The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1911-01-17
WILSON TAKES
OATH OF OFFICE
As GOVERNOR
New Jerseys Democratic State
Executive Advocates Sweep
ing Reforms
SUGGESTS THE REGULATION Of
new JERSEY TP'''SS CORPORATIONS
Other Reforms Urged y. Leelsla.
ture Include Oregon h &ck Cold
Storage Investigation and h J
Y ton and Employers Liability Lax

Storage Investigation and %
4 uon and Employers Liability La,
Trenton, ~ ]. Jan. 17.-Governor
kEWoodrow Wilson today assumed the
duties Of chief executive of New Jer-
hey, and delivered his inaugural ad-
faress.
Swooping reforms in legislation.
not the foolish ardor of too sanguine
gDf too radical REFORM" the governor
lys. "but merely. the tasks that are
ddent and pressing" are urged.
hief among them are the enactment
aof an employers liability law pro-
llaviding for compensation to injured
md disabled workmen; the perfec-
1 tf0A and extension Of the direct pri-
mary law to all elective offices, and
ITO party nominations; a law restrict
ling the issuance Of charters to cor
sporations and providing for close
Mscrutiny and regulation of existing
corporations the enactment of a con-
\ servation law and revision of the ex-
tsting method of taxation. He said,
Gin part:
"The opportunity of our day in the
Stfield Of politics no man can mistake
who can read any. even the most sup
Herficial. signs of the times. We have
Rnever seen day when duty was more
plain. the task to be performed more
obvious, the way in which to accom-
plish 1t more easy to determine. The
whole world has changed within the
lifetime of men not yet in their thir-
ties; the world Of business and, there
fore, the world of society and the
world Of politics. The organization
, and movement Of business are new,
and upon novel scale. Business has
changed so rapidly that for long
time we were confused, alarmed, be-
wildered in q sort of terror of the
things we had ourselves raised up.
But corporations are NO longer
hobgoblins which spring at US out of
some mysterious ambush. nor yet ,un-
holy inventions Of rascally rich men,
nor yet the puzzling devices by which
ingenious lawyers build up huge
wrongs; but merely organizations of
a perfectly intelligible sort which the
law has licensed for the convenience
Of extensive business; organizations
which have proved very useful but
out Of the control Of the very law
that gave them leave to be and that
can make or unmake them at pleas
ure. We have now to set ourselves
to control them; soberly but effec-
lively, and to bring them thoroughly
within the regulations Of the law.
Employers Liability Law.
I'm the first place it is plain that
our laws with regard to the relation
of employer and employe are in many
respects wholly antipudated and i'm
possible They were framed for an
other age which nobody now living
remembers, which is, indeed, SO re-
I mote from our life that it would be
4 difficult for many of us to understand
NIT If it were described to us.
M Eve call these questions of en-
Ahployers' liability and workingmens'
Scompensation, but these terms do not
&suggest quite the whole matter. There
MS something very new, very big, and
Igvery complete about these new rela-
Mtions Of capital and labor. A new
economic society has sprung up, and
x we must effect a new set of adjust
$ments. We must not pit power
&against weakness. The employer is
generally, in our day, a powerful
Ngroup of individuals. and the work.
ingman is still, under our existing
law. an individual when dealing with
his employer, in case of accident,
n for example, or of loss. or of illness
II as we'll as in every contractual re-
lationship. We must have a work.
\ ingman's compensation act which will
\ not put upon him the burden Of fight
ing powerful composite employers to
obtain his rights, but which will give
him his rights without suit, directly
and without contest, by automatic
operation of the law, as II of q law
of insurance.
This Is the first adjustment need
ed. because 1t affects the rights, the
happiness, the lives and fortunes of
the greatest number, and because it
ia the adjustment for which justice
cries loudest. z
Limiting Corporation Grants.
1--WE are much too free with grants
of charters to corporations in New
Jersey. A corporation exists only by
license of law. and the law is re-
sponsible for what it creates. It can
never rightly authorize any kind of
fraud or imposition. 1t cannot right
eously allow the setting up of bus
mess which has no sound basis or
which follows methods which in any
wav outrage Justice or fair dealing
or the principles of honest industry.
The law cannot give its license to
things Of that kind. It thereby au-
thenticates what it ought to forbid.
II would urge the imperative OBJ
legation Of public policy and public
honesty we are under to effect such
changes in the law of the state as
will henceforth effectually prevent
the abuse Of the privilege Of incor-
poration which has in recent years
brought so much discredit upon our