The true Democrat. [volume] (Bayou Sara [La.]) 1892-1928, 1913-11-22
SPEECH OF DON cAFFERY.

the Roberts committee on new proVlS-
ions and made the following argument
in support of the Patterson antitrust
ordinance;
"On the proposition that capital
must be encouraged to come to Louis
lana, and must be given free hand to
develop our industries and resources
nobody differs with the eminent mer-
chants and bankers who oppose the
amending of Article $780, If the ques-
ton were merely one of banking, or Of
the counting house, would not have
the temerity to take issue with them.
"The question is the very broadest
and the most vital in social and in po-
litical economy; and it has been set
tied, gentlemen of the committee, by
all the great thinkers, and by all the
great law-givers, and by a mass OF
practical legislation, against the views
of these eminent merchants and bank
ers.
"All of us are in favor of extending
our trade, of bringing in new enter
prises and of the growth of the banks,
but it is short-sighted policy to try
to do that by encouraging monopolies
and combinations in restraint OF trade.
There is too much for capital to do
for anybody to say that we are fetter-
ling it when we forbid it to crush out
lcompetition, and to conspire to perpe-
trate business assassination. Capital
has it's rights and its legitimate sphere,
but that is no reason for saying to it.:
Tyrannize, conspire against the hum
BILE shop of the yeoman; destroy the
business of thousand small trades.
linen
But this, gentlemen, is no longer an
lopen question. The whole of Angle.
Saxon legislation on this subject may
be summed up in these words: Mo.
Inopolies and restraints of trade bene'
lit no one, for they rob the many, and
they turn into degenerates and heart
less monsters the few who are char
tered to rob-
"That is what the United States has
Isaid through the Sherman act; that is
what all of our sister states, with q
flew disgraceful exceptions, have said;
that is what the English Parliament
said as far back as the year 1923, in
the twenty-first year of King James
when it established the rule of double
and treble damages in favor of the
victims of monopolies; and that is wha
| the State of Louisiana said when the
antitrust statute of 1892 was passed.
at is no innovation, therefore, tt
Iprohibit monopolies, and it is only be
cause of wretched technical flaw il
the statute of 1892 that we are nov
without a working antitrust law.
ITO say that we shall permit mo
nopolies and conspiracies against thu
freedom of trade would be to put our
selves back to where our English an
cestors were in 1923, and would be ;
lrepudiation of the Louisiana statute
of 1892.
"The technical flaw which makes
the statute of 1892 invalid arose from
its containing an exception in favor o
those engaged in agriculture, etc. Tha
exception was as useless as it wa
fatal, because it has since been decid
ed by the Supreme Court of the Unit
ed States that the antitrust acts affec
nothing but trade and commerce, an,
that agriculture is not trade and com
merce.
when monopoly comes to excus
and defend itself it does not forget tn
) devices it uses to pile up it's profits
for it is making the state ring with it
protests that this convention met for
, particular purpose, and that to correc
that breakdown in the statute of 1879
: was not on the program.
How careful men ought to be no
to do the right thing, at odd hours, re
! CARELESS of schedule; and how wron
: in the shepherd to protect his focl
, if wolves get in, when he is plannin
how to settle with his creditors!
Zone of the snug storm-cellars 70
the trusts to retreat into until popula
indignation blows over, and the oppol
3 tunity to throw off their yoke is gone
l is to say that the Federal Government
must deal with them under the Shel
3 man act, and that If we run them GU
of Louisiana they will turn up, ur
: harmed, in Wisconsin, or in Florida
or in New Jersey.
IF we are to wait for the interpos
ton of higher powers, why not fol
our hands and leave the trusts to God
Why not abolish our railroad commits