The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-02-15
ANTI TRUST BILLS
ARE ATTACKED BY
CROSSCUP
He Declares the Measures
Before Congress Miss the
Mark Entirely Corporate
Conditions May Lead to
Triumphant Socialism.

ANN ARBOR, Mlch., FEB. 14.-Judge
Peter S. Grosscup of the United States
circuit court of Chicago, dean Of the
Northwestern university law school,
lectured before the University Of Mich
1gan Good Government club tonight
on the subject of the New Nation"
He said
In the very nature of things we
must expect that men who do not see
their way clear to an Improvement OF
their condition under the old forms Of
industrial liberty will entertain sympa-
thy for system that promises some
! thing new. The separation of labor
| from proprietorship-the separate mo-
bilization of these tive forces as ene-
mics, instead Of their commingling in
common interests the most unrepub-
lican and menacing fact that now con-
fronts the American people,
THE consolidation idea has thus far
accentuated this menace 1t has done
what is still more menacing. In mar
rowing the personnel of the proprietor
ship OF the country it is detaching
| from the friends of property the great
liberal body Of citizenship However
we may wish 1t, this old time consery-
ative force will not thus isolated re-
| main stationary.
Make Socialism Invincible.
1T will swing in time to those whose
attitude is already opposed to the in
stitution of property and in this move
ment would give to socialism allies
that would make socialism invincible.
Could the old idea stand UP against an
alliance such as that? Will the great
body of the people excluded from par
tc1pation in the property of the coun-
try remain loyal to the order Of things
to which property must look to it's bull
Warks? Can we expect a bystander to
have the interest of one who has a
stake IN events? Can we invoke the
name OF America in an order of events
that in their practical outcome are es-
sentially un-American, unrepublican?
Our first duty is to wake up to the
realities of the situation and our next
to put forces Of industrial freedom into
operation. Not until we have done
these, not until the time when the
property acquiring instinct of the
country is again unified upon a basis
fair alike to ALL can we rest assured
that the outcome of the encounter need
be no longer feared. But what
policy will lead to the populariz-
ing of the proprietorship Of the coun-
try? Will the people under any condi-
t1ons to any large extent enter the field
of corporate ownership?
Bills in Congress No Good.
'"The measures before congress make
no change in the basis Of corporate
organization nor do they provide
agains over capitalization. They serve
no purpose-at least no controlling
"a
of the country. The publicity propos-.
ed is confined to the gathering and
publication Of statistics, valuable pos.
sibly to the speculator or the trained
investor, but ineffective or-worthless to
the ordinary man who may be seeking
ownership. What chiefly is needed
the intervention of 60 arnment as
trustee, not as a mere gatherer Of sta
tistics, a guaranty that when a cor
poration is created its creator has
seen to it that it is a fair organiza-
ton, not mere statistics of haphazard
corporate organization, that the people
cannot comprehend-is absent from
the bills.
I'm short, the measures pending miss
sight of the prime mischief to be rem
edied and thus running astray miss
the remedies to be adopted. But though
we cannot expect adequate legislation
now, it will come. The public mind is.
forming. Unless l am greatly deceived
the mad-dog policy of treating corpora
tions proposed by some will be reject
ed. The American people will not in
blind fury pull down about them the
industrial edifice. But any policy call
culated to merely temporize will with
equal conclusiveness be rejected
Calls 1t Masquerade.
There will be no room when the
public mind is made up for the diver
sions of the present masquerade. And
the public mind will in the end be made
up. The people Of the United States
will in time come face to face with the
full significance of the situation on
which they are entering. Side issues
that now obscure will then clear up
and sordid interests that now obstruct
will be brushed aside and 1t will be
made plain that but for some far
reaching reconstruction of our cor
porate policy we are on our way either
to socialism or to a form of govern
ment no longer republican. Then will
come about a determined public will
to set our house in order, to re-estab-
lish on the secure foundations of pop
ular proprietorship and industrial lib
erty the property interests of the re-
public, to restore those ideals into the
depths Of whose armament the people
of America have always looked and
look now for lights to g1lide thpm''