The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1904-03-18
THE KNOX INTERVIEW

The interview on the decision in the
Northern Securities case which Attor-
ney General Knox gave out for publ
cation on the day the decision was
rendered, promises to play an impor-
tant part in the presidential campaign.
Would it not have been better for the
administration, and for Mr.. Roosevelts
chances for being elected President, II
Mr.. Knox had not outlined the policy
of the administration in regard to the
prosecution of trusts? He is very
able lawyer, but is he a wise and dis
Greet adviser, such as a presidential
candidate needs to guide him through
the difficulties of campaign? Does he
know when TO talk and when to be ST.
lent?
OF course Mr.. Knox was expected 10
say something about the decision in
the merger case, but was it necessary
for him to say that il was rot the
purpose of the government to hunt Up
other violators of the antitrust law and
prosecute them? He did not say that
In so many words, but what he did say
practically amounted to that. He SAID
it was not necessary to give the "coun-
try assurances that the government
does not mean to run amuck, that is,
that it does not mean to attack every
corporation suspected of having vio-
lated the antitrust law.
The article in the New York Times
entitled LAS to Running Amuck,"
which Representative Williams of Mis-
sissippi, the minority leader of the
House, had read from the Speakers
desk on Wednesday closes as follows:
standing by itself the suit against
the Northern Securities Company,
pressed with so much ardor, will pass
for a theatrical campaign trick,
studied and carefully contrived device
of the Presidents to win the approval
and the votes of the anti-monopollsts
and the enemies of the corporations.
That charge will be brought against
him by every campaign speaker of the
opposition. He can meet it, he can
demonstrate his sincerity, he can
prove that he has been actuated sole
ly by sense of public duty, only by
continuing with unhinching courage
and unfagging zeal the work he has
so triumphantly begun. Only when
he can plant his feet upon the wreck
of fifty great railroad corporations will
his reputation as an honest, disinter-
ested and fearless executive be secure.
Does Theodore Roosevelt wish to have
it said that he has succumbed to the
threats or to the Establishments of
Wall street,"
In commenting on the article Mr..
Williams said it remained to be seen
whether the prosecution of the North
ern Securities Company was a theatre
cal campaign trick or the beginning
of a general policy "of Stacking cum
ming now, as strength and brute force
had been shackled in the past"
1t looks as if Mr. Knox, in his effort to
assure the trusts that are violating the
antitrust law that they are in no dam
ger of immediate prosecution-that, in
fact, there was no reason why they
should be hostile to Mr.. Roosevelt--had
done his chief an irreparable injury.
The country is likely to see the situa-
ton as the Times presents it, namely,
that if the President pursues vigor-
ously the policy inaugurated with the
beginning of the suit against the
Northern Securities Company he will
have the influence of the trusts and
the whole money power against him
in his campaign for President, and If
he abandons that policy, as Mr.. Knox
intimated he would, the impression
will go abroad that the Northern Sc
curities case was begun with the idea
of making a grand stand play and of
winning popularity with the masses,
but with no intention of carrying on
the war against them until they were
destroyed. In other words, it will ap-
pear that the President aimed to sat-
isfy the antitrust sentiment that lac
was against trusts and at the same
time sought to retain the support of
the trusts.
If Mr.. Knox intended to aid the
President in his campaign by his in
terview he made mistake. If he had
contented himself with simply saying
he was satisfied with the decision he
would have come much nearer accom-
plishing that object.