Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1903-04-04
Makes a Powerful Speech at
Milwaukee on Trusts. )"
Tremendous Crowd AppIauds Utter
ances Of Chief Executive.
Speech Earlier in Day to Wisconsin
Legislature Members.

Association at a banquet at the Plank
inton House. tonight, the occasion be-
ing the climax of the Presidents 10
hour visit to Milwaukee. Covers were
laid for $50 banqueters. A corps of
skilled decorators had worked out a
complete transformation of the ban
quet room, which was fairly canopied
with Alabama smilaX, which, spreading
from II chandeliers, radiated in grace
full arches to all parts of the room.
Lines of asparagus lines trailed from
chandelier to chandelier, supporting at
regular intervals fern balls covered
with American beauty roses, carnations
and other beautiful blossoms. A thou
sand electric lights lent beauty to the
room.
The President sat in the center of
long table with other guests of honor.
At his immediate right was United
States Senator Quarles, while E. A.
WadhamS, president of the Milwaukee
Merchants and Manufacturers Associa-
ton and POSTMASTER of the occasion,
was seated at his left. Extending in
opposite directions from the President
table were IL other tables, at which
the members of the association and
their friends are seated.
After the banquet had been served,
Toastmaster Wadhams introduced
President Roosevelt, who responded to
the toast, 1.-THE President of the United
States
The President took occasion to give
his views on the subject of TRUSTS"
The President spoke as follows:
Mr. Toastmaster,
Gentlemeh Today I wish to speak to
regulation of those great corporations
which are popularity, although rather
vasheIy, known as trusts dealing mostly
with what has actually been ACCOMPLISHED
in the way of legislation and in the way of
enforcement of legislation during the
past eighteen months, the period covering
the two sessions of the F'ifty-seventh
Congress. At the outset / shall ask you
to remember that l do not approach the
subject either from the standpoint OF
those who speak of themselves as anti
trust or anti-corporation people, nor yet
from the standpoint of those who are
fond OF denying the existence of evils in
tue trusts, or who apparently proceed up
on the assumption that If corporation
Is large enough it can do no wrong.
L think L speak for the great ma jority
OF the American people when / say that
we are not In the least against wealth as
that we merely desire to see any abuse of
corporate or combined wealth corrected
and remedied; that we do not desire the
abolition or destruction of big corpora
tons, but, on the contrary, recognize them
as being In many cases efficient economic
instruments, the results of an inevitable
process of economic evolution, and only
desire to see them regulated and con
trolled so far as may be necessary to sub
serve the public good. We should be
false to the historic principles of our Gov
eminent If we discriminate, either by
"a ri ittis .tt,nt
against man because Of either his wealth
or his poverty. There Is no proper place
in our society either for the rich man who
uses the power conferred by his riches to
enable him to Cypress and wrong his
neiShbors nor yet for the demagogic agi-
tator who, instead of attacking abuses as
all abuses should be attacked wherever
found, attacks property, attacks prosperi-
ty. attacks men of wealth, as such,
whether they be good or bad, attacks cor
porations whether they do well or i'll, and
seeks, in a spirit of ignorant rancor, to
overthrow the very foundation upon which
rests our national well-being.
. In consequence of the extraordinary
industrial changes Of the last half century,
and notably of the last two or three dec
AIDES, changes due mainly. to the rapidity
and complexity of our industrial growth,
we are confronted with problems which
in their present shape were unknown to
our, forefathers. Our great prosperity.
with it's accompanying concentration of
population and of wealth. it's extreme
specialization of faculties, and its devel-
opment of giant Industrial leaders, has
brought much good and some evil, and ii
is as foolish to ignore the good as will
fully to Hind ourselves to the evil.
The evil has been partly the inevitable
accompaniment of the social changes, and
where this is the case it can be cured
neither by law nor by the administration
of the law. the only remedy, lying in the
slow change of character and of economic
environment But for a portion of the
evil, at least, we think that remedies can
be found. We know well the danger of
false remedies, and we are against all
violent, radical, and unwise change. But
we believe that by proceeding slowly, yet
resoIUtely, with good sense and modera-
not to be swerved from our course either
by foolish clamor or by any base or sin
lister influence, we can accomplish much
fer the betterment of conditions
Nearly two years ago, speaking at the
State Fair in Minnesota. / said:
1T is probably true that the large ma
jority of the fortunes that now exist IN
this country have been amassed, not by
iniuring our people, but as an incident to
the comforting Of great benefits upon the
and this, no matter what may
have been the conscious purpose OF those
them. There is but the scanti-
est Justification for most of the cutlery
against the men of wealth as such; and it
ought to be unnecessary to state that any
appeal which directly or indirectly leads
to suspicion and hatred among ourselves.
which tends to limit opportunity, and
therefore to shut the door of success
against poor men of talent. and, finally,
which entails the possibility of lawless-
ness and violence. is an attack upon the
properties of American citi-
Our interests are at bottom
common. in the long run we go up or go
down together. Yet more and more it is
evident that the State, and if necessary
the Nation, has got to possess the right
Of supervision, and control as regards the
great corporations which are its creatures.
particularly as regards the great business
which derive a portion of
their Importance from the existence OF
some monopolstic tendency. The right !
should be exercised with caution and self
restraint; but it should exist, so that it |
may be invoked if the need arises.
Last fall in speaking at Cincinnati I
said
1.-The necessary supervision and con |
troll, in which firmly believe as the only |
method of eliminating the real evils of |
he trusts must come through wisely and |
framed legislation, which shall |
him in the first place to give definite con- I
.rol to some sovereign over the great cor /
porations, and which shall be followed, /
when once this power has been conferred i
BY a system giving to the Government
he full knowledge which is the essential
1or satisfactory action. Then. when this
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