Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1908-02-06

curing. by speech. editorial. book, or
pamphlet the defense by misstatc-
ments of what they have done; and
misstatements by telling the truth they
declaim against them for breaking
silence. lest values be deprecated"
They have hurt honest business men.
honest working men, honest farmers:
being told.
The keynote of all these attacks
business and in politics Is well ex-
pressed In brazen protests against any
enort TOT the moral regeneration Of the
unnatural. unwarrantetd and injurious.
and that business panic Is the neces-
s sary penalty for such effort to secure
such plea is precisely as great as II
made on behalf OF the men caught in
gambling establishment when that
gambling establishment Is raided by
the police. If such words mean any
thing they mean that those whose sem
timents they represent stand against
generation of business which will pre-
vent a repetition of the insurance.
banking and street railroad scandals In
& Alton deal: a repetition OF the COM
bination between certain professional
politicians. certain professional labor
from the disgrace Of which bic Sam an Fran.
cisco has just been rescued; a repeti-
ton of the successful effort by the
competitor, to overawe the common
carriers, and to establish monopoly
which treats the public with con-
long as It permits men of such prin-
ciples and sentiments to avow and act
on them with impunity The outcry
against stopping dishonest practices
among wrongdoers who happen to be
wealthy Is precisely similar to the out
cry raised against every effort for
cleanliness and decency in city gov
hurt business" The same cutlery is
made against the department of JUS
tice for prosecuting the heads of colos-
against the men who in San Francisco
have prosecuted with impartial sever
tty the wrongdoers among business
men. public officials and labor leaders
alike. The principle is the same in
the two cases. Just as the blackmail-
er and bride giver stand on the same
who makes an enormous fortune by
corrupting legislatures and municipal
tiles and fleeing his stockholders and
the public. stands on the same moral
level with the creature who fattens on
the blood money of the gambling house
and the saloon. Moreover, in the last
analysis, both kinds of corruption are
would at first sight appear: the wrong
doing Is at bottom the same. Corrupt
business and corrupt politics act and
ment. one on the other: the corrupt
head Of a corporation and the corrupt
labor leader are both in the same de-
gree the enemies of honest corpora
tions and honest labor unions; the re-
bate taker, the franchise traffieker,
the manipulation of securities. the pur-
veyor and protector of vice. the black
mailing ward boss. the ballot-box stuff
er. the demagogue, the mob leader, the
hired bully, and man-killer-all alike
work at the same web of corruption,
and all alike should be abhorred by
honest men.
The business which Is hurt by the
movement for honesty is the kind of
business which. in the long run, 1t
pays the country to have hurt. 1t is
the kind of business which has tended
to make the very name high finance" a
term of scandal to which all honest
American men of business should join
in putting an end. The special plead
ers for busines dishonesty, in denounc-
ing the present administration for en-
forcing the law against the huge and
corrupt corporations which have defied
the law, also denounce it for endeavor-
ing to secure sadly needed labor legis-
lation such as a far-reaching law max
ing employers liable for injuries to
their employees.