The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-04-27
THURSDAY, APRIL o., 1899.
TWELVE PAGES.
Politics and the Trusts.

N HOIHlNG that has lately hap
N pened either as the preface or
the appendix to dollar dinners
ana That sort of thing, goes to show
mat Mr.. Croker has any warrant for
giving out the remark. in the nature of
complaint, that is the essential SEN
tence in what he said Just as he was
quitting New York for Europe, His
Z 1dea Is that silver must not be next
years issue: he says that sixteen to
one will not -dp",and that he doesn't
helleVe democrats should be shut out
OF their party for not accepting it,
NO great issue, moral or economic or
political, is ever thrust on any great
party in national politics in this conn
try. Parties in the United States
formulate their own issues. The con-
vention of 1896 dfd this: the Doll for
that year bears witness to the fact that
very nearly fifty per cent of the citi-
zens of the United States, who made
up the very large proportion of the
democrats in this country, sustained
their party at the polls. Nor is anv
citizen "shut OUT of any party in
American politics. The individual can
shut himself out. if he wants to; that
is precisely what the men did, three
years ago, in whose behalf Mr.. Croker
now enters protest.
Z or course, party in politics can
make mistakes; our happy arrange
ment under self-government is such
that there's always a ready way to
occurred to silver's millions who voted
for Bryan and who We're the Democratic
party of 1896 that they made any mis-
take. but if Mr.. Croker and his friends
think there was a bunder it is their
splendid American privilege, if thew
come properly accredited. to Join issue
within the democratic councils, next
year, IN the framing of platform, and
have it out in the national convention
In that form of test, the Standard has
no doubt that the men of Mr. Cookers
view, whipped in 1885, will be whipped
in 1900. And, by the way, the men who
represented New York and who were
defeated in the democratic convention
three summers ago were men of higher
racy and with the democracy of the
state of New York than Mr.. Croker was
then, is now, or may hope to be before
July of next year
Mr.. Croker suggests that, for the
democrats, the trusts should be the
central issue Of the next presidential
campaign. Yes, but If the democratic
rla jc ~,
trust piatform-as no doubt it will
bet will be in the "enemy's country"
when it gets within the precincts of
Greater New York. There is the hot
house and hatchery Of the trusts; that
city is the principal place Of business
for the manufacture of trusts. Thev
are baneful things; worse than that
they are a danger and menace Nam.
of them are so top-heavy that when
they fall they'll fall hard; thu stand
ards belief is that some of them viii
go spraWling even before the national
conventions Of next year. Possibly b.
fore that time some of the biggest ana
loudest of them will tumble, and the
safeguarding world will get a fright
the like of which it has not recently
experienced. Then the perfectly-plain
proposition will face the American
people that you can't capitalize this
country into prosperity, and that fact
will be carried right into the polling
booths.
But even if this carnival of combina-
ton is kept up and manages to sustain
itself beyond next summer, therell be
a reckoning anyhow, even if later on,
1t is bound to come. Hitherto the ac-
cepted theory among this country's
conservative men has been that capital
and labor are entitled each to it's own
just share in the results Of wage-earn-