Perth Amboy evening news., 1906-04-09
CORPORATIONS
Are Victims of
Malpractice
BY United States Judge PETER S. GRosscUP

lgEEy HE great difficulty in the industrial life of America is not
the existence of the thing we call the corporation. THE
"a CORPORATION ITSELF HAS NO SIN. Being but
the elaboration of that first incorporation formed by two
men stalking their combined wealth for a common cause, it
is the potential agency not only for converging the strength of many
men TO A COMMON PURPOSE, but also of preserving to the
individual his share and pride in the development of his countrys
industries and power. Why have we been legBlating against the SO
called trusts for fourteen years WITHOUT DESTROYING A
SINGLE TRUST? Why have we been issuing injmctions against
them without failing a single man for violating the injuctions!
This cutlery has not arisen because the corporation is wrong. any
more than the factory or railroad or any other improvement of modern
life over its primitive predecessor is wrong. The wrong is in the
PUBLIC POLICY of state and national government that has PER
MITNIED the corporation to become the exclusive right Of a few
people. If when the transformation was taking place by which indi-
vidual shopkeepers were giving place to the great concerns there had
been carried with it the proprietorship and cooperation of the me
whose places were taken neither cutlery NOR CAUSE FOR IT
would exist Such was not the case and for a very good reason.
sss
We took care that our public lands should become the property of
the people. In 1910 we began to lcghlatc in such a way that no great
estate in lands exists. We have a mighty agricultural people, the
backbone of our whole western country, upon whom We can rely in
any possible emergency of the nation.
THEY FORM THE BULWARk OF OUR REPUBLICAN INsTiTu.
TIoNs.
Now, if the corporate domain, if these great corporate properties
could have been distributed thus in proprietorship AMONG THE
PEOPLE of America as the farming domain was, the problem that
presses us with such anxiety every day would have no.existence.
But it was left a lawless region, As lawhss Is were the frontier
towns before a United States marshal was put in charge. Any man
from the beginning could do in this domain just as he pleased. .Actu-
ally, five men can sit around a table, put 81 in the center, organize a
corporation calling for A MILLION DOLLARS WORTH OF
CAPITAL, repocket the dollar and go home after sending a certif-
cate of incorporation to the secretary of state with a million dollar en-
terprse ready to launch.
Why, twenty-five years ago a ma bought up the street car lines
of Chicago, saying he was going to improve transportation facilities.
He was hailed as a great municipal benefactor. His corporation
seemed so honestly organized and managed that five thousand to ten
thousand people took stock. But it didn't take long to see that, instead
Of taking the income TO IMPROVE THE ROAD, he thought he
could get better results by going into Iasale street, the Wall street of
Chicago. BY letting the road run down and paving high dividends he
raised the stock to several times what he paid for it, and then sold out.
The stockholders are now in my court administering the affairs of
the road. :
Corporations have got into the SUSPECT class. They must be
got back into the transformation state again, back to a sharing in them
BY THE INDIVIDUAL MAN. The citizenship of the country
must be invited back into proprietorship i'll them.
l am not against wealth, and the TAI who, starting with nothing,
creates a large fortune honestly is one of the most splendid phenomena
Of our civilization. But 1 have no federation for the man who
launches a bic scheme which, IL IL WERE SMALLER, would
land him i'll jail on the charge Of fraud.
We must Get back to the idea that the corporation is not organized
evil. that it really needs protection from the malpractice which has
been allowed to become its evil. Let the laws compel every corpora
ton to limit its advertised capital to the ACTUAL VALUE Of its
assets. Let the state which fol a price will sell a corporation a charter
TO go frccbootng for the savings of the humble all over the country
be dcnicd. the right to issue such charters. The bandits and trcspasscrs
must go.
the corporation. 1t is their savings that are being taken, and it is JUS
te that should protect them.
LIKE THE FLAMING CROSS AT THE BALTIMORE FIRE THAT,
SHINING HIGH ABOVE THE TENEMENTs, SEEMED TO SAY TO
THE REcoLlNe FLAMES, mot HERE" SO SHOULD JUSTICE SAY
TO THESE scHEMERs THAT ARE STILL cLAMoRINe FOR THE
SAVINGS OF THE POOR: mot HERE. NOT HERE"