The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-05-06
The Colonel Makes Warm Answer to MT. Taft's
 Baltimore Speech QUESTIONS SINCERITY
 OF THE PRESIDENT Says After Lorimer Could Not Carry Illinois for Taft the President Rushed to Massachusetts and
 Repudiated Him

ment issued here tonight by Colonel Roosevelt in reply to President Tafts speech in Baltimore last night tho colonel asserts that Mir. Taft knew he was making an untrue statement when he said that the former president ex- pressed the opinion that the antitrust , law ought to be repealed. He also asaln eontradicts the President in re- , 7nrd to the Harvester trust case, say , that cabinet meeting and in prl- ? tte conversation with him. Mr. Taft 7 repeatedly and emphatically approved the course actually taken"
 the colonel returned this morning from his Maryland tour. He said hs expected to remain in Oyster Bay for l a week, before starting on his Ohio , campaign.
 Colonel Roosevelt's Answer
 Colonel Roosevelt's statement in part follows:
 With MT. Tafts personal opinion about me, 1 have no concern beyond l pointing out the sufficiently obvious s Tact that he never discovered that l , was dangerous to the people until 1 had been obliged to come to the con- olusion that he was useless to the peo- pie. But his specific statements as to ' the. trusts, tho crookedness in selecting delegates and the Lorimer incident , shall once again answer although have already answered them specffi- cally in Massachusetts and although Mr Tafts repetition of them now Is incom- l pathle with sincerity of purpose or l conviction on his part
 MT. Taft knew all the facts about the Harvester trust decision and Ia Was present at that cabinet meeting where they were all discussed and also [ in private conversation with me he re- Ipeatedly and emphatically approved the course actually taken just as he repeatedly and emphatically approved the course taken as regards the Ten nessee Coal and Iron company. He was absent from the country when Mir. smith was reporting to me and con sulting with Mr. Bonaparte but after his return in January the matter came up again and it appeared that MT. Bona parte had not understood that my Judgment was that the course advocated ! by MT. Smith was the proper one to E Rollew,
 Some Plain Words "Aceeidlngly the matter was gone over l at lengt in the cabinet nieting AIr. Bonaparte was the only member who
 was inclined to believe that the suit should be continued without regard 10 Mr. Smiths Investigation. Mir Taft enl- phatically took the opposite ground, and
 it is utterly impossible that he should now have forgotten that he did thus.
 
 posite ground
 "Of course us member of my cabinet. who at that time l was supporting for the presidency, he knew and could not avoid knowing everything of importance I that went on. It Is impossible to recon- cile his present position with any stand ard of honorable conduct, whether we ac- cept the view that he then approved what he believed to be wrong or whether we accept the only alternative, which Is .1a hs. by help remembering. Moreover he has been President for three years. Every document was in his possession through : out these three years, and if he Is right now, his three years delay is 1neNcns- able.
 'I saw MT Perkins in this matter pre- csely as I saw Mir. Morgan al the time of beginning the Northern Securities suit !, and as l saw representatives of the stand ard Oil suit just as in tu3 case Of every large suit saw any party interested who asked to appear before me l believe then and believe now that the course , urged by MT. Smith was the only one to take. MT. Smith is one of the most , efficient and high minded officials in , the public service. and while it was not necessary for me to, and while as mat ter of fact, I did not. make up my mind as to whether he was correct in his be- lief as to what the investigation would show, it my clear duty to follow his recommendation and have him make the investigation before any suit was un- dertaken. Mir Taft, not once merely. but again and again expressed his com pete acquiescence in this view.
 No Change on Trust Law
 MT Taft says I have changed my rnnd about the antitrust law. He well knows that the position [ take now is precisely the position I took again and again in speeches and in messages to Congress while I was President. He was Ithen in my cabinet and repeatedly ex- pressed his approval of what thus said
 MT. Taft says have said that the anti- trust law ought to be repealed. MT. Taft well knows that this is not true. have always explicitly stated that 1t ought to be kept on the books and really enforced (not merely nominally enforced, as had been done by Mir. Taft in the Standard Oil and Tobacco trust cases) against all trusts guilty of anti-social practices but have always said, and now say. that by itself the antitrust law will never solve this problem of dealing with the great corporations, and t.- to control the great Industrial interstate corporations we should have a law akin to the present interstate commerce law. but without the mischievous interstate commerce court.
 "Mr. Taft says that critcise him be- Il cause he prosecuted the Standard oil and Tobacco companies to the supreme court and got decisions there. On the contrary Mir Taft knows we'll that I criticised him. not for having thus continued the prose- cution Of the suits that had begun, but because after he had gotten these de- cisions he then permitted the department of justice so to shape matters that the result was complete nullification of all the good results of his suit.
 Doubts Taft's Sincerity
 His conduct in this respect Is quite Incompatible with any sincere purpose really to enforce the antitrust law.
 "Evidontly Wall street has made up it's mind that Mir. Taft's prosecutions are fake prosecutions, whereas the bitter hostility of Wall street to me shows how lively Is Its memory of the fact that my prosecu- tons were really prosecutions and hurt the persons prosecuted"
 I Colonel Roosevelt refers to the pend ling investigation of Judge Archibald of the commerce court and asserts that tho l,udge was appointed to placate Penn Isylvania politician. although the ap- lpcintee's alleged unfitness for the of flee had already been called to Presi- dent Taft's attention. The statement lcontinues:
 "ln Kentucky and Indiana. in New | = --