The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-03-18

several combinations of railway sys-
tens grow fewer their separate mile
age greater Each year the beef trust
narrows its combination. The steel trust
freezes out the smaller in favor of the
larger stockholder- Each year the
Standard Oil brushes more and more
process of consolidation and combina-
ton, resistless as the movement of
glacier. overwhelming in its pathway
all rivalry and competition, approaches
under existing conditions the day of the
universal trust when all competition
and all production shall be within the
control Of an easily named and identi-
fed gang of highWayruen,s who have
won their way to power by the same
methods as an Attila, Caeser and Ma
poleon.
Thirty years ago John D. RockefeI-
Ter was struggling to save his financial
scalp. borrowing money and worth per-
haps 500, 600. Two years ago he testi-
fed in law suit in New York City that
he did not know within ten million dol
lars what his annual income was. Think
of it, You and can tell within ten
dollars of what ours was; but here is a
man that within the life OF a single
generation. by the methods of the trust
has wrung from the people Of the Uni
ted States fortune so vast that hescan
not compute his annual income within
ten million dollars. Given the. continued
progress of this trust. the beef trust,
the steel trust and all the other colossal
vampires to prey upon the public at
the end of another generation how
much of the wealth of the nation viii
be outside their possession.
within the past two years the pub
lie has begun to awaken to the signifi-
canoe of the trust movement. Within
the past three months Kansas has ia
ken the lead in an effort to confront and
externinate them. It is fitting that this
new revolution should come from KAN
sas. 1t was on Kansas soil that the
dragons teeth were sown, whose har-
vest was a million armed men. 1t was
on Kansas soil that the seed was sovVn
whose flower was human liberty and its
fruit the Fifteenth Amendment. 1t was
Kansas that gave to the War of the Re-
bellion more soldiers than it had citi-
zens. Kansas cares not for precedent
or formulas or shibboleths; it is not de-
TERED by epithets, nor awed by phrases.
It knows that the true anarchists are
Rockefeller and Armour and Swift. who
diSobey and disregard and trample un-
der foot all law in the accomplishment
of their desires.
kansas knows that it is entering
upon no ninety-day campaign but is en-
listed for the war. In that war no legfti-
mate property interests will suffer; no
legitimate business will be harmed; no
legitimate exercise of corporate rights
or franchises will be disturbed. We
know how great the power that con-
fronts US; we know that hitherto legis-.
latures and courts have failed to curb
the insolences and exactions of these
trusts, but still we do not believe that
the last word has been said on the sub
ject. We are confident that within the
limit of Republican institutions and be-
meath the aegis of constitutional law
may be found a, remedy for the wrongs
inflicted and a curb for the power that
in1icts them. Where there are no pre-
cedents, we will make them. Where
none have gone before, we will blaze
the way. Where the last legislature
paused there the next one shall begin
iG rn w
embarked upon. 1t is war, real wal
We have not entered upon it lightly but
with the solemn determination that ev-
cry force and power of a sovereign state
shall be spent and exhausted to the last
atom before we yield, before we signify
our subservience to this Industrial
slavery that threatens the dissolution Of
the Republic the determination of all
liberty save its empty forms.
THE revolution had its Lexington, its
Valley Forge and its Yorktown This
Kansas revolution against the trust has
had it's Lexington: it's reverberations
have been heard around the world. 1t
will have its Valley Forge; its hours of
doubt and darkness and disaster and
failure; it will have its defeats unques-
tionably, but the spirit of Kansas can
not fail This is not war Of the pro-
ducer alone, because the trust robs both
the consumer and the producer, and in
this struggle, beside the handful of oil
producers in the Third district, you
consumers of Kansas, all the wealth
and sinews of a great and prosperous
commonwealth.
BE brave and be fair. Show the
consumer that your fight is his; that
you are fighting for a. better price for
your oil and a lower price for the con-
sumner. Prove that all you ask, that all
you demand of the trust, is the right to
live; a square deal for the producer and
consumer alike. Back of you is an over
whelming public sentiment that needs
but to be organized and directed by wise
heads to win.
For myself I am proud of the hum
bic part L have played in the opening
battle of this struggle. and I pledge
you this, that here and now I conse-
crate the remainder of my official life,
be it long or short, whatever experience
l have gained, whatever talent and en-
ergy God has given me, to this most
sacred cause