The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1899-09-08
A REVOLUTION.
Judge Severance Takes
Gloomy View.
Says that there is More Genuine Liberty
in Russia Than in the United
States.

1t did not require an overflow meet
ing to handle the people who attended
the Labor day meeting of the Direct
Legislation club at the Baptist church
Monday. 1t is possible that fifty peo-
pie were present, but there was an alb
sence of laboring men, and the mos
quitoes that focked about the room
proved on the audience mercilessly,
Mayor F. NJ. Currier called the meet
ing to order and made few remarks
in which he said that the Direct Legis-
lative club ought to bring the initiative
and referendum into use. He said that
representative government is failure
in many respects, as the will of the
people is not needed. He considered
that the great question now before the
people is how to prevent strikes and
boycotts, and referred to the Cleveland
strike. There should be some way to
cause a settlement of these troubles
and not force the citizens at large to
suffer because of a quarrel between the
street car companies and their en-
ployes.
w. D. Willard read a thoughtful
paper on THE Commercial Side of
Trusts" He thought that the concen-
tration of capital and energy resulted
in the making of a better quality of
products and the cheapening of them.
Expensive experiments can be made
that smaller concerns could not afford,
and trade is extended to foreign coun-
tries in manner that could not be &C
complished by smaller combinations of
capital or individuals acting singly.
The people are going to see that the
public gets the benefit of the saving in
by trusts The field for statesmen is
not how to destroy but how to limit
and direct the trusts into paths for
good. The abundance of capital makes
competition sure to follow the attempt
to reap excessive profits, as has been
shown recently in several instances,
The solution of the problem does not
lie in denunciation.
JudgeSeverance spoke at some lenght
on THE Legal Aspect of Trusts, in
the course of which he made public
some startling views on the future of
the republic He opened by saying
that Labor day ought to be notable
day throughout the country, but he
had his suspicious that it is not, but
that in Minnesota it is thrown out as a
sop to the laborers by the politicians.
Judge Severance said that there is
no law of trusts in this country. The
question is whether there should be
should be such a law and whether
there is such a.power capable of max
ing such law. The state legislature
is supreme. The Gar of Russia is not
more so. The state legislature is limit
ed only by the state constitution and
by few powers conferred upon con-
gress. The federal government has no
power over trusts. Trusts are de-
nounced by the press of every party all
over the land as a bane to the body
polite, and by the people as being
wholly in the interest of plutocracy.
They are becoming absolutely colossal
in this country. They have closed
scores of plants as they have the lin
seed oil plant in this city, causing all
the people gaining living there to lose
their employment, The general senti-
ment is that there are too many COR
porations and that we bow to wealth
too much.
The different railroad companies are
running lines parallel with each other
only few miles apart. The speaker
said that this had aroused his curiosity
and he had asked railroad official
about it and been informed by the Off
cial that the railroads are building
these lines because they have more
money than they know what to do
with. That is true, and the railroads
have extorted this money from the peo-
pie
The conduct of trusts is what the
people have right to complain of, be
cause they stifie competition, AS they
do not do business in any other way, it
is safe presume that this is their pur-
pose. Their motive is so concealed
that the only safe way is to prohibit
them entirely, and the legislature can
do this. Trusts are in the interest Of
plutocrats, The speaker defined plu-
tocrat as person who believes in the
rule of money. There are United
States senators who are known to have
bought their seats-that's plutocracy.
This territorial expansion. and Judge
Severance here warmed up to his sub
iect, is wholly in the interest of pluto
cracy. The inhabitants of the tropical
islands are the only people who can live
in those countries. 1t isn't the purpose
that other people should live there.
Rich people in the United States ag-
gregate their capital and buy up the
sugar interests of Hawaii, the sugar
and cotton of the Philippines and the
oo++o, rr,n opd tobaccO of Cuba