River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1908-02-06
rhe Administration and those who snn.

The administration and those who sup
port its views are not only not engaged
in an assault on property, but are siren
uous upholders of the rights of property.
Under no circumstances would we
countenance attacks upon law-abiding
property, or do aught but condemn those
because of their riches On the contrary,
our whole effort is to insist upon con-
duct, and neither wealth nor property nor
any other class distinction, as being the
proper standard by which to judge the
actions of men. For the honest man of
great wealth we have hearty regard,
lust as we have a hearty regard for the
honest politician and honest newspaper.
But part of the movement to uphold hon
/ esty must be movement to frown on
men of wealth. who find in the purchased
politician the most efficient instrument of
corruption and in the purchased newspa-
ruption. Our main quarrel is not with
these agents and representatives of the
interests They derive their ce chief power
stand behind them. They are but pup
pets who move as the strings are pulled.
1t is not the puppets, but the strong cum
for evil behind and through the puppets,
with whom we have to deal We seek to
control law-defying wealth; in the first
the republic, and in the next place to
avoid the vindictive and dreadful radi-
calism which, if left uncontrolled, it. is
certain in the end to arouse. Sweeping
attacks upon all property, upon all men
of means, without regard to whether they
do well or i'll. would sound the death
knell of the republic; and such attacks
become inevitable If decent citizens per-
init those rich men. whose lives are cor
rupt and evil to domineer in swollen
pride unchecked and unhindered, over
the destinies of this country. We act in
no vindictive spirit, ana we are no re-
specters of persons. Ii labor union
does wrong, we oppose it as firmly. as
we oppose a corporation which does
wrong; and we stand equally stoutly for
the rights of the man OF wealth and for
the rights of the Wage-Worker. We seek
to protect the property OF every man who
acts honestly, of every corporation that
represents wealth honestly accumulated
and honestly used. We seek to stop
wrongdoing, and we desire to punish the
wrong doors only so far as is necessary
to achieve this end.
Campaign of Lawbreakers
Against Governments Policy
There are ample material rewards for
those who serve with fidelity the MAN.
mon of unrighteousness; but they are
dearly paid for by the people who per-
NIT their representatives, whether in pub
lie life, in the press, or In the colleges
where their young men are taught to
preach and to practice that there is one
law for the rich and another for the poor.
of certain great moneyed interests are
willing to spend can be gagged by their
recent publication broadcast throughout
the papers of this country, from the At
lantic to the Pacific. of huge advertise
ments attacking with envenomed bitter
ness the administrations policy of
and by their circulation of pamphlets and
books prepared with the same object;
while they likewise push the circulation
of the writings and speeches of men who,
VUb hQO9IISQ thew mlSloQ.
cause, seeing the light, they yet are will
ing to sin against the light, serve these
of the plain people: The books and
pamphlets, the controlled newspapers, the
speeches by public or private men to
which I refer, are usually and especially
in the interest of the Standard Oil Trust
and of certain notorious railroad COM
binations, but they also defend other in
wealth that have been guilty of wrong
doing. It is only rarely that the men re-
sponsible for the wrongdoing themselves
speak or t write IL fmeg hTe %o
will do it without hire. From the rail-
road-rate law to the pure-food law. every
measure for honesty in business that has
been passed during the last six years has
| been opposed by these men on it's pas
sage and in it's administration with every
resource that bitter and INSCRIPTIONS
craft 3ould 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 ad-
ministration of the law, especially
through the department of justice, but
also through the Interstate Commerce
Commission and the bureau of corpora
tons. The extraordinary violence of the
assaults upon our policy contained In
these speeches, editorials, articles, adj
vertisements, 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 actions have caused the cor
Sc 70 in "a
very marrow of their being. The attack
is sometimes made openly against us for
enforcing the law, and sometimes with
certain cunning, for not trying to en-
force it in some other way than that
which experience shows to be practical.
One of the favorite methods of the lat
ter class of assailant is to attack the adj
miniStration for not procuring the I'M
prisonment instead of the fine OF offend
ers under these antitrust laws The man
making this assault is usually either a
prominent lawyer or an editor who takes
his policy from the financiers and his
arguments from their attorneys. If the
many wealthy malefactors and he knows
we'll that, thanks to the advice of lawyers
like himself, certain kind of modern
corporation has been turned into an ad-
mirable instrument by which to render it
well-nigh impossible to get at the head
of the corporation, at the man who, is
to put the real wrongdoer in prison, this
is what we strive to do; this is what we
have actually done with some very
wealthy criminals, who, moreover. repre-
scented that most baneful of all alliances,
the alliance between the corruption of
organized politics and the corruption of
high finance. This is what we have done
in the Gaynor and Greene case, in the
case of the misapplication of funds in
connection with certain great banks in
Chicago. in the land-fraud cases, where,
as in other cases likewise neither the
highest political position nor the posses
sion of great wealth, has awaited to save
the offenders from prison. The federal
government does Scourge SIM it does bid
sinners fear; for it has put behind the
bars with impartial severity, the powerful lid,l
land thief. the rich contractor-all. no
matter how high their station, against
whom criminal misdeedS can be proved.
All their wealth and power can not pro-
effort to imprison a given defendant is
certain to be futile, while it is possible
to fine him or to fine the corporation of
which he is head; so that, in other words.
by filming the corporation, unless we are
content to proceed personally against the
minor agents. The corporation lawyers
to whom I refer and their employers are
state of things. and their responsibility is
shared with all who ingeniously oppose
the passing of just and effective. laws. or
who fail to execute them when they have
been put on the statute books.
Much is said. in these attacks upon
the policy of the present administra-
ton. about the rights of innocent
stockholders" That stakeholder is
stock in a corporation whose methods
and management he knows to be cor
rupt; and stockholders are bound to
try to secure honest management, or
about the proceedings the government
finds necessary in order to compel the