The Morris County chronicle. [volume] (Morristown, N.J.) 1877-1915, 1906-10-09
ROOSEVELT DELEGATES
PENNSYLVANIA CAPITOL
Address Contained Stern Warn
ings to LaWIess Corporations.
GOVERNMENT MUST CONTROL

Attacks Judges For Not Interpreting
Laws in Spirit in Which Law
makers Intended to Have Them
Enforced.
Harrisburg, Pa. President Roose-
welt was the central and absorbing
figure in the ceremonial by which
was dedicated Pennsylvania SPLEEN
did State Capitol. Although a
drenching rain fell throughout the
proceedings, which were conducted
outdoors, the crowd that faced the
speakers stand was the largest that
had ever gathered here.
Mr.. Roosevelt stood as he spoke
5areheaded in the pouring rain, pro-
tected otherwise by a rain coat and
rubber overshoes His address, aside
from a review OF the historic achieve
ments OF the old Commonwealth and
commentator for recent enactments
of her Legislature, was mainly de-
voted to stern warnings directed
toward lawbreaking common carriers
and trust magnates, to lawyers whose
clever schemes Of evasion divert the
punishment deserved by their mill
ionaire clients of the corporations
and generally to all who amass
wealth by dubious methods
The Presidents personal example
as spelling refOFmer was shown in
the printed press copies of his adj
dress-the first from the printers
since he enunciated his ideas on the
subject In the 5000 words only six
were reformed These were
tho" ''stopt," thru, "lookt, 4
.leapt," and past for passed.
Met at the station by the Capitol
Dedication Committee. along a route
lined by cordially demonstratiye cit
liens, he was greeted at the new
$18,000,000 State House by Govern
or Pennypacker and Mayor Gross,
each of whom presented to him a
gold medal, gifts Of the State and
the city of Harrisburg.
A large part of Mr. Roosevelts ad-
dress here was devoted to Pennsyl-
vaniai its history, its great men and
its recent reform legislation
Touching upon the power of the
States to deal with corporate wealth,
the President developed the main
theme of his address, as follows:
Actual experience has shown that
the States are wholly powerless to
deal with this subject, and any action
or decision that depriyes the nation
OF the power to deal with it simply
results in leaving the corporation ab-
solutely free to work without any eff
fective supervision whatever; and
such a course is fraught with untold
danger to the future of our whole
system of government, and, indeed,
to our whole civilization
But it is our clear duty to see, in
the interest of the people, that there
is adequate supervision and control
over the business use of the swollen
fortunes of to-day, and also wisely to
determine the conditions upon which
these fortunes are to be transmitted
and the percentage that they shall
pay to the Governments whose pro-
tecting arm alone enables them to
exist. Only the nation can do this
work. To relegate it to the States
is farce, and is simply another way
of saying that it shall not be done at
all
Under a wise and far-seeing in-
depreciation of the Interstate Com
merce clause of the Constitution,
maintain that the National Govern
ment should have complete power to
deal with all of this wealth which in
any way goes into the commerce be-
tween the States-and practically all
of 1t that is employed in the great
corporations does thus go in.
But, on the other hand, it shall
and must ultimately be understood
that the United States Government,
on behalf of the people of the United
States, has and is to exercise the
power of supervision and control
over the business use Of this wealth
lin the first place, over all the work
of the common carriers of the ma
ton, and in the next place over the
work OF all the great corporations
which directly or indirectly do any
Interstate business whatever-and
this includes almost all of the great
corporations.
Many of the greatest f1nanciers Of
this country were certain that Mr.
Knox's Northern Securities suit, if
won, would plunge us into the worst
panic we had ever seen. They de-
nounced as Indictment to anarchy, as
an apology for socialism, the advo-
cacy OF policies that either have now
become law or are in fair way of
becoming law; and yet these same
policies, so far from representing
either anarchy or socialism, were in
reality the antidotes to anarchy, the
antidotes to socialism
The Government ought not to
conduct the business of the country;
but it ought to regulate it so that it
shall be conducted in the interest Of
the public.
1t behooves us Americans to look
ahead and plan out the right kind Of
a civilization as that which we intend
to develop from these wonderful new
conditions of vast Industrial growth.
It must not be. it shall not be, the
civilization of a mere plutoeracy,
banking house, Wall Street syndicate
civilization; nor yet can there be sub
mission to class hatred, to rancor,
brutality and mob violence, for that
would mean the end of all civiliza-
ton.
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