The Kinsley graphic. [volume] (Kinsley, Kan.) 1890-1940, 1902-10-03

that would be paid by all.
Coal Trust Menaces Nation.
"a forcible example of the power they
would easily WELD in this regard is fur
nished by conditions that now exist in the
anthracite fields of this country. There
one huge combination has possessed Itself
not only of the soil from which our hard
coal must come. but of the means Of trans
portation through which 1t must reach the
outer world.
For a perio0 of nearly four months the
managers Of that moEstrouS combination
have been at loggerheads with their en-
ployes over differences they are unable to
harmonic, and although thousands upon
thousands of their hard-handed workmen.
with their wives and little ones, are suffer
ing for the necessaries of life ard the
whole country is on the verge Of a fuel panic
not a muscle of that soufless combination
is moved and not word of Cancellation es-
capes the lips of its managers.
These men have formulated the terms
on which their workmen may return to
their toll. They can accept or starve; tina:
Is their Only choice.
What 1 have said of the two examples
to which 1 have referred is largely APP
plicable to nearly 300 similar combin aSions
of greater or less degree.
LAS heretofore stated, while all seem to
realize the danger to the great mass of our
people which this new departure in our
business methods threatens, We are hope
Two Views of the Tariff.
For generations the American people
have been divided, on the question of the
right or the wrong of a protective as dis
tinguished from a revenue tariff, but 1t is
only III recent years that the trust evil has
entered into discussion of that question
1.-The teachings of democrats logically
lead them to believe that our protective
tariff system has made the organization of
these trusts possible, and so long as it is
continued they also believe it will furnish
a defensive breastwork behind which they
can find shelter from every shaft that could
reach vital part
1.-The course of reasoning by which this
conclusion is reached is easily understood.
They say truthfully that the conceded OBJ
ject of protective tariff is to exclude from
our market goods Of foreign manufacture
which, if permitted to be imported, would
be SOLD in competition with home manufac
lures and hence reduce the price Of these to
the same level at which foreign gooCs OF
like quality could be bought. That so long
as we maintain tariff wall that shuts for
eign goods out of our markets there is 70
possible way to prevent home producers
from combining by either express or i'm
piled agreements and fixing the price at
which their own products shah be sold.
The futility of legislation, other than
tariff reduction, in restraint Of such action
is to them demonstrated by the fact that
the great bulk of our trusts have been
openly organized; in the face of antitrust
laws carefully prepared and incorpora ted
into the statutes of the nation and many of
the states.
Remedy Through the Tariff.
'They insist, therefore, that inasmuch as
the plain object of these combinations is to
destroy competition among themselves
and thereby become able to fix their own
prices upon whatever they produce there is
but one remedy for the evils they threaten,
and that is to take down the wall that shell
tiers them and compel them to compete with
the world at large.
In this view l heartily concur, as do in
the OLD and revered democratic doctrine
that a tariff which is nothing less than tax
on consumers can rightfully be laid for one
purpose only, ard that to raise needed rev.
enue for the use of the government.
But, as old as that doctrine is and firmly
rooted in the democratic faith as it has be-
come, it must always be interpreted in the
light of conditions they exist when it is
to be applied.
I'm the absence of circumstances requir-
ing a different Interpretation demand 10;
an immediate reduction in our tariff sys-
| tenn to a revenue basis would naturally be
| understood to mean a demand for a general
revision of our tariff laws and reduction
of all their schedules to a common level
that would produce needed revenue oEly.
This, however, is not as 1 understand
the Interpretation democrats at the pres
ent time put upon that demand.
1T must be remembered that it is made
in the presence of new conditions, in the
| bright glare Of which it must be construed.
Host of Unique Evils.
ITO the mind, of democrat, at least this
country is threatened with unique and over
shadowing evils.
in the presence of the great combiEa-
| lions that have been and are being organ
| lied in our Industrial pursuits he reads the
| of r. eOt ho h
| ing in the youth. of our future of manly
hope to stand at the head of some business
enterprise and, with brain as we'll as Drawn,
lead it upwarGl to success; the witherirg
away of a great army of leaders who have
stood at the pilot wheels of our industries
and made the whole world wonder a t Amer
ica's business success, and, looking out il to
| the future, he sees in the place of these
| single individual, whom the wsrld Gubs
captain of industry, be6ecked with en-
! blems of authority that cost a million
year to support, leading behind him great
| columns of detected men who never dream
| of better place, but come ard go at one
mans beck.
And, turning from visions like these, he
sees the wealth that millions are made to
earn at the feet of men whose hands were
| never stained by toll, and then is it any
wonder that he asks: Is this the result OF
| law?
| ARD who are the men that we see and
| speak like this? You. who would lead or
| drive them, call them the common herd, but
| in among them are millions of men who
| drank from their mothers breast the milk
| of human kindness that makes every ma t
| a brother, who learned at his fathers knee
| his Bible faith, the equality of mar before
| the law.
Aim Mt Heart of Trusts
J ITO the worshipers of protection let ne
| say it is not the fetish you have made your
| god these men are after now. An evil
| greater than that must be dealt with first
| 1t is the heart of the trust they would re CHI
| To DO this you know the wall that shelters
| it must be battered down at the place
1 where It is concealed.
| IF this should reduce our tariff system
| below a revenue basis they would help to
| build II higher whenever or wherever a
/ trust is not sheltered behind it.
This is the present day doctrine of a tar