The Lafayette gazette. [volume] (Lafayette, La.) 1893-1921, 1902-08-30
Roosevelt on Trusts.
New Orleans Picayune.

President Roosevelt is making
a campaign tour through New
England, and as New England is
essentially a manufacturing re-
giOn whose interests are pro-
tected by a high tariff, he did not
feel called upon to say anything
about tariff revision and reduc-
ton. The chief theme of his add
dresses was trustism and trusts.
The president preached a
homily on the wickedness of en-
vying our wealthy neighbors,
which was all right enough since
every individual has a right to
use his abilities to their extent
towards gaining wealth, and it
he fails of success he has no
business to blame fortune or fate
for his failure. It is all right to
endeavOr to make men cOntented
with their several states or con-
ditions, but this does not absolve
the lawmaking and executive de-
partments of the government
from protecting the people from
the injurious aggressiOns and
depOtism OF trusts.
Under our Democratic inStitu-
tons every individual who can,
by honest and lawful means,
gain great wealth. is entitled to
enjoy it in any proper manner
that may please him: but he has
no right to use his means to the
injury and damage Of the popula-
ton of the country. No man or
combination of men should be
allowed to control the entire
supp1yDf any article of universal
daily consumption, and extort
from the people who must have
it, unreasonable and outrageous
prices. In the same way the
transportation companies should
not be allowed to com bine so as
to mOnOpOlize every route for
the carriage Of articles of neces
sity, and so hold the people at
the mercy of such com binations.
The civil and criminal laws Of
the land have deprived indivi
duals of the right of acting with
impunity to the injury and OPP
preston of their fellows and
neighbours There are many per
sonal acts that individuals are
forbidden by law to do, because
such acts would be hurtful to the
lives, liberty, rights or comfort
of their fellow citizens. a man
may not set fire to and burn his
own house, even if be not in
sured, because it may set fire to
the property of his neighbours.
A man may not maintain nuiS-
ance of nOxiOuS OdOrS and I'M
sanitary conditions upon his
premises, because these would
be likely to cause disease and
possible death to other persons.
A man may not keep a house dis
orderly and of evil reputation in
a locality where the residents
are orderly and respectable, be-
cause such conditions would
shock public decency and might
corrupt morals otherwise ire
proachable. A man may not beat
his horse numerically because
such exhibitions of cruelty are
offensive to good taste and in
furious to general morality.
If citizen can with justice
and propriety be deprived of
what in a state of barbarism
might be an undoubted right,
because in a state of civilization
such acts would be injurious and
offensive, by the same rule of law
a combination of capitalists or
an Individual possessing great
wealth, may be and should be
prohibited from using that
wealth to the injury, damage,
loss and undoing of great bodies
of the population. The law
makers shrink from the exercise
of such benefcent powers as are
required to put proper restraints
on trusts, not because there are
rs. - 10 FL,