The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1908-02-07
IN SPECIAL [SSAG /.
President Urges Necessity Of Ger
tain Labor Legislation.
FOR ENFORCING THE LAWS
Refers to the Bitter and Persistent
Attacks Now Being Made on
the Administration.

Washington, Feb. /. President
| Roosevelt has sent special message
to congress in which he again calls
attention to the abuse of tnjunctions
in labor cases and urges remedial leg
| mends the re-enactment of the en-
| ployers' liability act, recently de-
| clared unconstitutional, limited in
| scope to apply only to Interstate COM
merce. He refers at length to gam
| bling in stocks and futures and urges
that action be taken to prevent. at
least the making of large sales of
what men do not possess and corner
strengthening of antitrust laws he
calls attention to the bitter and per-
sistent attacks on the administration
| now being made by corporations
brought to the bar of justice for viola
| ton of law. On this subject he says,
in part:
The attack by the great corpora
lions on the administration actions
| have been given a wide circulation
| throughout the country, in the news
| papers and otherwise, by those writer's
and speakers who, consciously or I'M
| consciously, act as the repres entatives
of predatory wealth-Of the wealth
| accumulated on giant scale by all
| forms of iniquity, ranging from the
| oppression of wage workers to unfair
| and unWholesome methods of crushing
out competition, and to defrauding
the public by stock jobbing and the
manipulation of securities. The adj
ministration and those who support
it's views are not only not engaged in
an assault on property, but are siren
uous upholders of the rights of prop
erty. The books and pamphlets, the
controlled newspapers, the speeches
by public or private men to which l
refer, are usually and especially III
the interest of the Standard Oil trust
and of certain notorious railroad COM
binat1ons, but they also defend other
individuals and corporations of great
wealth that have been guilty of wrong
doing. 1t is only rarely that the men
responsible for the Wrongdoing them
selves speak or write. Normally they
hire others to do their bidding or find
others who will do it without hire
Every Honest Measure Opposed.
From the railroad rate law to the
pure food law every measure for hon
esty in business that has been passed
during the last six years has been .op-
posed by these men on it's passage
and in it's administration with every
source that bitter and INSCRIPTIONS
craft could suggest and the command
Of almost unlimited money secure. But
for the last year the attack has been
made with most bitterness upon the
actual administration of the law, espe-
cially through the department of JUS
t1ce, but also through the Interstate
commerce commission and the bureau
of corporations. The extraordinary
icy contained in these speeches, edi-
torials, articles, advertisements and
pamphlets and the enormous sums of
money spent in these various ways,
give fairly accurate measure of the
anger and terror which our public ac-
lions have caused the corrupt men
of vast wealth to feel in the very mar
row of their being.
We act in no vindict1ve spirit and
we are no respecter Of persons. We
seek to stop wrongdoing and we de-
sire to punish wrongdoers only so far
as it is necessary to achieve this end
We seek to control law defying
wealth; in the first place to prevent
its doing dire evil to the republic and
In the NEXT place to avoid the vindic-
live and dreadful radicalism which, if
left uncontrolled, it is certain in the
end to arouse.
The methods by which the Standard
Oil people and others have achieved
great fortunes can only be justified by
the advocacy of a system of morals
which would also justify every form
of criminality on the part of labor
union and every form of violence, cor
ruption and fraud, from murder to
bribery and ballot box stuffing in poll
tioc