Meade County news. [volume] (Meade, Kan.) 1900-1918, 1902-12-11

To the Senate and House Of Represen.
tatiNes: We still continue in a period o.
unbounded prosperity. This prosperity
is not the creature of law. but undoubt-
eddy the laws under which we work have
been instrumental in creating the condi-
tons which made 1t possible, and by I'M
wise legislation it would be easy enough
to destroy 1t. There will undoubtedly
be periods of depression. The wave will
recede; but the tide will advance. This
nation Is seated on continent f1anked
by two great oceans. 1t Is composed
of men the descendants of pioneers, or
in a sense, pioneers themselves: of men
winnowed out from among the nations
of the old world by the energy, holiness
and love of adventure found in their own
eager hearts. Such a nation. so placed,
Will surely wrest success from fortune
As a people we have played large
part in the world, and we are bent upon
making our future even larger than the
past In particular, the events of the last
four years have definitely decided that.
for woe or for veal our place must be
great among the nations. We may either
fail greatly or succeed greatly; but we
cannot avoid the endeavor from which
either great failure or great success
must come. Even If we would. we can
not play small part. If we should try.
all that would follow would be that we
should play a large part ignobly and
shamefully.
No country has ever occupied higher
plane of material well-being than ours
at the present moment. This well-being
is due to no sudden or accidental causes,
but to the play of the economic forces
in this country for over a century; to
our laws, our sustained and continuous
policies: above all, to the high individ-
ual average of our citizenship. Great
fortunes have been won by those VINO
have taken the lead in this phenomenal
Industrial development, and most of these
fortunes have been won not by doing
evil, but as an incident to action which
has benefited the community as whole
Never before has material --l-being
been SO widely diffused among our peo-
pie. Great fortunes have been accum-
ulated and yet in the aggregate these
fortunes are small indeed when com
pared to the wealth of the people as
whole. The plain people are better off
than they have ever been before. The
insurance companies, which are prac-
tically mutual benefit societies-especially
helpful to men of moderate means-rep-
resent Accommodations of capital which are
among the largest in this country. There
are more deposits in the savings banks.
more owners of farms, more well-paid
wage workers in this country now than
ever before in our history. OF course.
when the conditions have favored the
growth of so much that was good, they
have also favored somewhat the growth
of what was evil. 1t is eminently neces-
sary that we should endeavor to cut out
this evil, but let US keep a due sense of
proportion; let US not in fixing our gaze
upon the lesser evil forget the greater
good. The evils are real and some OF
them are menacing. but they are the
outgrowth, not of misery or decadence,
but of prosperity-of the progress of our
gigantic industrial development. This
Industrial development must not DC
checked, but side by side with 1t should
go such progressive regulation as will
diminish the evils. We should fail IN
our duty if we did not try to remedy the
evils, but we shall succeed only if we
proceed patiently, with practical common
sense as well as resolution, separating
the good from the bad and holding on tc
the former while endeavoring to get TIC
of the latter.
National Action to Control Trusts.
In my message to the present Congress
at it's first session l discussed at length
the question of the regulation OF those
big corporations commonly doing an in
terstate business, often with some ten
dency to monopoly, which are popularity
known as trusts. The experience of the
past year has emphasized. in my opin-
ion, the desirability of the steps ther
proposed. A fundamental base of civil
but this is in no wise inconsistent will
the right of society to regulate the ex-
ercise of the artificial powers which II
confers upon the owners of property. un-
der the name of corporate franchises. II
such a way as to prevent the misuse
of these powers. Corporations, and espe-
cially combinations of corporations
should be managed under public regula'
ton. Experience has shown that under
our system of government the necessary
supervision cannot be obtained by state
action. 1t must therefore be achieved
by national action. Our aim is not to d.
away with corporations; on the contrary
these big aggregations are an inevitable
development of modern industrialism, anC
the effort to destroy them would be futile
unless accomplished in ways that would
work the utmost mischief to the entir,
body polite. We can do nothing Of goot
in the way of regulating and supervising
these corporations until we fix clearly IL
our minds that we are not attacking tn,
corporations, but endeavoring to do ava,
with any evil in them. We are not hos
tile to them; We are merely determined
that they shall be so handled as to sub
serve the public good. We draw the lin,
against misconduct not against wealth
The capitalist who. alone or in conjunc
ton with his fellows. performs som,
great Industrial feat by which he win
money is welldoer, not a wrongdoer
legitimate lines. We wish to favor sucl
a man when he does well. We wish t,
supervise and control his actions only t,
prevent him from doing Ill. Publicit,
can do no harm to the honest corpora
ton; and we need not be overtende
about sparing the dishonest corpora ton
The Necessity for Care.
In curbing and regulating the combina
tons of capital which are or may becom
injurious to the public we must be careful
not to stop the great enterprises whicl
have legitimately reduced the cost of pro
duction, not to abandon the place whicl
our country has won in the leadership o
the international industrial world, not t
strike down wealth with the result O
closing factories and mines, of turnin;
the wage-worker idle in the streets an,
leaving the farmer without a market 70
what he grows. Insistence upon the i'm
possible means delay in achieving tn