Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1908-08-22
Continued from Page One.)


the form of the violation of
granting of rebates and dis
ordinations by railways to large ship
pers. When the extent of these evils
were brought home to the people, he
said, President Roosevelt evoked the
attic ntion of Congress and the public
to them and proceeded to enforce the
laws then on the statute books.
ct was not he said, until Mr..
Roosevelt, realizing to the full the
danger to which our society was eX-
posed unless the offending corporations.
railwa. and industrial, were made to
obey and fear the law, took vigorous
action in the recommendation of new
legislation and in the enforcement of
the old, that anything very effective
was done to check the growing evil
The Republican Congress which had
been elected with Roosevelt in 1904, Mr..
Taft said, made record for remedial
legislation along the lines recommend
ed by the President which, as he has
said himself has never been equalled
in our time. Mr.. Taft referred to the
railway rate bill, the bill creating the
bureaus Of corporations, the pure food
bill and the meat inspection bill. most
of which he declared encountered the
open bitter opposition of all the corpor-
ations and failed Of passage in the
previous Congress. In spite of contin :
ued opposition they We're finally enact
ed into law.
"VVhat has been the result OF this
legislation and executive action?' he
asked Secret rebates and unlawful
determinations have been actually
abolished. No monopoly of business in
any lines is now maintained by Sc
cret reduction Of freight rates to it
which is denied to competitors
lie declared that the people have
ruled through the Republican party.
81 have no hesitation in saying that
not since the beginning of the govern
ment has any other national admlnlS-
tration done so much for the cause of
labor 10y the enactment of remedial
legislation as Theodore Roosevelt and
the Republican Congresses elected and
sitting during his term of office"
"It is true" he said, that additional
legislation is needed to perfees the ma
chlnery for enforcing the principles
laid down by Mr.. Roosevelt and de-
clared in the remedial statutes already
passed,
"The present Congress" he added
has re-enacted the employers liabll-
ity act. has strengthened the safety
appliance acts. has passed the govern
nient employees Compensation act
has directed investigations into mine
disasters and has passed IL model child
labor bill. 1t has not amended the in
terState commerce law so as to prevent
over issue of stocks and bonds on in
terstate railroads. and it has not
amended the antitrust law as suggest
ed by Mr.. Roosevelt
Great care he said, would be re-
CURED in the enactment of additional
legislation and THE fact that the
Democratic party has had but little
recent experience in the responsibilities
of power and but little training in ac-
tual legislation makes the party and
it's distinguished leader utterly obliv
ious of the necessity for care and eau
ticn in the enactment of statutes
which are to accomplish changes in
our social and business relations.
They seem to have an impression
that an evil which is very insiduous
and which is elusive in its character
when definite legal description is to be
given Oh IL anu HtdNy ptIldlly IL " bt
prescribed for it, may be safely met
by a statutory denunCiation hastily
prepared i'm a day or a week on Il short
period. We have seen within the short
four years Of the present administra-
ton such measures government
ownership of railways. election of fed
eral judges and national initiative and
referendum proposed as remedies for
our existing evils and now Withdrawn
under assurances that they will not be
again suggested"
He declared that the Republican
party WAS not responsible for the
abuses he had described and ;hat the
evils were due to the fallibility of hui
man nature ana the Willingness of am
bilious ana unscrupulouS men To turn
an instrumentality necessary in human
progress to n vicious purpose.
OF all possible agencies for reform,
he said the Democratic party under its
present leadership is the one least Ell
titled to any credit.
While the resolutions of its plat
form in 1896. 1900 and 1904 denounced
the abuses of corporate wealth. he
said, they never proposed feasible
plans or made the prominent and chief
issue Of any campaign the carrying
out Of what have now become known
and properly known rs the Roosevelt
policies. on the contrary in 1896. the
party made the chief issue a disastrous
financial experiment which would have
retarded the progress of this country
Il quarter of a century and Sullied its
financial honor In 1900 the party re-
iteratcd its adherence to this suicidal
policy of reputation of national and
private debts and obligations and then
advanced as the paramount issue of
the campaign not the trusts, not cor
porate wealth and abuses. but rather
the reputation of all our international
responsibilities growing ont of the
Spanish War and the destruction of
what they call the growing cancer of
Imperialism in the policy of this coun |
try Again in 1904. instead of selecting
the abuses and evil for which they now
seek to make the Republican party re- |
sponsible as the main issue of the cam
paign the burden of their contentious |
was the usurpation of the powers of