Waterbury evening Democrat., 1908-12-08
GOVERNMENT CONTROL
Will Not Mean Weakening of the
 Rights of the States,

The opposition to government con
 trol of these great corporations makes
 its most effective effort in the shape
 of an appeal to the old doctrine of
 states rights. Of course there are
 many sincere men who now believe in
 unrestricted individualism in business,
 just as there were formerly many sin
 cere men who believed in slavery
 that is, in the unrestricted right of an
 individual to own another individual
 These men do not by themselves have
 great weight, however The effective
 fight against adequate government
 control and supervision of individual, and especially of corporate, wealth en-
 gagged in interstate business is chiefly done under cover, and especially un-
 der cover of an appeal to states
 rights. It is not at all infrequent to
 read in the same speech a denuncia- tion of predatory wealth fostered by
 special privilege and defiant of both the public welfare and law of the land and a denunciation of centraliza- ton In the central government of the power to deal with this centralized and organized wealth. Of course the policy set forth in such twin denuncia- tions amounts to absolutely nothing
 for the first half is nullifled by the second half. The chief reason among the many sound and compelling req sons that led to the formation of the national government was the absolute need that the Union and not the sev- eral states should deal with interstate and foreign commerce, and the power to deal with interstate commerce was granted absolutely and plenarily to the central government and was exer- ciSed completely as regards the only instruments of interstate commerce known in those days-the waterways, the highroads-as well as the partner ships of individuals who then conduct ed all of what business there was.
 Interstate commerce is now chiefly conducted by railroads, and the great corporation has supplanted the mass of small partnerships or individuals. The proposal to make the national government supreme over, and there fore to give it complete control over, the railroads and other instruments of interstate commerce is merely pro- posal to carry out 10 the letter one of the prime purposes, if not the prime purpose, for which the constitutions was founded. It does not represent centralization. It represents merely the acknowledgment of the patent fact that standardization has already come in business. If this irresponsible out side business power is to be controlled in the interest of the general public 1t can only be controlled in one way, by giving adequate power of control to the one sovereignty capable of exer- rising such power-the national gov srnmsnt. Forty or fifty separate state
 governments cannot exercise that power over corporations doing busi- ness in most or all of them. first, be- cause they absolutely lack the author lty 10 deal with interstate business in any form and. second, because of the Inevitable conflict of authority sure to arise in the effort to enforce different kinds of state regulation, often incon- siStent with one another and some times oppressive in themselves. Such divided authority cannot regulate con- mcrce with wisdom and effect. The central government Is the only power which without oppression can never. theless thoroughly and adequately control and supervise the large cor. poratiOnS. To abandon the effort fof national control means to abandon the effort for all adequate control and yet to render likely continual bursts of action by state legislatures, which cannot achieve the purpose sought for, but which can do great deal of dam. age to the corporation without confer ring any real benefit on the public.
 l believe that the more farsighted corporations are themselves coming to recognize the unwisdom of the violent hostility they have displayed during the last few years to regulation and control by the national government of combinations engaged in interstate