Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1902-08-28

ne 70 whom has been given what the
psalmist prayed for. neither poverty nor
riches, but the great captain OF industry,
the man of wealth. who alone or In COM
our great business enterprises, is a fac
tor without which this country could NOT
possibly maintain its present Industrial
position in the world. Good, not harm,
normally comes from the piling up OF
wealth through business enterprises.
Probably the most serious harm resulting
to us, the people of moderate means, IS
when we harm ourselves by letting the
dark and evil vices of envy and hatred
towards our fellows eat into our natures.
Still, there Is another harm of a more
evident kind, n such harm 1t Is our
clear duty to try TO eradicate, If possible,
corporations, containing some tendency
to monopoly, which we have grown to
speak of rather loosely as trusts, are the
creatures of the state, and the state not
only has the right 70 control them, but
Is in duty bound to control them wherever
the need for such control Is shown. There
is clearly need of supervislon-neeo to
exercise the power of regulation on the
part of the public, wherever, as in our
own country at the present time, business
corporations become so very strong both
for beneticient work and work that Is not
always beneficent. 1t Is idle to say there
Is no need for such supervision. A suff1-
Gent warrant for 1t is to be found over
and over again in any of the various evils
resulting from the present system, or,
rather, lack of system.
There Is in our country a peculiar
difficulty in the way of exercising sucn
supervision and control because of the
When the industrial conditions were sim
pie, very little control was needed, and
no trouble was caused by the doubt as
to where power was lodged under the con-
Stitution. Now the conditions are COM
plicated, and We find it difficult to frame
national legislation which shall De
adequate, while as a matter of practical
experience state action has proved en-
tirely insufficient, and in all human prob
ability can not or will not be made suf-
fcient, to meet the needs of the case.
Some of our states have excellent laws
laws which it would be well, indeed, to
nave enacted by the national Legislature.
But the wide differences in these laws,
even between adjacent states and the UNI
certainty of the power of enforcement
result practically in altogether insufficient
control. l believe that the nation must
assume this power of control by leSiSla-
ton, and if it becomes evident that the
constitution will not permit needed legis-
lation, then by constitutional amendment.
The immediate need in dealing with trusts
is to place them under the real, not NOM
inal, control of some sovereign to which,
as its creatures, the trusts shall W al
legiance, and in whose courts the sover-
eign's orders may with centrainly be en-
forced. This is not the case, with the
ordinary so-called trust to-day, for the
II uSl iS Il sc olutt COl pOI dlIpl, Sth-
orally doing business in other states also,
and often with a tendency to monopoly.
Such a trust is an artificial creature,
not wholly responsible to or conrtollable
by any legislature, nor wholly subject to
the jurisdiction of any one court. Some
governmental sovereign must be given full
power over these artificial and powerful
corporate beings. In my Judgment. this
sovereign must be the national govern
ment. When it has been given full pow
err, then this full power can be used to
control any evil influence exactly as the
government is now using the power con-
ferred upon it, under the Sherman anti
trust law. Even when the full power has
been conferred, 1t would be highly unde-
sirable to attempt too much or to begin
by stringent legislation. The mechanism
Of modern business is as delicate and
complicated as it is vast, and nothing
would be more productive of evil to all
of us, and especially to those least well
off in the worlds goods, than ignorant
meddling with this mechanism, and above
all, If the meddling was done in a spirit
Of class or sectional rancor. 1t is desir-
able that this power should be possessed
by the nation, but it is quite as desirable
that the power should be exercised with
moderation and self-restraint. The first
exercise of that power should be the Sc
curing of publicity among all great cor
Horations doing an interstate business.
The publicity, though non-inquisitor1al,
should be real and thorough as to all i'm
portant facts with which the public has
concern