Arizona republican., 1902-10-15

Pittsburg, October 14-In response to an invitation by the Chamber of Com merce of this city, Attorney General Knox delivered an address upon "The Commerce Clause of the Constitution and the Trusts" The utterance of the attorney general had been earnestly looked forward to as pronouncemenu by the administration. It was his con- clusion that congress has under the constitution power to deal with the trusts, and the ground is taken that legislation on that subject should grow with the growth of commercial meth ods. He said in part:
 ''The people, by common consent have denominated the great industrial and other corporations now controlling many branches of commercial business, trusts. The technical accuracy of the term is unimportant, but indeed it $ much more apt than might be supposed when it is recalled that the essential difference between the old industrial trusts and the great corporations own ing and controlling subsidiary ones is that in respect to the former the shares of independent corporations agreeing to
 
 trustee who received the separate earnings and distributed them among the holders of trust certificates, while as to the latter, corporation is creat- ed to talk over the title to the stock or properties of the constituent com panies and issues its own shares as the evidence of interest in the combina- tions. The corporation owner of cor i'm ty from the legislature of the state un- der which is is created.
 The president, in his first message to congress, said:
 There is a widespread, settled con- viction in the minds of the American people that these trusts are, in many of their features and tendencies, hurtful to the general welfare. This springs from no spirit of envy or uncharitaDle- ness nor lack of pride in the great in dustrial achievements that have placed the country at the head of the nations struggling for commercial supremacy It does not rest upon a lack of intelli- gent appreciation of the necessity of meeting changing and changed condi- tions of trade with new methods, nor upon ignorance of the fact that combin- ations of capital and effort to accom- plish great things is necessary when the worlds progress is demanding that great things be done. It is bottomed upon sincere conviction that combina- ton and concentration, while not to be prohibited, is to be controlled, and in my Judgment this conviction is right
 These great combinations, now num- bering thousands, are the instrument alities of modern commercial activity Their number and size alone appall no healthy American. We are accustomed to large things and to do them in large way. We are accustomed to speak with a justifiable pride of our great institutions and what we have fairly accomplished through them. No right thinking man desires to impair the efficiency of the great corporations as instrumentalities of national commer- cial development Because they are great and prosperous is no sufficient reason for their destruction. If that greatness and prosperity are not the result of the defiance of the national rights or recorded will of the people, there is no just cause of complaint
 THE EVILS OF TRUSTS.
 That there are evils and abuses in trust promotions, purposes, organiza- tions, methods, management. and eff fleets none questions except those who have profited by those evils. That all or any of these abuses are to be found in every large organization called a trust no one would assert who valued his reputation for sane judgment.
 "The conspicuous noxious features of trusts existent and possible are these. Overcapitalization, lack of publicity of