Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1908-05-07
| RIGHT AUST Be DONE
| ROOSEVELT DECLARES
Rouses Congress with Another
Singing Message Demand
ing Action.
TO STOP INJUNcTIoN's ABUSE
Need of Meeting Popular Will and
Curling Lawless Wealth Is
Pointed Out.

Curling Lawless Wealth Is
Pointed Out.
President Roosevelt sent special
message to Congress Monday asking
that further power be extended to the
Interstate Commerce Commission and
that action be taken on plans of leris-
lation he has urged in former messages.
The President cenSured the man who
stirs up class hatred, whether he be-
longs i'll the ranks of the rich or the
poor, and decried corruption. either by
labor or capital. The executive likens
home of the millionaireS of the United
States, whose SOUS are fools" and
whose daughters are foreign prin-
cesses," TO ''marauding barons of the
dark ages
The message was sent to Congress
late in the day. Conditions in both the
Senate and House were such that the
message received but scant attention.
Legislation Demanded.
The President in his message demands
the following legislation:
Restriction of federal iniunc-
tions.
Strengthening of antitrust law.
Recompense for injured govern
ment employees.
Child labor law for the District
of Columbia.
Continuation of the water ways
commission.
Tariff commission to clear the
field for revision at the beginning
of the next session.
Financial legislation including a
commission to study the situation
here and in Europe and providing
for postal savings banks
Appropriations to permit the in
terstate commerce commission to -
take actual control over the ac-
counting systems of railroads.
Forest reserves in the Appalach-
ian Mountains,
Two measures are mentioned as being
not certain OF passage at this session. and
the President recommends their favorable
consideration before adjournment.
One of these is bill to limit the power
OF injunction and punishment for con-
tempt of court in order to relieve condi-
lions which arise in labor disputes.
The other is bill to strengthen the
antitrust laws, although at the same time
lodging IN the executive branch of the
government power to permit combinations
that will benefit the public interest.
In connection with financial legislation
the message recommends commission of
experts who shall Thoroughly investigate
the whole matter, both here and in the
great commercial countries abroad. so as
to be able to recommend legislation which
will put our financial system on an eff
cient and permanent basis 1t is much
to be wished that one feature of the finan-
clal legislation of this session should be
the establishment of postal savings banks
Failure to provide means which will
enable the commerce commission to exam
inc the books of the railways" says the
message, would amount to an attack on
the Hepburn law at its most vital point,
and would benefit, as nothing else could
benefit, those railways which are corrupt
ly or incompetently managed.
Wants Limit on InjunctiOn's Use.
Continuing, the President says:
There seems, however much doubt
about two of the measures | have recon-
mended, the measure to do away with
abuse of the power of injunction and the
measure, or group of measures, to
strengthen and render both more efficient
and more wise the control by the national
government over the great corporations
doing an interstate business.
First, as to the power of injunction
and of punishment for contempt In con-
tempt cases, save where immediate action
is imperative, the trial should be before
another judge. As regards injunctions,
some such legislation as that | have pre-
viously recommended should be enacted.
1--WE are trying to steer a safe middle
course which alone can save us from a
plutocratic class government on the one
hand, or socialistic class government ON
the other. either of which would be
fraught with disaster to our free institu-
tions. State and national.
There is grave danger to our free in
ercised by great wealth suddenly concen-
trated in the hands of the few.
my personal belief is that ultimately
we shall have to adopt a national incor-
poration law, though / am we'll aware
that this may be impossible at present.
1.-The decisions of the Supreme Court in
the Minnesota and North Carolina cases
illustrate how impossible is a dual con-
troll of national commerce.
SAT present the failure of the Congress
to utilize the great power conferred upon
it as regards interstate commerce leaves
this commerce to be regulated not by the
State nor yet by the Congress, but by
the occasional and necessarily inadequate
and one-sided action of the federal judi
ciary.
However upright and able a court is,
it cannot act constructively it can only
act negatively or destructively. as an
agency of government, and this means
that the courts are and must always be
unable to deal effectively with a problem
like the present.
THE heartiest encouragement should be
given to the wage workers to form labor
unions and to enter into agreements with
their employers, and their right to strike,
so long as they act peaceably, must be
preserved. But we should sanction Meth
er boycott nor a blacklist which would
be illegal at common law
RELIGION AND REFORM.
two-Weeks revival ar the Methodist