The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1902-04-25
TRUSTS AND REPUBLICANS.
The Only Party That Has the Cour-
age and Honesty to Legislate
Against Trusts.

One of President Roosevelt's express
sions about the trusts in his Charleston
speech seems to have given some salts
faction to many democrats. The presi-
dent said ''the nation should exercise
overcombinations, cautiously but firm
ly, the power of supervision and regu-
lation." Representative Richardson,
the democracy's titular leader in his
branch of congress, says chats good
democratic doctrine, and if the presi-
dent wishes any assistance in the line
he suggests he can count on every
member of the democratic party in
congress-, Mcclellan, Patterson and
other democrats in congress say the
same thing, states the ST. Louis. Globe
Democrat.
This democratic hypocrisy in regard
to the trusts can be easily exposed.
The first square and honest expression
by either of the two great parties
against the trusts was made by the
republican party in the convention
which nominated Harrison the first
time, that of 1883. The democrats in
that year made a shutting and dishon-
est. deliverance on the trust question,
which not one out of ten of the mem
bers of the convention understood, and
which ntt one out of hundred of the
members,of their party in the country
at large ever thought of in that con-
vass or ever cared for. The republic
ans in that convention proclaimed:
eve declare our opposition to all COM
binations of capital, organized in
trusts or otherwise, to control arbi-
trarily the condition of trade among
our citizens, and we recommend to
congress and our state legislatures, in
their respective Jurisdictions, such leg
islation as will prevent the execution
OF all schemes to Cypress the people
by undue charges on their supplies or
by unjust rates for the transportation
of their products to market"
That is what the republican party
said in 1855, the first year of a national
canvass after the trust idea came up
through the organization of the sugar
combine. The republicans, with char
acteristic promptness and courage,
carried out their promise by putting
their platform declaration into the
Sherman antitrust law of 1890, passed
by congress republican in both
branches, and signed by Gen. Harri-
son. That act has done good service,
and il is expected to do more work of
| the same kind. Under the direction of
| the president and the attorney general
| the act of 1890 is to be invoked against
the merger of the northern railroads.
| If the law proves to be inadequate to
meet the present needles the republic
ans will amend it in the right direc-
| tion or pass,a new act which will cover
the situation. The democrats, despite
the prating of Richardson and his con-
geners, have neither the brains nor
the honesty to pass an antitrust law
that will hurt the combines. All the
work that they have attempted in this
direction in the states under their con-
troll has either become a dead letter or
has been set aside by the courts, as in
the case of Texas the other day. The
only party which has the courage, the
honesty and the sense to do any legis-
lating against the trusts which is eff
fectiye is the republican party. The
whole country, democrats as well as re-
| publicans knows this.