The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1914-04-23
Indignation Department.
Another Modern Instance For Your
Consideration.
re. w. Howes' Monthly.]


When the Standard Oil Co. was ordered
out of Missouri, in order that competing
companies might get chance to lower
prices. kerosene was selling in St. Louis
at wholesale at less than seven cents per
gallon. As soon as the Standard was
booted out of the State by the reformers,
the price was advanced to eleven cents
bv the down trodden opposition. The
people of Missouri soon discovered that
reform was actually costing them money,
so they demanded that the Standard te
forgiven. and again be permitted to do
business in the State. Forgiveness was
finally granted, on the paying OF sou, OOO to
the politicians, and the price of coal oil
in st. Louis again dropped to less than
seven cents a gallon. Any St. Louis
proceryman will verify the truth OF this
statement.
l cannot remember time when there
was not a vicious fight on the Standard
Oil Co., to give the opposition chance
to lower prices. Great regulations have
been made in fighting the Standard, and
charging it with throttling opposition,
in order that it might keep up prices.
Yet when the opposition got rid OF the
Standard in one State, thanks to the
help of the politicians, the opposition al
most doubled prices on kerosene and
gasoline. Millions of the peoples money
have been spent in fighting the Standard
for the benefit of rival oil companies.
The suits against the Standard COM
PAW in Missouri were not filed because
of complaints from the people. All the
complaints against the Standard came
from rival oil companies; and you know
that when a man talks of his opponent
in business. he.goes beyond.exaggeratlon
The suits against Big Business generally
are not filed because of complaints from
the people, but because of incessant
falsehoods circulated by the opposition.
The trust-busting policy OF the govern
ment is neither economic, sensible, nor
fair. 1t is the Old story of the poor
workman Directing because the good
workman is advanced beyond the mini
mum wage. Big business should be re-
gulated, but to needlessly biackmali and
annoy it, and force higher prices, is
disgrace not only to Reform, but to
Fairness and Common Sense.
POLITICIANS HAVE MORE POWER THAN
EMPERORS.
Politics is more ambitious every year.
Members of the Federal Reserve Board
will have greater discretionary power
than was ever before vested in small
number of individuals in this country in
time of peace. The power of the sup
RENE court of The United States IS more
limited than the power of the Federal
Reserve Board and the power of the In
ter State Commerce Commission Is IN
significant in comparison.
The members of the Federal Reserve
Board will be politicians; the board was
created by politicians, and the pay is
$12, 900 per year per member.
There was no public demand for such
a board: practical bankers opposed it.
The board, with all its power and ex.
pense, was Matched by politicians as an
experiment. If it hits, well and good;
if it misses, it will be shelved, and the
people will pay the losses.
There is steady growth in the num-
Der of our political masters, and their
power is incr asing. No king of old
ever had the power Woodrow Wilson
now exercises.
1t is not matter of principle: Mr..
Wilson refused to endorse equal suffrage
because his party had not endorsed the
idea, but in the matter of free tolls at
Panama, he defied his party platform.
And Democratic politicians promptly
got in line: not because they have par
ticular confidence in President Wilson,
but because he controls public patronage.
Why the expense of Congress Why
the absurdity of political parties, if their
platforms are meaningless: if one man
who was not in the convention may out
vote the hundreds who were :?