The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-11-06
A HALT is CALLED.

Announcements from Washington
that President Roosevelt has decided
to refrain in his forthcoming message
to congress from any extended discus
sion of the trust question are beyond
doubt founded upon fact. The presi-
dents conclusion probably commends
itself to him as at once good sense and
good politics; but where does it leave
him as to honesty and consistency?
The presidents record with reference
to the trust question is a very curious
one. Were not the memories of the
American people the shortest in the
world, it would be matter today for
study and amusement for every citizen.
Perceiving that the public mind was
greatly agitated and alarmed by the
appearance of numerous great aggre-
cations of capital engaged in business
enterprises, the president, with char
acteristic impetuosity, rushed into the
field. He declared that the trust must
be smashed, but he did not go much
farther than that.
When the president was on his tour
of the country a few months ago, and
before that time, in many of his public
speeches, he made two and only two
announcements in the least bit definite
about the trust question. One was that
the country in dealing with it must
distinguish carefully between good
he said, were legitimate and really an
aid to business, while others were
odious and dangerous monopolies. The
one We must crush, while with the
other we did not need to interfere. His
second statement was that, in his judg-
ment, an amendment ought to be added
to the federal constitution giving to
congress the power to control and reg
ulate the trusts.
Out of neither of these declarations
has anything practical come, and the
second of them at least the president
will not reiterate at this time. He prob
ably sees clearly enough the dangers of
any such unheard-of Capitalization of
power as comforting upon congress the
right to regulate the minutest details
of all business enterprises. With an
election only year ahead, he has no
appetite for definite declarations of
policy. Earlier in the game the trust
question was a splendid theme for
commencing himself to the people and
raising hurrah that would tend to his
denomination. With business in it's
present condition and the country in
temper by no means serene, he has
decided to call halt.
A part of this change of base is due
to the advice of his associates In the
cabinet, and still more to the Republic
an party leaders. They have sensed
the disaster that the persistence of ill
advised action has already brought
upon them. He has done nothing to
bring to book any of the combinations
that exert real control over business
enterprises and affect the markets and
the prices of the commodities that are
necessary to life. Not move has been
made to interfere with one of them.
The only action of the government that
has been positive, well advertised and
notorious is an attack upon the legiti-
mate corporate interests that have not
been depressing the people; that can,
on the contrary, show great record of
economies effected and public charges
reduced; and that can never create or
constitute monopoly, because they
are forever subject, under the laws and