Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1907-10-24

Chicago, oct. 23.-"My own opinion
which runs counter to that of many
others TO whom we are bound to lis
ten with respect, is that nothing is
necessarily to be feared from a cor
por2tion because Of its size. The
character OF a corporation does not
depend upon its size,' but upon the
principles and policies which actuate
it's management. Corporations them
selves have no moral qualities, it is
corporate UmCers and managers who
are good or Dad, honest or dishonest,
as the case may be. Inc problem or
creating and developing public ser
vice corporation that truly serves the
pubic Is simply the problem always
and everywhere present in cur life,
OF securing for positions Of trust ana
power men who are not only intelli-
gent, but uprgnt, who are not only
ethclent but honest. 1t is not com
Dlnation and corporation that are to
De feared and antasOnized, but only
monopoly and discrimination.
President Nicholas Murray Butler
OF Columbia university, speaking be-
fore the conference on trusts and
combinations, promulgated the doc
trine Of seriousness in the efforts
that are being made to direct the
current of modern thought upon cop
nomic questions along lines that are
sane and safe.
"rTOblems of grave Importance"
said President Butler, mot only legal
but political in the highest sense,
arise when we attempt to fix the
ways and means by which the gov
eminent shall control and supervise
public service corporations. Our con-
stitutional limitations, our political
traditions and past party differences,
and the complex structure of our
whole government system with its
state and national agencies, make the
problem of governmental control of
corporations an extremely difficult
one. There are those who think they
see short and easy methods of &C.
cOmplishing the desired end, but nay
prediction is that, true to the charac-
teristtcs of our people, we shall work
out a just solution Of these involved
problems, not at one stroke or by
wholly logical processes, but step by
step and after many experiments, and
that not few unforeseen difficulties
Will have to be surmounted or cir
cumVented. Above all else, unless
we propose to wreck the whole eco
nomic basis on which our prosperity
and our happiness rest, we must have
a care that we SO speak and so act as
not to disturb that faith or conf
dence which civilized man has in his
fellows and upon which rests the
whole enormous structure of our
credit system. Destroy that, and
there will not be many public service
or other corporations left to regulate
TO- some time to come.
We all know how much feeling,
and what just feeling, has been
aroused ia the United States by cor
pirate mismanagement. 1t is diff
ncult to speak in language too strong
of the usurpatiOns of power and the
larCenies of funds which have beens
committed by corporate officers. But
let us not lose our heads. We are
face to face with economic conditions
that are new, and with economic
abuses that, though manifold, have
grown up slowly and in the dark.
There is ample power in our institu-
hons, in our constitution and our
laws to check and to remedy them all.
There is now reason to believe that
the DneTman antitrust law commits
the nation to policy which is too
extreme to a policy that, in putting
an end to certain admitted evils, also
puts an end to certain demonstrable
benefits. Many of us believe that
the act unduly exalts the principle of
competition and fails to lay due en-
phasis upon the public benefits which
may follow from properly regulated
and supervised cooperation. The dis
tinctiOn between combinations which
are reasonable and may we'll be per
mitted and those which are unreason-
able and must at all hazards be for
hidden, is one which ought not to be
surrendered or overlooked. It is
most imnOrtant question, therefore.
whether the time has not come when
this act should be amended in order
to relieve, not corporations, but the
people, from limitations upon their
business activity which this act i'm
poses. although in reality they are
moi necessary I'm the public interest.
1t is not combination itself so much
as it is unfair discrimination which
should control our criticism and our
opposition"