Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1907-08-20
|AFI ON THE ISSUES
Opens His Presidential Cam
paign at Columbus by Discus
sing Railroads, Tariff, Etc.
a ROOSEVELT PLATFORM.
u For Tariff Revision on Protective
limestone Schedules Excessive
Opposes Bryan's Scheme of Govern
ment Ownership as Dangerous
Talks Of Trust.

Taft sounded the keynote of his cam
l,aign in his speech here yesterday be-
fore the Buckeye Republican club, His
theme was the qlrickenng of the public
conscience in the midst of prosperity
slrld he dealt with the important sub
jects Of the day in no uncertain words
Including corporations and the tarlft
Taft is for revision on protective lines.
but declares there are some schedules
at present too high.
Discussing the Elkins bill and the
later rate law he said THE present stat
utes do not go far enough. Continuing
he said:
The practice under 1t has already
disclosed the necessity for new amend
ments and will doubtless suggest more
Such is the true method--the empirical
and tentative method-of securing
proper remedies for a new evil. The
classification of merchandise for trans
portation is most important matter
9 in rate fixing, for by a transfer from
one class to another, the rate is changed
and may work injustice. With the
power OF rate fixing, it would seem,
should go to the power of the commits
sion to classify and prescribe rules for
uniform classification by all railroads
Recent revelations have emphasized
\ the pernicious effect of the so-called
OYER apitalization Of railroads which
aids unscrupulous stock manipulators
s1vxy,
reasonably high prices to innocent
buyers. This evil would not of itself
Justify federal restraint or control be-
cause such stock and bonds are usually
issued under state charters. This prac-
Etice, however, has a tendency to divert
1.-The money paid by the public for the
stock and bonds which ought to be
expended in improving the road bed,
track and equipment of railways into
the pockets of the dishonest lnanipulat-
ors and thus to pile such AN unprofit-
able debt upon a railway as Ito make
Bankruptcy and receivership probable
In the first business stringency. This
result In an interstate railway, neces-
sarily interferes with and burdens inter-
state commerce, and justifies the eXer-
cises of Nhe regulative power of con-
gress to stop the practice. A railroad
company engaged in interstate COM
nferee should not be permitted, there
fore to issue stock or bonds and put
them on sale in the market except after
a.ee.tificate by the Interstate commerce
commission that the securities are is
sued with the approval of the commits
sion for legitimate railroad purpose.
The railroads that are honestly con-
Quoted would accept the certificate of
the commission as a valuable one in the
markets of the world, and only railway
stock manipulators who look to 1.-THE
floating watered securities as their best
source Of profit, would have reason to
complain.
II am opposed to government own
ership-
"First-Because existing government
railways are not managed with either
the efficiency or economy of privately
managed roads, and the rates charged
are not as low and therefore not as
beneficial to the public.
"second-Because it would involve
an expenditure of certainly $4,000, OOO.-
900 to acquire the interstate railways
and the creation of an enormous ma
tional debt.
"Third-Because it would place III
the hands of a reckless executive
power of control over business and
politics that the imagination can hard
~ conceive, and would expose our
popular institutions to danger.
The supervision proposed need not
materially reduce the legitimate oper-
alton of individualism in railway en-
r
portunity to accumulate enormous for
tunes thru over-capitalization or secret
rebates, but the legitimate profit which
comes from close attention to opera
ton, to efficiency of service, and econ
omy in details and from broad concep-
tons Of new methods of reducing cost
without impairing the service will not
be disturbed in the slightest. There is
no attempt to take away the property
5 OF the railway companies there is no
furnishing of public money to the en-
serprise and no public officers are re-
CURED to administer the property.
There is no more attempt in this law
to make transportation government
business than there is in the national
banking to make banking, a govern
ment business"
He then took up the subject of trusts
and said:
Il pass now from railway resula
ton and the abuses arising in the dis
charge of public function to the
evils which have grown out of the
combinations existing in private bus
mess. and SO come to the subject Of
trusts. The combination of capital in
large plants to manufacture goods with
the greatest economy is just as neces-
sary as the assembling of the parts of
machine to the economical and more
rapid manufacture of what in old times
was made by hand. The government
should not interfere with the one any
more than with the other. In the
proper operation of competition the
public will soon share with the man.
ufactnrer the advantage in lowered
prices When. however. such combin-
ations not only lowered the cost to
themselves, but are able to control the
market and maintain or raise the old
prices, the public derives no benefit
and is helpless in the hands OF a mon
opoly
Fear of the existence of such an
abuse led to the passage of the anti
trust law in 1890. 1t recognizes two
forms in which this evil may be main
tanned. One is by an agreement among
a number of different manufacturers
of an article for the maintenance of
the price of the article and the sup
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