The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-06-13
CUTTING 4 Mr1LEN.

nerves of people who are otherwise, and under more seasonable conditions quiet, pleasantly spoken and hopeful of the future. Thoughts are being ex- pressed and charges made every day which cannot be reconciled with the art of gentle speech as developed in the i agreeable intercourse of well hammered men, If we refer to them in a definite | connection, it Is not because we hold a brief for the abused but to aid in the restoration of that balance which will arrive of itself when the weather set ties.
 At the one hundred and ninety l eighth annual meeting of the General Association of Connecticut in this city | Tuesday, the Rev. Charles s. Macfar- | land, who is long and favorably known | to this people, made the charge that l the State of Connecticut Is living under the conscience of Charles Sanger Mel l len, the president of the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad company; that the reformers of the State have their work cut out for them in tackling the senate, whose majority is controlled by his company. We are , bit confused by this attack. It would be clearer if the charge had been made that the State of Connecticut is living under a railroad president who does noG possess a conscience. The possess sion of a conscience presupposes, or we have always thought it did, solicitude for the right as contrasted with the wrong, natural aptitude for the straight and narrow path, and a con- | stant indulgence in introspection. Granting Mir, Mellen a conscience, is 1t 1 true that he leaves it in the family ice
 box when he goes to the big yellow
 building, to resume it's enjoyment when he returns home? What evidence has MT. Mcfarland that this is so? No man has ever occupied the presidency of the New Haven road whose motives have not been questioned, some of them with justification. We confess to an under starding of Mr. Mellen as a human be- 1 ing. upon whose shoulder blades the celestial wings have not yet sprouted, but we have no such impression of him as to justify the conclusion, or con- viction, that he Is a wicked man, who has the State of Connecticut by the | throat.
 Tn other words is 1t either good | judgment or Christian ethics to attack man of his responsibilities without offering the proof? Whether for good or bad, he is the president and master mind of an institution upon whose service the manufacturing welfare of Connecticut depends, and upon whose enterprise the prolongation of life rests. It's failure to carry the raw material of manufacturing to the shops and the finished product to the markets would spread great disaster. It's failure to bring the necessartes of daily living to our local markets each week would confront us soon with starvation. Is President Mellen so conducting the affairs of that property that the manufacturing interests are being imperiled, or that our lives are being endangered? If it is true that he controls a majority of the State senators, which we do not believe,
 though his alleged representatives or-
 ganized that body to suit themselves
 out of the inexperience of its members,
 does he use them in such a way as to demorallze the well being of the State,
 and encourage that ultimate in- dulgence in the whirlwind which is
 the final product of wickedness? No
 such charge as that can be brought unless a similar charge is brought
 against the people of the State them- selves, for in all wicked and corrupt enterprises 1t takes two to make s
 bargain. President Mellen cannot
 with all of his skill, buy what is not
 for sale. If there is rottenness in this beautiful Denmark, those whom the
 people have deliberately elected to of
 flee are active sharers and promoters of it.
 At the hearing on Tuesday before the , railroad committee of the Massaehu. setts general assembly, President Tut
 tie made a significant remark in reply
 to an inquiry if he was in favor of the
 proposed merger of the Boston and
 Maine with the New Haven? Presl. dent Mellen had previously stated tha if he had not taken over the Bostor and Maine, the New York Centra would have taken it. In other wordl it was sure to pass from the control O the state of Massachusetts. President T Futile asserted that the reason, or a least one of the reasons, for the pass ] ing of the control of the Boston ,anC Maine to the New Haven was the hos } tritv of the Massachusetts laws f.