The Grit-advocate., 1905-05-12
Not Cure All Evils.

NoA So'S ~ IN''S.
Now fix clearly in your minds two
| facts at the outset. AS with every
thing else mundane when you get that
supervisory and regulatory power on
behalf of the nation you will not have
cured all the evils that existed. and
you will not equal the expectations of
the amiable but illregulated enthusi-
asst who thinks that you will have
cured all those evils. A measure OF
good will come. some good will be
done, some injustice will have been
prevented. but we shall be long way
from the millennium. Get that fact
clear in your minds or you will be lay
| ing up for yourselves store of meal
culable disappointment in the future.
That is the first thing.
Now the second and even the more
important: when you give a nation
that power remember that harm and
not good will come from the giving 1t
| unless you give it with the firm deter
mination not only to get justice for
yourselves but to do justice to others
that you will be as jealous to do JUS
/ tice to the railroads as to exact JUS
tice from them. CHEERS and ap-
plause.)
I'VE cannot afford in any shape or
way in this country to encourage
feeling which would do injustice to n
man Of property any more than we
would submit to injustice from a man
of property. Whether the man owns
the biggest railroad or the greatest
outside corporation in the land, or
whether he makes each days bread by
the sweat of that days toll, he is en-
titled to justice and fair dealing, to no
more and TO no less. CHEERS and ap-
plause.) A spirit of envy on the part
of those less well of against the better
off is as bad and no worse than n
spirit of arrogant disregard for the
rights Of the man of small means on the
part of the man of large means. The
arrogance and the envy are not two diff
ferent qualities, they are the same
quality shown by men under different
circumstances.
Would Bring Harm.
Eve must make up our minds that
nothing but harm will come from any
scheme to exercise such supervision as
that advocate over corporations, and
especially the common carriers, un-
less we have 1t clearly fixed in our
minds that the scheme Is to be one of
substantial justice alike to the com
mon carrier and to the public. CAD
plause) II l have the appointment or
retention Of my commission and power
to administer a law of such increased
powers shall neither appoint nor re-
tain the man who would fall to do JUS
tice to the railroad any more than |
would appoint or retain the men who
would fail to exact justice from the
railroad. I want that understood as a
preliminary, that is. if / have the ap-
pointment Of any of those men or their
retention, they will give a square deal
all around or else there shrift will be
short. But with that statement as
preliminary, wish to urge with all the
earnestness | possess not only upon
the public. but upon those interested in
the great railway corporations the alb
soute need of acquiescence in the en-
actment of such law. AS has been
we'll set forth by the attorney general.
Mr.. Moody, in his recent mastery
argument presented to the committee
of the Senate which is investigating
the matter, the legislators have the
right, and, as | believe, the duty of CON
1erring those powers upon some execu.
tive body. It cannot confer them upon
any court, nor can ii take away the
courts power to interfere if the law is
administered in way that amounts to
confiscation of property.
The Great Corporations.
"Of course it would be possible to