The chronicle=news., 1914-07-24
THE TRADE coMM1ss1oN

i THE TRADE COMMISSION
The business men of the countr,
who want trade commission that
will assist in the Interpretation oi
the Sherman law are astounded al
the attitude of the Attorney General
lat Washington, who Is opposed tc
lgiving commission any work OF
Jurisdiction. except to carry on ma.
tional inquisition. The august At
toIney General makes the excuse that
a commission with any authority
might give some business man "im-
munity."
| Under present conditions the At
torney General practically holds On
imperial monopoly of power to grant
Immunity" No case against cor
poration or any one else can be prose-
cuted under the Sherman law except
by his direction: unless the case Is
so scandalous that the President or
ders action taken. No one knows.
outside his office. how many thous-
ands of complaints made by citizens
under the Sherman law have been
lpigenholed in the past fifteen years
by order of the Attorney General.
Only a few cases have been prose-
cutcd, but thousands of people have
been wronged.
Neither the public nor the men ac-
cused have any means of knowing
what goes on I'm the secret recesses of
the Attorney Generals department.
No one knows what motives control
the disposition OF the cases that are
not prosecuted.
Should one man hold the power to
grant immunity and exercise 1t In
secret. or Is 1t better that this pow
err should be held by commission
of five men, who are required by law
to give jrompt and open, public
hearing on every complaint that is
filed? The mere fact that public
hearing lis held does not grant Inn
munity. Legal immunity for crime
is only given when man is required
by legal authority to testify against
himself. A commission will be COM
posed, of intelligent men. and some
or all of them will be lawyers. They
will act In open hearings. where they
must answer to the public, and they
will not grant immunity for any
crime without reasons that will sat
isfy the public. This is vastly diff
ferent from the form of immunity
from prosecution that one man can
give in the secret recesses of gov
ernment department. by ordering his
subordinates not to prosecute.
Respectable business men want to
obey the law. They want a trade
commission to help them find out
what is legal and what is not. The
Supreme Court has only decided a
few of thousand questions that may
come up under the Sherman law and
the new bills now pending. Since
it decided that two national consoli-
dations of properties were illegal. no
mergers or cancellations have been
formed, although other kinds than
those condemned may prove legal.
Since Judge Taft afterwards Presi-
dent) decided that an association to
fix prices was illegal. no associations
of the kind he condemned have been
formed. Business men are quick to
obey the law. when they know what
1t is. and they want to know about a
thousand questions which the courts
have not yet decided.
When a business man is charged
with crime under a federal law.
the lawyers usually have three to
five years to bleed him before he
lands in prison. Respectable men do
not want to walt three to five years
to find out whether they must go to
iail for some technical offense
n every other respectable nation
in the world business men can 60 to
the proper office or commission OF
tho government and find out wheth-
er a contract, ora trade custom, or 4
trade practice, is legal. II they are
told 1t Is all right they can go ahead
without any fear of a midnight in
dictment by a grand jury. and 4 long.
expensive criminal trial which may
last until the victims money is ex-
hausted.
The United States is as backward
as Turkey or China in trying to regu-
late the affairs OF respectable. busi-
ness men by the machinery of GRIM
inal law. The object of constitu-
tion is to protect the citizen against
that kind of imperial government.
The Salvation Army can use any
cast-off clothing, furniture. kitchen
ntnr aa1a Mfsha~ hndAevw >xo Auv