Bisbee daily review., 1905-04-29

ly to Protect the - Nec Er~@n Cor
 poratiOn Imposition-TI'- ,sy7lefieId Measure Recalled.
 The following from The COmmoner proves the iRsincerity of the Republic an party in it's assumed role of trust buster:
 A Montgomery (Ala) reader writes: Do you consider the Esch-Townsend bill as a record maker for those who voted for the measure? If the vote in the lower house was sincere, then we may reasonably expect Mir. Depew to support 1t in the senate. I would be glad if you would expose some of the inconsistency of the vote in the lower house."
 While the Esch- Townsend bill was not exactly what the friends of reform preferred, it was a move in the right direction. and. so far as individual members were concerned. it was q record maker" But the failure of the Republican senate to pass the measure places responsibility upon the Eepub- lican party. It has been claimed by many Washington correspondents. and by many men in public life that had there been any probability that the sen ate would pass the Esch-Townsend bill many of the Republican members of the lower house whose votes were recorded in favor of that measure would have found some excuse for de feating it.
 President Roosevelt may recommend measures designed for the public inter ests and one branch of congress may adopt those recommendations. but the people. being interested in results. will judge the party by the legislation actu- ally accomplished and the reforms ac- tually established. The failure of the senate to give the people relief from railroad imposition places the responsi- billty upon the Republican party, and that party will not be relieved of ac- countablity before the people on the plea that some of the reforms desired by the people were recommended by the president and concurred in by one branch of the congress.
 This is not the first time the Repub- lican party has sought to make rec ord through the action of one branch of congress under the pretense of respond ing to public sentiment. At the begin ming of the Fifty-seventh congress. which met in December. 1903, it was said that the administration had deter mined upon an antitrust campaign and | that Mir Littlefield of Maine had been selected to lead the fight against mo nopoly MT. Littlefield seems to have been in earnest. for he prepared bill which Attorney General Knox and oth- CT Republican leaders concluded was entirely too drastic" The bill was amended. and among the amendments was the provision that 1t should affect only corporations hereafter organized. leaving the existing trusts to continue their depredations. The Littlefield bill passed the house by unanimous vote Feb. 6. The Democrats were not per mitted to amend the measure They voted for it, not because it exactly suited them, but because 1t was a step in the right direction.
 When the bill went to the senate it MQS ItAtAICu lO held it until the Democratic members of the committee. together with a ml- nority of the Republican members. re- ported the bill over a protest of the majority of the Republican members of the committee By the same vote the committee added an amendment making the bill to apply to existing corporations as well as to future ones.
 But when Senator Blackburn, acting Hnder instructions from the Democrat ic caucus, moved to take the bill up for consideration in the senate only two Republicans voted with the Democrats to consider the measure.
 In dispatch to the Chicago Record Herald under date of Washington, Feb. II, William F. Curtis said that NIr. Littlefeld was surprised to learn that he could not expect any encourage ment from Mir. Roosevelt in the effort to push the Littlefield antitrust bill through the senate.
 The Littlefield measure failed of pas sage in the senate, just as the Esch- Townsend bill failed In the latter case history repeated itself.
 In an address delivered before the graduating class of the Albany Law school June 1 David J. Brewer. asso- ciate justice of the United States su- preme sourt, said, Senators and rep resentatives have owed their places to corporate influence. and that influence has been exerted under an expectation. if not an understanding, that as law makers the corporate interests shall be Subserved."
 It is not likely that senators who owe their official places to corporations will do anything to protect the people from corporation imposition. But it is the duty of men who profess to serve the people and who publicly champion measures designed for the peoples re- lief to exert every possible effort for the accomplishment of practical re- suits.
 r-t.-