Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1904-07-15
SPEECH OF TEMPORARY chairman WILLIAMS


/ contract and expand the country's cur
rency at his will, and illustrates this by
the occurrences which happened in 1902,
| which he quotes. Remember, he boasts
that this is a fact. If so, what mag
| nifcent one-man power it is.
| AS to the Republican platform, it Is
chiefly boast that the Republican party
| is responsible for rything good which
has happened.
i Not only is the boast that Mr.. McKin-
| ley's election was responsible for high
prices false, but it is a very dangerous
| falsehood! Some men preach the doctrine
with the hope that during periods Of
prosperity the average man will let even
an extravaganza and dishonest and I'M
| just government, in which he is interest
ed, continue uninterrupted This is the
chief, if not the sole, hope of the Re-
publican party.
The Republican platform declares that
the Republican party was responsible
for the relief Of Cuba and the war with
| Spain. 1t was not the "Miseries of
Cuba" but public demand, that led the
Republican party to fall in line. Demo
Gratis voted for the war measure as en-
! Enthusiastically as Republicans. Not the
Republican party, but the people of
America, fought the Quick, victorious
war with Spain"
| What have the Republicans to say for
themselves in connection with the great
trust question?
| This is the language of the platform:
Laws enacted by the Republican par
| ty, and which the Democratic party had
failed to enforce have been fear
lessly enforced"
| Here are three stateemnts, first, that
the Republicans, instead of both parties,
| enacted the laws, which is not true; sec
ondly, that the Democratic party had
done nothing, which is also not true; and,
| third, that the Republican party has en-
| forced the law, which is only partially
true.
Fight the Trusts.
Attorney General Harmon, under
| Cleveland's administration, found the suit
| of the governments against the Trans
| Missouri Freight Association lost, reviv-
| ed it and won it. He then instituted suit
| against the Joint Traffic Association and
also against the Addystone Pipe Com
| pany. The principle established in the
case Of the government against the
| Trans Missouri Freight Association-the
| principle there contended for by Cleye-
| lands Attorney Generals the principle
| which gave life to the proceedings in the
| Northern Securities case, and which led
Gov. Van SAINT, and not the Republican
| party, as has been falsely pretended, to
inaugurate that case.
| One of the chairmen of the Republ-
can convention says it has "enjoined the
beef trust" The injunction does not
seem to have had any practical effect
upon the beef trust or upon the price of
beefsteak
! The boast that the administration has
| executed the antitrust laws is ridicu-
| LOUIS The Attorney General in response
to resolution of my own, frankly con-
fessed that nothing had been done, and
| left the inference that nothing would be
| done, toward the criminal prosecution of
the men found guilty by the Supreme
Court in the Northern Securities case OF
having violated the law and incurred its
| penalties.
The Attorney General, in answer to
another resolution, failed to show that
anything substantial was being done,
civilly or criminally, against the anthra-
cite coal carrying railroads and anthra-
cite coal mine owners, constituting, in
violation of law, one of the greatest
trusts in this country, although a private
American citizen had proceeded at great
expense to get up the evidence
This same trust buster" Attorney
General Knox, has just been appointed
by the Governor of Pennsylvania a SEN
ator from that State, on the demand, so
the newspapers all say, Of the very men
who constitute this unlawful combina-
ton, or who are at any rate the presi-
dents Of the railroad companies and the
owners of the mines constituting it.
The Republican platform reads: Tar
if rates should be readjusted only when
conditions have SO changed that the pub
lie interest demands their alteration"
Public interest, in this connection, to
the man who wrote it, and the conven-
ton which adopted it, really means pro
tected interests"
Does not everybody who knows any
thing know that the Republican party
has no idea of making any alterations in
the tariff, unless they can thereby pur-
chase the support of additional special
interests, or tie to them already bought
special interests by yet closer bonds?
Are there no conditions demanding
changes in any of the schedules of the
present tariff law, when dozens of highly
protected steel and iron products, includ-
ing rails, locomotives, barbed wire and
agricultural implements of American
make are being sold daily in competi-
ton with the so-called pauper labor of
the world, in the home of this same pau
per labor? And when they are sold, af-
ter freight has been paid and profit OBJ
tanned. at a less price than tho samo
goods are sold to Americans in American
markets five miles from the factory?
The platform then goes on to say that
these alterations cannot be safely COM
mitted to any other hands than the Re
publican party" What has been the
matter with the hands Of the Republican