Coeur d'Alene evening press. (Coeur d'Alene, Idaho) 1907-1929, 1908-10-22

- interests Of the people demand
would the number Of trusts have null
tipiled so rapldiyg Not only would
the trusts doing business have been
put ont OF Business. but men would
not have put money into new trusts
Il they bad believed that the law
against trusts aud against persons
guilty Of combining would be vigorous
~ enforced.
l submit that By the test OF punish
ing hwbreakers and lettering others
from violating the law--the eternal
and true test-the execution Of the
antitrust laws by the federal govern
ment is q failure: and that the exist
ence and nourishing condition Of the
very trusts you have prosecuted con-
yinces the people that the trusts are
superior 10 law. or as Woodrow VIII
son, president OF Princeton university
Gaid last week.
The most striking fact about the
actual organization Of modern society
Is that the most conspicuous. the most
readily welded. and the most formula
bic power Is not the power of the gov
eminent, but the power Of capital Men
OF our day in England and America
have almost forgotten what IL is TO
fear the government, but have found
out what it is 10 fear the power OF
capital, TO watch IL with jealousy and
suspicion, and trace to IL the source
II every open or hidden wrong"
] submit that the collection OF fines
from trusts aggregating a million dol
lars, IL you had collected SO much,
which has not been done, would be no
punishment worth the name OF pun.
ishment to the 2S7 trusts with an ag-
gregate capitalization OF $6,972, 44S,-
651.OO. The lining process in trust
prosecution Is analogous to those fines
imposed by police justice upon per-
sons keeping illegal resorts in towns.
These fines often operate as sliding
scale or license lax--so may dollars
whenever the aroused moral sense OF
the community will no longer be silent
while the lawless dive debauches the
people. What the people wish to know
Is this: How many trusts have yon
compelled to dissolye--in truth, and
not merely to officially dissolve, and
then continue to DIX the price.sas the
dissolved paper trust has done? The
meat trust paid fine and soon put up
the prices Of all that men must eat by
some now-yOu-see-it-and-now-you-don't
slelght Of hand that seems to escape
further prosecution while continuing to
levy a tax upon all the people. No
prosecution OF the trusts is effective
that is not felt by the public in re-
heying them OF trust imposition In
what they buy. Your department says
the paper trust was prosecuted and
dissolved, but the publishers know that
the mills in the trust have a combina-
ton now as injurious to them as before
your prosecution. You say you have
prosecuted the tobacco trust, but that
trust has put up the price OF the manu-
featured product it sells and put down
az VIII tie price OF the raw material
Il buys from the farmer You do not
claim, believe, to have ever even in
stituted proceedings against the steel
trust, and only last year, in the teeth
Of the law, your department acquiesced
IN the complete monopoly OF that giant
OF trusts when It took over the only
large company able 70 compete with
It in any line of production.
II your department In seven years
mas prosecuted nineteen civil and
twenty-five criminal cases, in which
no trust official has been jailed and no
trust robbing the people has been COM
PEELED to take its grasp from the throat
OF free competition while 223 new
trusts have been born during the Nc
kinley and Roosevelt Republican ad-
ministrations, how long at this rate Of
progress viii 1t take the Republican
administration TO stop the extortion Of
2S1 trusts that fatten by taxing the
peoplel That Is the question that the
voters are propounding and II Is a
question which the department Of jus
tice should answer.
/ am, sir
Yours very respectfully.
ISlgnedl
JoSEPHUS DANIELS.