The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1902-05-31

There Is now great deal or anti
! trust feeling and antitrust agitation
| the trusts make much more rapid pro-
gress than does the popular understand
| ing Of them.
The capitalization of these trade
| combinations proceeds not by millions
| but by billions. Everybody sees that
they are engrossing the national re-
| sources and the business Of the coun-
| try-that in confederation with the rail-
| road companies they form power with
| which individual competition is impos-
sible and against which the existing
machinery of the law is impotent.
In reality the trust is but normal
| product of modern conditions-a legi-
innate child Of steam and electricity.
The trusts and combinations are the
| same improvements in business that
improvements Of machinery are to la
Dor.
The popular antitrust sentiment is
the rioting against the introduction of
the spinning jenny over again. The
trusts are as truly a labor saving de-
velopment as is any device which in
| factory does that by machinery which
before was done by hand. Even as
the new machine or the improved ma
| chine displaces the workman, so does
the corporation displace the Individual
| in business. Sifted down to the bot
| tom trusts are therefore simply the
outcome of competition.
Competition under the capitalist sys-
tenn means the advancing of ones self
at the cost of others, the pulling the
many down, the elbowing the many
aside, in order to benefit the ore.
| Heretofore it has been most cruel to
the workmen whom it forced into
struggle to see who should live and
who should starve.
| But for the last ten or twenty years
the workmen have been by no means
the only sufferers. The small employ
ers, the small merchants, are just as
much victims of that cruel kind of COM
petition as the wage-workers. The hand
of each business man" Of the same
branch IS against every other, and no
foe Is more terrible than the one who
IS running neck-to-neck race with
him every day. The giant factory, the
mammoth store are the most implaca-
BILE foes of the small shop and the
small store-keeper. The fierce COMPETE
ton lessons the profit on each article.
ana that must be compensated for by
the production and sale of a greater
number of articles; that is the cheaper
the goods, the more capital is required
Precisely, then, for the same reason
that the mechanic with his own shop
and working on his own account has
nearly disappeared in the struggle be-
] nd y1rlx
the small employers with their little
machinery, their small capital and their
scanty stock of goods are driven from
the field. The great capitalist naturally
triumphs. And to the few remaining
in the field their. BUSINESS SENSE
dictates COOPERATION INSTEAD
OF COMPETITION. Should the claw"
come after them, they will simply give
up the little shadow Of separate bust
ness and rivalry and go into partner
ship-form gigantic stock company.
| And the evils that accompany the
trusts business activities are many.
The end of all business nowadays is to
! MAKE MONEY. And while produce
! ton on a large scale allows the adop-
ton of improved and cheaper methods.
and while the resulting economy of cost
would enable the trust to lower the
price of the product to the consumer.
none Of the trusts does any such thing.
Some of the trusts have done so tenn
porarily. But 1t is only right to saw
that the formation Of trusts has re-
suited in HIGHER PRICES than were
paid by the consumers before. Building
material, for instance, went up 40 and
IN some cases 100 per cent by the for
nation of the trusts-coal has gone I'M
to $40 ton, although it could be
sold at good profit for HALF THE
PRICE charged and living wages be
paid to the poor, oppressed miner-and
the extortions of the meat trust from
the people, as we'll as from the cattle
raisers, have just led to a government
investigation, while the workmen of the
packing houses are treated in a. way
that battles description.
In short:
The economies resulting from i'm
proved and cheaper methods of produc-
ton undoubtedly lessen the cost of the
article to the TRUST. But they are
under no compulsion to give the bene-
fit of this to their workmen in form
of higher wages and shorter hours, or
to the consumers through a. reduced
price. AS human nature is constituted,
under capitalism they prefer to take
the benefits out themselves in the form
of huge dividends-which are paid on
incredibly "watered" capital It must
be considered a sound conclusion that
if trusts multiply and have full swing
as they have had during the last two
or three years they will raise the prices
of commodities even higher than they
are now.
Nor are these the only evils. The
trusts will add to the general political
corruption. Whatever trust. wants
from legislators, courts. assessors and
public prosecutors it will get if money
can buy it. It will buy exemption from
/ molestation by political bosses when it
lis necessary. 1t will concern itself in
elections, whenever the outcome has
any bearing on it's pockets. 1t will SUBJ
sidize newspapers, bride voters and
spread corruption whenever duty" to
it's own financial interests leads. The
trust has no more moral scruple about
systematically committing crime of this