The Corvallis times. (Corvallis, Or.) 1888-1909, 1904-02-03
CITIZENS ARTICLE.

CITIZENS ARTICLE.
It is About Trusts-A Remedy Sug-
gested-The Evil Growing.
For sometime past various news
papers have been sgitating the
trust" question. Especially has
this been.the case during our po.
litical campaigns, and not only has
it been discussed through the press
but has been general subject for
street-corner debates. In fact, it is
fast becoming one of the most i'm
portant questions, not only of po-
litics, but of the people generally.
The time has come for something
to be done to stop the giant COM
binations OF capital called trusts.
the object of which is, in most
cases, to gain power enough to con,
troll a certain article ofmanufacture
or production, thereby giving to
the corporation or trust absolute
power to regu' ate the prices of ar.
ticles manufactured by it or that
it may wishto buy from the pro-
ductr.
! While it is absolutely necessary
to form companies and unite GER
tain amount of capital for the pur-
4 pose of conducting many maou-
!. facturing aud business enterprises
it certainly is neither necessary aor
right for few men who own or
control millions of dollars to unite
that vast amount of wealth in a
trust for the purpose of forcing
, smaller and less wealthy compan-
les out of business And yet that
is what they are doing right along.
Take the Standard Oil Co. for ex-
, ample. They are Immensely
wea thy, own or control the princi-
, pal oil wells in the United States,
and regulate the price of ccal oil.
They manufacture a great many
by-products from petroleum,-gas-
oline, benzine. parafne, vasoline,
etc, and the revenue from these by
products more than pays for the
production of themselves and the
;. coal oil as wsll. Therefore the oil
, costs them nothing consequently
} they can sell it at very low prics
and still make money On it. Now
suppose some smaller company
| puts out oil to compete with the
| product of the Standard Oil Co.
and succeeds in establishing a
Q market for their oil. what does the
| Standard Oil Co. do? Put the
Q price of coal oil below what the
D other company can make it for and
keep it there until they fleece. "
out their opposition aud then run
1.-THE price up higher than it was be-
fore to make .ba,k what they lost
while ''freezihg" out the other COM
pany,
And 70 it is all down along the
, line. There is the billion-dollar
steel trust, controlling the iron and
steel market; the food tru-t, which
: practically controls prepared foods;
the beef trust for canned meats;
; bicycle trust. which is doing all in
! its power to gain control of all the
,, leading bicycle factories; the plow
trust; camera trust, rubber tru.t,
l. and many other, each controlling
or trying to control its particula,
product throughout the entire coun'
: try.
: Now the questions naturally arise
do we want the trust monopoly!
And if n not,,how can it be prevent
: ed or at least. regulated? 1t is al
o most impossible to make laws thai
e will prevent the forming of trusts
: or even place any restriction or
u them. Then the best and perhaps The
: only way to accomplish any results
= is for the people to take the matter
/ iu haod and every one refuse
u to buy or use any article of trus
% manufacture or production when
l. ever they can possibly do 30, there
e by giving support to the independ
10 ent manufactures. If every per
J. son in the United States had beer
doing this for the past ten years
Il we would have fewer trusts, NOR
y independent manufacturing estat
l. lishments. better prices. and bette
=, times today. On the other hane
e' if they are allowed to continue a
y in the past few years, it will I
~ but very short time until a CON
90 paratively few men will own an
ne control the entire manufacturin
% resources of the American contir
20 ent.
or X.
res