The daily morning journal and courier., 1903-04-04

During the Last Eighteen Months to
 Solve the Trust Probiem-A substan-
 tiaI Achievement.
 Milwaukee. Wis. April S.-President Roosevelt was the guest of the Mill waukee Merchants and Manufacturers association at banquet at the Plank inton house tonight, the occasion be- ing the climax of the presidents ten hours visit to Milwaukee. Covers were laid for 530 banquetters.
 The president sat in the center of a 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 associ- ation and toastmaster of the occasion, was seated at his left. The president spoke in part as follows:
 After quoting from speeches made at the Minnesota state fair and at Cincin- natl and from one of his messages to congress he says:
 Many of the great packing house con- cerns were shown to be in combination with each other and with most of the great railway lines, whereby they en- joyed large secret concessions in rates and thus obtained practical monopo- ly of the fresh and cured meat industry of the country. These fusions, though volative of the statute, had prevailed unchecked for so many years that they had become intrenched in and inter woven with the commercial life of cer- tain large distributing localities; al- though this was of course at the ex- pense of the vast body of law abiding merchants, the general public and par ticularly of unfavored localities.
 Under those circumstances it was a serious problem to determine the wise course to follow in vitalizing law which had in part become obsolete or proved incapable of enforcement. Of what the attorney general did in enforc- ing it I shall speak later. The decisions of the courts upon the law had betrayed Gl1il iillpClIC1llollSs oplIiC UL them so serious as to render abortive efforts to apply any effective remedy for tn existing evils.
 It is clear that corporations created for quasi public purposes. clothed for that reason with the. ultimate power of the state to take private property against the will of the owner, hold their corporate powers as carriers in trust for the fairly impartial service of all the! public. Favoritism in the use of such powers, unjustly enriching some and unjustly impoverishing others, dis eliminating in favor of some places and against others, is palpably violative of plain principles of justice. Such a prac- tice unchecked Is hurtful in many ways, Congress, having had it's atten- tion drawn to, the matter, enacted a most important anti-rebate law, which greatly strengthens the interstate com merce law. This new law prohibits, under adequate penalties, the giving and as we'll the demanding or receiving of such preferences, and provides the preventive remedy of injunction. The vigorous administration of this law, and 1t will be enforced, will. it is hoped, afford a substantial remedy for certain trust evils which have attracted public attention and have created public un- rest.
 This law represents a noteworthy and important advance toward just and ef- fective regulation of transportation Moreover, it's passage has been supple mented by the enactment of law to expedite the hearing of actions of pub lie moment under the anti trust act, known as the Sherman law, and under the act to regulate commerce, at the request of the attorney general; and, furthermore, additional funds have been appropriated to be expended under the enforcement of these laws.
 All of this represents, a great and substantial advance in legislation. But more important even than legislation Is the administration of the law, and ask your attention for moment to the way in which the law has been admin istered by the profound jurist and fear less public servant who now occupies the position of attorney general, MT. Knox. The constitution enjoins upon the president that he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed, and under this provision the attorney general formulated a policy which was in effect nothing but the rigid enforce ment, by suits managed with consum- mate skill and ability, both of the anti trust law and of the imperfect provis- ions of the act to regulate commerce. The first step taken was the prosecution of fourteen suits against the principal railroads of the middle west, restraining them by injunction from further viola tions of either of the laws in question. About the same time the case against the Northern Securities company was initiated. This was a corporation or ganized under the laws of the state of New Jersey with capital of $400, ,0O0, 900, the alleged purpose being to control the Great Northern and the Northern Pa- cific Railroad companies, two parallel and competing lines extending across the northern tier of states from the Mississippi river to the Pacific ocean. Whatever the purpose its consummation would have resulted in the control of the two great railway systems upon which the people of the northwestern states were so largely dependent for their supplies and to get their products to market being practically merged into the New Jersey corporation. The prop osition that these independent systems of railroads should be merged under a sipola ooY+rol a Io rr,, ad tIa peonIa oP &lo