New-York tribune., 1907-07-23
TEXAS STILL UNHAPPY.


svery hotel and inn Qequired by the famous
Griggs law, just gone Into effect Texas IS
not entirely happy. Every trust Is on the run,
but there is a growing feeling that with the
trusts all fed the big State Of Texas would be
a mighty lonesome place. Thus we read in
'TThe Houston POST:
From talk heard yesterday by Post" reporters,
it might be stated that summed up as q whole,
the opinion is that If 1t possible 10 enforce
this [the Davidson antitrust law the people Of
Texas would be forced TO go hungry and naked
thew would not have a house to live in - they
could not ride in vehicle, or walk in street;
they could neither smoke nor chew tobacco, they
could not work their jaws on chewing gum If
they should get sick they could not purchase
medicine. and when they came to die they could
not be buried II would be impossible TO
get drink OF water except by the old method OF
scooping 1t up with the hands. In a word, the
people could do nothing but run naked through
the woods, did their ancestors that Darwin
wrote about and when they died they would lie
and rot
Robinson Crusoe had nice time Of it on bis
island compared with what would have befallen
him If he had got stranded In the trust bust
ing State Of Texas. The business men are
talking Of holding mass meetings and asking
for q special session TO repeal the antitrust
law and everybody is getting ready to file
his bail bonds when the great day comes and
all the State Of Texas is arrested and thrown
into Jail.
believe the stnte papers, and everybody who
is mad because all the other trusts are to be
driven out is furious because this trust is let
in This is the barber trust The recent Legis-
Iature, which regulated everything subunary,
regulated the BARRIERS and appointed three Of
them to license the others. This Is the Barber
Trust. Says THE Galveston News:
The same administration that sought to pay
its campaign debts by practically turning over
one sort OF trust all the people OF Texas to
be skinned alive proceeded Immediately after
It had thus chartered one trust, TO provide that
any merchant or anybody else in Texas who
happens TO buy and sell the goods OF any trust
shall be arrested and landed In the penitentiary
for from two to ten years as felon.
Skinned alive! Are the razors so duh in
Texas? This is a subject that somehow
escaped the attention of the omniscient Leglslat-
ure a special session should be called to enact
that all razors shall be kept sharp This barber
law lin the absence Of the amendment that we
suggest THE Galveston News says, as one
"of dozen foolish and dangerous acts of tho
"Thirteth Legislature that the fair minded
Democratic people Of Texas are eager to re-
Duke and to destroy" And it further ex-
claims In perfectly heartrending accents: 20
Democracy, Democracy, what deceit is being
"perpetrated In thy name!"
Why not have a definition Of Democracy from
Texas? 1t has got further along in the Bryan
sort than any otner state IN lne Union.
Attorney General Davidson attempts to soothe
this strange unhappiness of Texas. blessed as
it is with the most up-to-date legislation Of all
the states in the Union He says his new law
will not put everybody In jail, but only the
merchants who act as agents OF a trust. No
one need go naked or starve or die "unknelled
uncoffined and unknown" in Texas or do any
Of the other picturesque things mentioned by
the gloomy Houston Post" A merchant may
sell trust made goods but not as an agent If
he has the exclusive right TO sell the Boojum
Trusts popular articles In Rising Star or
Sandy Hill or Honey Grove he goes to Jail
If he sells the same articles without that ''eX-
elusive right which is the proud distinction
Of country merchant he may hold his head
high, be "Our leading citizen" and contribute
his untainted money to the village church.
But IL this is all there is to the famous trust
busting law, Will anybody be satisfied with it?
VIII the pure spirits who are working for the
moral upbuilding Of Texas be content with SO
many people out OF jail1 With nearly oil OF
its people out OF Jail wearing trust clothes and
eating trust food like the rest Of the world.
what is to differentiate Texas from other states
Attorney General, 'it IS the well known purpose
'of the trusts TO convert and appropriate for
"their greed and exploitation? With trust
goods selling freely in Texas and the usuGl
number Of people out of jail, some doubt will
inevitably arise whether the trusts are, after
all, whipped to a custard. Then the moral In
dlgnation OF Texas will again be aroused and