The age-herald., 1899-07-06

directed to 1t early last spring by Judge Augustus Van Wyck in his great speech before the New York Democratic club. The southern people are great admirers of Judge Van Wyek and claim him as one of them. They admire his great ability, his sterling democracy and bis innate genti.- ity. They particularly admire the gallant race he made for governor last November, when he came within 1S,00O votes of over coming an adverse majority of 260,00O, and would have completely done so but for the military hurrah his opponent aroused. which swept so many young men off their feet and out of their heads.
 This question of trusts has lately
 aroused such interest that democratic
 leaders, and even republicans, all over
 the land have taken 1t up, and it is
 safe to say 1t will be one of the lead
 ing issues, if not the leading issue in
 the next campaign. We all admit that
 consolidation is the spirit of the age and
 that the universal tendency resulting
 from modern machinery is to blend man
 into the mass and destroy his individ-
 uality-to make a mere machine of him.
 But surely governments should not ac-
 celerate, but should counteract this ten
 dency as much as possible, by placing
 upon him individual responsibility for
 his share of current events. We all ad-
 init, too, that capital, which Is indis-
 pensable to progress, has rights, and one
 of these is the right of contract Man
 Kind has rights, too. and one of these
 Is to abolish any system or condition
 Which initiates against the public good
 CT places the power in the hands of one
 man to crush another, or which tends
 10 degrade man into q soulless, lifeless
 machine.
 Violates the Right to Contract
 If 1t be said that antitrust laws violate the right to contract, we reply there are many laws which violate such right. such as the law against usury, gaming, doing business on Sunday, etc., and the wisdom or these laws has never been successfully assalled No maA or corporation has the inherent right to make contracts in vio- laton Of public policy or contrary to the interests of humanity, and the right to leg lsiate against monopoies Is as old as the history of Jurisprudence. This right was Known to the Roman and Grecian peoples two thousand years ago, and to our Eng ilsh, French and German ancestors hum dreds of year ago. But it is said the trusts benefit humanity by reducing the price to the consumer of the article manufactured. Recent experience in the formation of trusts proves this not true, but the reverse is rms cannot be true, for what is saved in the- expenses by the consolidation is more than lost in the interest charges on the wa ter in the stocks and bonds which is al- ways injected into the trust as profits to the promoters and brokers who. float tine scheme, and to pay for unprofitable plants which must be shut down. Of course the interest on these watered bonds and stock must be added to the cost of the article, ard recent experience in nearly every in stance has shown the price of the article was immediately advanced over former prices. If this be true. then the only plaus- lDie argument vet advanced hv tho trI1st II found to be unsound. and they serve no purpose except to crush labor and pluck mankind. It is impossible for an individual to compete with them, for it would not only be to engage in a struggle with com petitor having superior capital but with one clother by law, with privileges and 1rancnises he did not possess. It would be an individual attempting to fight a system, with the result in no doubt whatever.