Tonopah daily bonanza. [volume] (Tonopah, Nev.) 1906-1929, 1911-09-28
ANTI TRUST LAW AND POLITICS.


While the whole country is discussing the re-
ports,-some authoritative and others quite the
contrary-that every last interstate corporation
from the Atlantic to the Pacific and from the
Great Lakes to the Gulf big or little, rich or
struggng is just now moving heaven and earth
to set its house in order under the Oil and the
Tobacco DEGREES and while the "indusrials'' in
the stock markets shrinking in value under
concentrated bear" attacks, it is not without in
terest and significance that the politicians great
and small not failing to sense the opportuni-
ties for them that lie in all this agitation. And
neither the agitation nor the politicians conse-
qnent activity is good thing for the business of
the country-for this requires above all things
else an period of rest and recuperaton from
the scourge Of politics. But since much of the
hubbub centers around the Sherman law, general
comment on this phase of the situation is in
cvitable Our Washington dispatches, for in
stances project the following:
The political effect Of the movement to
dissolve and reorganze in conformity with
the law among the industrial combinations
is not being overlooked in Washington.
It's most important significance, according
to the administrations friends, will be to
prove the efficacy Of the Sherman law as
interpreted by the supreme court and to
Toilette who have declared that the court
emasculated the law and made it meffect
tive a weapon against trusts and com
bnations in restraint Of trade. President
Taft has been defending the supreme
court decision ever since it was delivered
and has declared that it will give vitality
TO the antitrust act His political adver-
SarieS have taken the opposite view and
are trying to make political capital against
the president by starting movement to
amend the law with view of making it
more effective.
There is absolutely nothing says the New
York Commercial III the contention that the sll
preme court has emaScuated the antitrus
law and made it ineffective as a weapon agains
combinations III restraint Of trade:'' for through
tWentH-one years or the great bulk Of that perioe
the act was practically dead letter under boil
republican and democratic administration. Sc
these is everything in the argument that the two
decisions OF May last gave "vitality' to thu
enactment. 1t was never much alive as 1t Il
today. And never before has it been such al
instrument for misunderstanding in the industrial
and the commercial world If the 'tpoltical adj
versaries' Of President Taft are working fol
the amendment of the law SO to make it more
effective, they are simply wasting their time anG
energy. How could it possibly be made more
effective than it is now? But it does neet
amending in order to make it more intelligiblt
and the manner of its application more specific
absurdities-and it has only recently been citet
by the president in defense of the law A MAJ
owned some steamboats, that did interstate
business on the Ohio river. He wished to sci
out He did sell out, and i'll the sale Of thu
steamboats, he wished to sell the good will Of Thu
line that he had been running. Accordingly h
stipulated that he would not himself engage il
that business between those same points for
certain number Of years. That interstat
business and his contract was in restraint o
trades but the supreme court held that it wa
a mere incidental reStraint-that is, incidental t
The sale Of the good will and not within
the statute That man did only what the Oil an
Tie Tobacco conn aneS did-yet the court let hin
eff but applied Tie law literally and rig 'lv I
both the big companies Suppose his IDEAL ha
involved every interstate steamboat line TIL
Ohio river? Is it mthinkablc that he would the
have been quite big enough for coculpri
with the Oil and the Tobacco men?
Does not law upon which the United State
supreme court easis, reverse itself stand i
serious need of amending?
meyer NAYS q lSC the name of an enninep