Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1910-09-02

lead to war upon the owners OF prop
erty. Property Is the fruit of labor; prop
erty is desirable; Ia a positive good in
| the world. Let not him who is houseless
| pull down the house of another but let
him work diligently and build one for
| himself, thus by example showing that
| MS own shall be safe from violence when
oullt 1t seems to me that in these
words Lincoln took substantially the atti-
| tude that We ought to take; he showed
the proper sense of proportion in his rela-
| tive estimates OF capital and labor, of
human rights and property rights. Above
all, in this speech, as in many others, he
| taught a lesson in wise kindness and
| charity; an Indispensable lesson to us of
| today But this wise kindness and char
| ity never weakened his arm or numbed
his heart. We cannot afford weakly to
| lFnd ourselves to the actual conflict
which faces us today The issue is Join
ed, and we must fight fail.
Equality of Opportunity.
In every wise struggle for human bet
| terment one of the main objects. and
| often the only object. has been TO achieve
| I'm larger measure equality of opportunity.
| In the struggle for this great end ma
| tions rise from barbarism to civilization,
| and through it peoples press forward from
! one stage of enlightenment to the next.
/ One of the chief factors in progress is
|
| essence of any struggle for healthy lib
| erty has always been and must always
| be to take from some on" man class
of men the right TO enjoy power, or
! wealth, or position. or immunity, which
| has not been earned b. service to his
| or their fellows.
At many stages in the advance of hu-
| ma nifty this conflict between the men who
| possess more than they have earned and
| the men who have earned more than they
possess is the central condition of prog
| reSs. In our day It appears as the strug
! gle of free men to gain and hold the
! right Of selfgovernlnent as against the
| special interests. who twist the methods
| of free government into machinery for
| defeating the popular will. At every
| stage and under all circumstances the
! essence Of the struggle is to equalize OPP
portunity, destroy privilege, and give to
the life and citizenship of every individ-
ual the highest possible value both to
himself and to the commonwealth.
Practical equality of opportunity for all
citizens, when we achieve it, will have
two great results. First, every man will
have fair chance to make of himself all
that in him lies, to reach the highest point
to which his capacities, unassisted by
special privilege of his own and unham-
pered by the special privileges of others.
can carry him, and to get for himself
and his family substantially what he has
earned. Second equality Of opportunity
means that the commonwealth will get
from every citizen the highest service Of
which he is capable. No man who car
ries the burden of the special privileges
of another can give to the commonwealth
that service to which it is fairly en-
titled.
l stand for the square deal. But when
say that I am for the square deal
mean not merely that I stand for fair
| VNIoIy
but that / stand for having those rules
changed so as to work for a more sub
stantial equality of opportunity, and of
reward for equally good service.
This means that our governments, Ma
tlonal and State. must be freed from the
sinister influence or control of special
interests. Exactly as the special interests
of cotton and slavery threatened our po-
litical integrity before the Civil war, so
now the great special business interests
too often control and corrupt the men and
methods of government for their own
profit. We must drive the special inter
eGts out of politics. That is one of our
tasks today Every special interest is
entitled to justce-full. fair and COM
plete-but not one is entitled to a vote In
congress- voice on the bench, or to rep
resentation in any public office. The Con-
stitution guarantees protection to proper
ty. and we must make that promise good.
to any corporation.
Property Should Be the Servant.
The true friend of property, the true
conservative is he VINO insists that prop
erty shall be the servant and not the
master of the commonwealth; who insists
that the creature OF mans making shall
be the servant and not the master Of the
man who made 1t. The citizen of the
United States must effectively control the
mighty commercial forces which they
have themselves called into being
There can be no effective control of
| corporations while their political activity
remains. To put an end to it will be
neither short an easy task but it
can be done.
We must have complete and effective
| publicity of corporate affairs, so that the
| people may know beyond peradventure
| wnsther the corporations obey the law
an.s whether their management entities
| them to the confidence of the public 1t
| is necessary that laws should be passed
| to prohibit the use of corporate funds
| directly or indirectly for political pur-
! poses; 1t is still more necessary that
| such laws should be thoroughly enforced.
| Corporate expenditures for political pur-
/ poses, and especially such expenditures
by public service corporations have sup
! piled one of the principal sources of cor
| ruption in our political affairs.
| 1t has become entirely clear that we
| must have government supervision of the
| capitalization not only of public service
corporations, including particularly rail-
| ways, but OF all corporations doing an
| Interstate business. l do not wish to
see the Nation forced into ownership of
| the railways If it can possibly be avoided
and the only alternative is thoroughgoing
| and effective regulation. which shall be
| based on full knowledge of ali the facts
| including a physical valuation OF the
| property. This physical valuation is not
| needed, or at least is very rarely needed
| for fixing rates: but it Is needed as the
| basis OF honest capitalization.
We have come to recognize that fran
| chises should never be granted except
| for limited time. and never without
| proper provision for compensation to the
| public. 1t Is my personal belief that the
| same kind and degree of control and
| supervision which should be exercised
| over public service corporations should
| be extended also TO combinations which
| control neCessares Of life. such as meat
| oil. and coal. which deal in them on
| an important scale.
| I believe that the officers. and espe-
| cially tAs directors OF corporations
| should ha held personally responsible