The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-09-12
SENATOR BgvERIDeg's SPEECH.

lone CANNOT HELP admlrlng SEN
~ ator Beveridge for his frankness.
/ lie appears boldly as an attorney
for the trusts, He makes no secret
OF his amliation. AS an ambitious
/ young man, who would like TO be-
come president some day. he has al
J lied himself with the power which has
controlled the nation since the advent
( OF Mark Hanna with his new school
/ Of statesmen.
/ II has not been very long since Re
/ pubncans denied the existence of
trusts. We all remember that time
/ here in Utah. When they We're forced
az last TO acknowledge the fact, they
/ declared that, while decidedly an evil.
| the Republican party would suppress
/ them. The trusts continued 70 flour
| ish and increase in numbers. SO Re-
/ publican campaigners reluctantly ad-
/ mitted that trusts were Of two kinds
good and bad. Now comes Senator
! Beverage proclaiming that all trusts
are good. although an evil exists in
| some of them-that Of watering their
stock. the only injury resulting TO
stock Investors.
/ |: 9 3
Why. the senator said in his ogden
! speech last evening that the country
! had prospered under trusts and be-
cause of trusts; that the number Of
/ employees Is greater than ever before;
Z that rates of transportation are cheap
/ er than In the early days OF railroad
/ ing. and that farmers and wage earn
ers are more prosperous since trusts
came into power.
! 1t is true there are more wage earn
I ers now than there we're a dozen years
ago. but We should bear in mind that
there are goo more people in the
United States now than there were in
/ 1880. and as all OF them have TO make
a living somehow or other. they are
/ presumably wage earners. But the
trusts are not to be credited with this
/ Increase Of population, nor have they
employed more men than necessary in
/ their plan of reducing running ex-
/ penses and the cost OF production"
} Everywhere that trusts have been
! in operation, mills and factories have
been closed from time to time. throw
/ Ing thousands out of employment. The
avowed purpose Of these combinations
of capital has been 10 limit the output
that prices may be held up. TO reduce
expenses aud to Increase the profits
! Of stockholders by decreasing the cost
| OF production. Trusts are a menace
10 the people OF this country because
| Of these things. The supreme court
of the United States has declared
/ against unlawful combinations Of cap
ital in restraint OF trade. The congress
OF the United States has enacted laws
for their suppression. But the en-
! forcement OF those laws. left to Re-
publican president and attorney gen
eral has been a farce.
/ g g q
The tariff is not the parent of
trusts" said Senator Beveridge Then
why have Republican leaders during
the past four years advocated "a re-
duction of the tariff on those articles
produced by trusts?" Why does ev-
cry trust in the country send a lobby
to Washington at every session of con-
gress whose special business il is to
see that no tariff reductions are made
on the articles they respectively pro-
! duce?
The senator wants to know why
trusts did not develop during the Nor
lyffT Fa~FTf
operating along different lines in those
days. 1t was necessary first 20 con-
tract and control the volume of cur
rency. Under the war tariff Of Nor
rlll law and the still higher tariff OF
the Wilson acC occurred two OF the
most disastrous panics the country has
ever knoWn--thOse of 1873 and 1898. The
money power was after the money sup
ply then. This secured. it WAS an
easy matter to reach out and grasp
the industries OF the nation, one by
one, making wage earners Of men who
once were in business for themselves.
Have these organizations trusts
! eXtorted money from the people?'' asks
Senator Beveridge. Yes. When they
are enabled 10 make from 100 10 500
per cent protit out of the sweat OF labor
they are eNtorting that which is not
theirs by any law of right. When they
sell to foreign customers for less than
they supply the same product 10 home
consumers. they are extorting money
from the people,
Examine the scale of the cost of the
necessities Of life during the last gen.
Grafton and you viii md steady de-
cline In prices" says the senator. Yes.
This is true Of what the farmersraises
and sells. But let us inquire if labor
ing men are any better OF now than
they were four years ago, in relation
to the necessaries of life. Ask any
clerk in any store. He viii tell you
that il costs so much 10 live. that he is
unable 10 lay up anything. Nor is this
local condition. Ia the coal camps
Of the east where wages are not satIs-
factory and thousands OF people are
out of work, the following scale Of
prices has been found:
ISqS 1902