Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1907-12-03
THE SHERMAN LAW.
Should Be Amended to Permit Proper
Combinations In Business.

moreover, III my judgment, there
should be additional legislation looking
to the proper control of the great bust
ness concerns engaged in interstate
business, this control to be exercised
for their own benefit and prosperity no
less than for the protection of invest
ors and of the general public. AS
have repeatedly said in messages to
the congress and elsewhere, experience
has definitely shown not merely the
unwisdom, but the futility, of endeav
oring to put stop to all business COM
binations. Modern Industrial condi-
lions are such that combination is not
only necessary, but inevitable. 1t is
so In the world of business Just as it Is
so in the world of labor, and it is as
idle to desire TO put an end to all cor
porations, to all big combinations of
capital, as to desire to put an end to
combinations of labor. Corporation and
labor union alike have come to stay.
Each if properly managed is a source
of good and not evil. Whenever in
either there is evil it should be prompt
" held to account. but it should re-
ceive hearty encouragement so long as
1t is properly managed. 1t is profound
ly immoral to put or keep on the stat
ute books a law, nominally in the in
terest of public morality, that really
puts premium upon public immoral
ity by undertaking to forbid honest
men from doing what must be done
under modern business conditions, so
that the law itself provides that its
own infraction must be the condition
precedent upon business success. To
aim at the accomplishment of too
much usually means the accomplish
ment of too little and often the doing
Of positive damage. In my message to
the congress a year ago. in speaking of
the antitrust laws, l said:
The actual working of our laws has
shown that the effort to prohibit all
| combination, good. or bad, is noxious
where it is not ineffective. Combina.
ton of capital, like combination of la
Dor, is necessary element in our pres
| ent industrial system. 1t is not pos
sible completely to prevent it. and II
| it were possible such complete proven
|
| polite. What we need is not vainly
| to try to prevent all combination. but
to secure such rigorous and adequate
! control and supervision of the com
binations as to prevent their injurine
the public or existing in such forms a!
inevitably to threaten injury. > L
IS unfortunate that our present law:
should forbid all combinations instead
of sharply discriminating between
those combinations which do good ant
! those combinations which do evil
Often railroads would like to combin,
for the purpose of preventing q bi,
shipper from maintaining improper ad
vantages at the expense of small ship
pers and of the general public. Such
combination, instead of being forbid
den by law, should be favored. .
1t is a public evil to have on tn
statute books a law incapable of full
enforcement, because both judges an,
juries realize that its full enforcement
. would destroy the Business of tn
] country, for the result Is to make de
} cent men violators of the law agains
I their will and to put premium on tn
| behavior of the willful wrongdoers
I Such result in turn tends to throw
] the decent man and the willful wrong
doer into close association and in tn
: end to drag down the former to tn
: latter's level, for the man who be
I comes lawbreaker in one way I'M
= happily tends to lose all respect 70
e law and to be willing to break it il
= many ways. No more scathing con
g demnation could be visited upon a Law
: than is contained in the words of tn
e Interstate commerce commission whel
. in commenting upon the fact that tn
: numerous joint traffic associations d
Il technically violate the law they say