Perth Amboy evening news., 1906-09-17
W. j. BRYAN ON
CUBAN AFFAIRS
Holds That Fifty Per Cent, Out
put Forms a Trust Statement
TO Iron Trade Review.

ROANOKE, Va, Sept. T.-Wllilah
Jennings Bryan last night gave thu
first expression he has made on th'
present Cuban situation. When inter
I.viewed in his car just before lie lei
, here for Lynchburg and asked II Ut
would say anything about the sltuatiol
in Cuba and whether in his opinion iht
United States should intervene MI
Bryan dictated the following state
ment:
81 am very glad that the adminlstra'
ton recalled the troops landed at Ha-
vana. While we should do all i'll our
power to bring about peace by oller-
inc the good offices of our country, we
have no business interfering with their
local affairs. They must settle the DIS
putes anon themselves, but | Would
be glad if both parties would be willing
| TO accept mediation with the idea of
bringing about an agreement through
| the good offices of our government"
Mr.. Bryan, with his wife, left ut z
D. m. for Raleigh, N. c., via Lynch
burg and Greensboro. He will speak
at Raleigh, Durham, Burlington and
Greensboro today and at Kernersville,
Winston, High Point, Lexington, Sails
bury, Concord and Charlotte tomorrow.
He will speak at Columbia, S. c., on
Wednesday.
The Iron Trade Review obtained
from William j. Bryan a more definite
statement of his position in regard to
the so called trusts. In a letter to Mr..
Bryan, George Smart, the editor Of
that paper, said:
SIN your recent address at Madison
Square Garden, New York, you de-
fined a trust to be amy corporation
which controls so much of the product
of any article that it can fix the terms
and conditions of sale Later in your
address you say, 1T is far easier to
prevent a monopoly than to watch it
and to punish it, and this prevention
can be accomplished in a practical way
by refusing a license to any corpora
ton which controls. more than d Ger.
tain portion of the total product, this
proportion to be arbitrarily fixed ut a
DOllit NlItd VIII SlNC lINC ODNl IN "
competition
eff you consider the percentage too
large, to what extent would you COM
pei the corporation to sell or disman-
tie its plants SO that it will not be Il
trust?"
as follows:
"Your favor at hand. / thank you
for the information given in regard to
the steel trust. / note that in some
cases it controls more than half of the
product ana in some cases less. l am
not prepared to state just how much
a proportion a corporation can control
without becoming Il trust in the sense
that it limits competition, and compe-
tition controls the price and terms OF
sale. For the conduct of my own pa
per | draw the line at 80 per cent and
do not accept an advertisement of a
corporation controlling more than 80
per cent of the prodnct in which it
deals. l have only been c%ontending
for a principle. The details are less
important, as they can be determined
according to experience and expert
ment. l an inclined to believe, how
ever, that the steel trust controls more
of the product than it is good for the
American people that one corporation
should.
"In saying that a corporation should
not be licensed when it controls
enough to eliminate competition | do
not mean to say that the individual in
dustries that are under one manage
ment should be destroyed. The cor
poration should simply be compelled to
reduce its factories until its production
is in the limit fixed by the law"