Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1899-1903, 1901-10-10

old John Sherman, the only bill
against trusts that ever passed con-
gress. The democrats gained control
in 1892. and the President was inaug-
urated in the spring of 1893, but dur
ing the four years of democratic rule
which followed nothing was done to
strengthen the Sherman bill.
You can easily kill trust in an in
dividual state. There are no trusts
in Iowa, but Iowa legislators cannot
kill a trust organized in New Jersey.
So it was that a joint bill providing
that congress have supervision over
all the states in this regard was in
troduced before that body But this
was foreign from the aims of the dem
ocratic leaders, and one of these made
a speech against the bill, telling his
fellow democrats that to vote for this
bill would be to vote to eliminate the
trust question from the campaign, and
only six democrats voted for the meas
ure. They preferred to keep the issue
rather than kill the trust. 1t was de-
feated.
A New Scheme.
After the Sherman law passed the
trust men went to a lawyer to invent
a plan for lodging this law and it was
finally arranged. Instead of conduct
ing the business as combine, each
separate interest was sold out and one
company was formed. Now Captain
Harper, our trustee, becomes presi-
dent of the Great American Starch
! Co.. and he keeps right on doing bust
ness. No one can stop it. There is no
| combine. there are several stockhold-
| ers in the new company, each former
owner having an amount of stock pro-
portionate with the value of his orig
inal factory.
A Difficult Problem.
So you will admit that the trust
| question furnishes quite difficult
problem. You can't compel a man to
operate four factories just because he
| has them, any more than you can
compel man to feed stock in four
| feed yards because he has them. 1t is
much easier to write an antitrust
plank than it is to draft an antitrust
law. One is the work of politician,
the other that of statesman.
The Colorado Plan.
/ At an antitrust convention in ST.
| Louis some time ago one man said
| that what he proposed doing in his
state was to have law passed in Col
orado providing that no company
could do business in the state without
| first Incorporating under the state
laws. IF they do not incorporate
he said, III dissolve them" But he
didn't tell how he would dissolve them
AS l sat and looked at him l remem
4 bered old Prof. Sellers and his eye
salve. That salve, he said, was al
right, it would make man a million
dollars, but it lacked one ingredient
to make it good. This ingredient-ht
didn't know
Now let me give an example. l wa.
in Michigan some time ago, and / saw
salt mandatory, from which were
shipped $4,000 barrels of salt eacl
day. A trust bought all the salt made
in the country. Now, for example
again, let us think of Captain Harpe
as the president of that salt company
Suppose he started shipping salt tt
Colorado. My friends meet him a
the borders of the state and forbid
him to enter until he has incorporate,
, under the stateilaws. But l., won
incorporate" he. says. Then yo-
cannot sell the salt in Colorado" h
: is told.
But the people of the state wan
: salt. He goes to another man, an,
this man takes the salt into Colorado
: where he sells it, but the people of tn
state pay another profit for it. Ism
: that great craftsmanship?
!, The World Moves.
e Those people who do get excite
r over such matters are like the cour
L tryman who stood beside the track
Y of big railroad line in New Yorl
f soliloquizing on the merits of the roat
i "A great line he thought, "fou
e tracks, a monster freight business,
great passenger business, splendi
trains. Here comes the flyer" An
as the fast train rushed past him h
J. caught cinder in the eye. Then h
J. cursed that road. He cursed ever
: rail in the four tracks, he cursed tn
S engines, the flyers and the progressiv
t age which made such cinder THROWN
4 machines part of the world of bus
e ness.
l. We must remember that we are d.
d ing business rapidly. In the last for
years we have sold clear billion do
lars worth more agricultural pr
ducts than during the four years pr
It ceding. In the 100 years before "
y sold more abroad than we bougl
: there. In the last five years the di
' ference between the amount of TO
eign sales and purchases has bee
more than five times as much as fl
the 100 years preceding. We are Sc
ing goods to foreign countries, and "
have wonderful trade. Who gets tt
n benefit of this? We all do tt
:. farmer gets part of it, the laborir
/ man gets part and the merchant ge
II part.
L Labor Benefited.
: | was at the home of friend son
- time ago, and saw sitting on tab
- cut glass vase which cost $3.50.
y, thought of the waste of money, al
- in my mind / censured the man f
~ his reckless expenditure Why d
d he not take that money and give
~ ~ to the poor But again | reflect
-, that cut glass is only white sand pl