Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-10-17
ALL TRUSTS
CHAUNCEY Of. IaBLACK STRIKES
oBT WILDLY.
Declares There is'Adequate Remedy il
Earnestly Agphed-Punches
ath D. B. Hill.

In an open letter given out at York, Pa,
Yesterday Chauncey F. Black, president of
the National Association of Democratic
Clubs, discusses vigorously the administra-
toms attitude toward the trusts, with spe-
eiaI reference to the coal situation and Da-
yid B. HIS proposition in the New York
platform.
- 1.-THE whole people Of the country" says
Mr.. Black. turn at this crisis to President
Roosevelt with degree Of unantmity and
a sort of sympathy and respect never seen
before, except In war times, when neeessa-
rily all good citizens stand behind their ex
ecutive. No one doubts hts personal or his
official integrity or his eager and patriotic
desire to serve the best interests of the
country so far as his authority extends.
But 1t was not Mr.. Roosevelt who was
placed in power by the election of 1900. 1t
was the trusts, and they are now, as here
tofore, exercising the power which they
naturally assume properly belongs to them.
Indeed, the Presidents position Is almost
pitiable. VIII ne serve his country and
wreck his party?' 1t Is a hard alterna tive,
and it is small wonder that he hestates,
apparently dazed and bewildered. There
would be no republican party without the
trusts. railroads banks and monopolies of
various kinds, fostered by excessive tariff
duty and the fiscal policies of the govern
ment.
Take the vast aggregation of selfish
concerns out of the party, destroy them or
set them over against it, and there would
not be enough of the republican party left
to name candidates by nomination papers in
any state in the union, not excepting Penn
sylvania. If. however, the President is pre-
pared to serve the whole people, to do i'm
partial justice. to relieve the suffering and
insure the peace of the country he can
readily find a way. 1t Is written large in
the Sherman law. and the case presented
to the government by Mr.. Hearst against
the coal trust is complete with supera-
bundant evidence to support it,
1T is unnecessary to recite what they are
actually doing. III they had not their iron
grasp on every anthracite mine; If they
were not the real owners of the most of
the mines through auxiliary corporations;
If they did not fix rates and prices and reg
ulate the whole business through the Tenn
pie Iron Company. or some other obscure
medium devised for the purpose; IT, in
word, they had not united the stealing
power Of all into one grand monopoly and
put the whole people at their mercy there
would be independent mining; there would
be freedom Of contract between separate
operators and their men: there would be
competition in the furnishing and in the
carrying of coal, and there would be no
strike in the coal region and no dearth of
fuel at the nigh beginning Of winter.
The governor has thus far seemingly
perceived only one side of his duty, namely
that of keeping the peace by turning out
the whole National Guard at an exDense
OF S5o,oOo per day. In regard to the obvious
duty or going into the courts of the state
in the name of the commonwealth and ask
ing the dissolution of this unlawful COM
bnatton or the forfeiture of the abused
charters. with such other immediate relief
as the court might grant, he and his legal
advisers appear, to be smitten with even
worse type of judicial blindness than that
which prevails at Washington.
He has a cleans, clear road stretching
straight before, If only he will dare to take
it. Let him bring the offending corpora
tons into court, strip them of their usurped
power for evil, and enforce in that Just and
peaceful way the constitution and laws of
the state If that fails. he has still an
other resource. He. can call the legislature
together. and unless the majority Of that
BODY is frrevoGably sold to the trusts II
would, In the present temper of the people
lncontinently revoke the misused and the
unused charters. expel the obstinate usurp-
ers and provide the official machinery for
supplying the people with coal. This Is not
Mr.. Hills proposition. 1t is not nationaliz-
ing the mines or the railroads. 1t is the
state or pennsylvania reSuming on behalf
OF her own people grants which have been
m1sused, perverted, prostituted, or grants
which. since they do not mine coal and sup
ply the public, the grantees are falling to
use at all.
Meanwhile. it is not astonishing that
some of those who feel a guilty sense of
responsibility for the present state of af-
falrs seek to wash their hands of it by
proposing the most radical means of amend
ment, like that of the New York convention
Ihat small percentage of money-loving
democrats. whose tender consciences were
so afflicted at the prospect of full resto-
ration OF the double metallic currency of
the constitution. of our forefa theirs and of
all mankind. since the beginning of trade
tnat they went over to the centralizing
hlgh tar1r, trust party, and then boasted
that 1t was the smaller balance of power
IN their sordid hands that accomplished the
results In 1896 and 1900. do not appear to
look upon these later and inevitable con-
sequences of their handiwork with the
equanlm1ty which might have been expected
from a class of SNUG and sleek, who claim
eo 10 monopolize all, the intelligence and all
the integrity Of the democratic party, Just
as the trusts they served sought to monopo-
NE all the Industrial opportunities of the
country. The New York proposition i'm
plies that they find great pleasure in
contemplating the results they claim to
nave brought about, and that at least
some OF them hope to escape Judgment by
turning suddenly more populistic than the