie opinion.
Nor have the slightest question
that If it becomes plain to the people
that the combinations manipulate poll
ties to their own private end. and per-
sist in this, they will have themselves TO
thank for driving the country further
and faster into socialism than any and
all forces that have ever shown them
selves in our public life"
Mr. William Fortune, of Indianapolis,
president of the Indiana state board of
commerce, made an earnest plea for
conservative procedure as a more hope
ful course than the application of revo-
lutionary or too radical measures to an
evolutionary problem. He indicated a
grave doubt of the usefulness of the
doetrinaire in arriving at rational
solution of the question. He guardedly
suggested the danger capital may bring
TO itself by needless abuse of Its power
and Indicated the Importance to 1t of
seeking proper regulation which will
make trust methods acceptable rather
than obnoxious to the people by whose
permission and tolerance only can their
existence continue. His speech was a
plea for the practical rather than theo-
retical approach to the subject. which.
in its present stage. the speaker be-
iieved TO be too immature to give basis
for conclusive Judgment as to the extent
of either its harmful or beneficial eff
| farfS