New-York tribune., 1905-08-12
THE PRESIDENT AT CBAUTAUoUA

President ROoseyelts Chautauqua speech deals
with two main features of his present policy.
The attitude taken by the administration in
Santo Domingo has still TO be approved by the
Senate. Its programme for regulating railroad
rates and asserting fuller federal control over
interstate commerce has still 10 be indorsed by
Congress-. Properly and helpfuly then, the
President continues to present the argumnts
and motives which have impeled him to sanction
a friendly recelvership in Santo Domingo and
TO urge legislation ending railroad rate abuses
and freeing trade from the restraints put upon
ii by lawless trusts and combinations.
AS TO Santo Domingo, 1t is hard to see how
any one can dissent from the Presidents con-
clusions. His Interpretation OF the Monroe Doc
trine and of our duties under II is clear and
logical. We cannot assert that doctrine and
then seek by casuistry to avoid its
quences. We guarantee the republics south of
us against territorial spOliation. We have an
nounced our purpose to protect them from Euro
pean aggression. But cannot undertake TO
absolve them from all accountability for their
conduct. If they drawn into conflicts with
European states and we deny these European
states the right TO territorial indemnification
for torts committed, we must see to it that some
other mode of settlement is supplied We must
pay price for the right 10 say TO Europe that
the Americas no longer open to colonization
or conquest. We must insist that our southern
neghbOrs square their accounts with Europe
honOrably and in good faith. For the protec
ton which these southern republics accept from
us they too, are bound TO pay price; and that
price is the acknowledgment of their duty TO
settle their disputes with Europe on basis
which is fair and equitable.
If. then we are appealed 10 by southern
republic TO adjust its foreign Indebtedness
resort to pacific blockades' and a seizure Of
customs and custom houses. we are only doing
the rational and neighborly thing in instituting
q friendly receivership. From this point of view
the President rightly defends his policy in Santo
Domingo in the highest sense humane and
charitable and patriotic.
His attitude toward trust and railroad abuses
the President justifies with equally cogent argu-
ments. His purpose has been TO strike at evi-
dent evils and 10 expose actual wrongdOers.
Much fervent denunciation has been heaped on
combinations such. But combination as an
economic principle has come to stay, and we
must get accustomed TO its consequences. As
the President well puts it:
The effort to prevent all restraint OF competi-
tion whether harmful enefcial. has been i'll
judged; what is needed is not much the effort
TO prevent combination as a vigilant and ef-
fective control Of the combinations formed so
as secure just and equitable dealings on their
part alike toward the public generally, toward
their smaller competitors and toward the wage
workers they employ.
What the President wants to obtain is 1.-The
square deal for everybody" The impatience
with which he speaks of the spirit of lawless-
ness and greed which rules in some of our
| trusts to-day is fully shared by the American
| public. That spirit is a menace 10 the stability
OF our institutions, for, the President says,
| it is awakening a feeling Of injustice which
may lead 10 drastic and i'll considered legsla-
| tion. Stricter supervision of the activities of
| all corporations engaged in interstate commerce
| is the remedy which he would apply; and that
remedy seems the only practicable and
| logical one. The President will find the great
body Of the people sustaining him in the poll
| cies which he has made his own and which he
is soon TO urge on the attention of Congress-