Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1914-01-22

lsprings out of that experience. Legls
lation is a business Of Interpretation
not of origination and 1t Is now plain
what the opinion Is to which we must
give effect in this matter. 1t Is not
recent or hasty opinion. 1t springs out
of the experience of whole genera
ton. 1t has clarified itself by long
contest and those who for long time
battled with 1t and sought to change
it are now frankly and honorably
yielding to it and seeking to conform
their actions to 1t.
THE great business men who
organized and financed monopoly and
those who administered 1t in actual
every day transactions have year after
year, until now, either denied Its ex.
istence or justified it as necessary for
the effective maintenance and develop.
ment Of the vast business processes
of the country in the modern circum.
stances of trade and manufacture and
| finance; but all the while opinion has
made head against them. The aver.
age business man is convinced that
the ways of liberty are also the ways
of peace and the ways of success as
well, and at last the masters OF bust
ness on the great scale have begun to
yield their preference and purpose,
perhaps their Judgment also, in honor
able surrender.
| What we are purposing to do,
therefore, is. happily, not to hamper
or interfere with business as enlight'
ened business men prefer to DO 1t, or
in any sense to put it under the ban.
The antagonism between business and
government is over. We are now
about to give expression to the best
business Judgment Of America, to
what we know to be the business con-
science and honor Of the land. The
government and business men are
ready to meet each other half way IN
a common effort to square business
methods with both public opinion and
the law. The best informed men of
the business world condemn the meth
DDS and processes and consequences or
monopoly as We condemn them; and
the instructive Judgment of the vast
majority of business men everywhere
goes with them We shall now be
their spokesman. That is the
strength of our position and the sure
prophecy of what will ensue when our
reasonable work is done.
when serious contest ends, when
men unite in opinion and purpose,
those who are to change their ways OF
business joining with those who ask
for the change, it Is possible to ehect
it in the way In which prudent and
thoughtful and patriotic men would
wish to see it brought about, with as
few. as slight, as easy and simple
business readjustm as possible IN
the circumstances, nothing essential
disturbed, nothing torn up by the
roots, no parts rent asunder. which
can be left in wholesome combination.
Fortunately, no measures OF sweeping
or novel change are necessary. It
will be understood that our object is
not to unsettle business or anywhere
seriously to break it's established
courses athwart On the contrary we
desire the laws We are now about to
pass to be the bulwarks and safe
guards of industry against the forces
that have disturbed it. What we
have to do can be done in a new
spirit, in thoughtful moderation, with
out revolution of any untoward kind.
I'VE are all agreed that private
monopoly is indefensible and intoler-
able and our program is founded
upon that conviction. It will be a
comprehensive but not a radical or
unacceptable program and these are
it's items, the changes which opinion
deliberately sanctions and for which
business waits:
1T waits with acquiescence, In the
first place for laws which will effectu-
ally prohibit and prevent such inter-
lockings of the personnel OF the d.
rectorates of great corporations
banks and railroads, industrial, COM
mercial and public service bodies-as
in effect result in making those who
borrow and those who lend practically
one and the same, those who sell and
those who buy but the same persons
trading with one another under Diff
ferent names and different combina-
lions, and those who affect to COM
pete, in fact partners and masters
of some whole field of business.
Sufficient time should be allowed.
of course, in which to effect these
changes of organization. without IN
or confusion.
ouCn pIOulUltlOu VIII WI AAoAC
than a mere negative good by correct
ing the serious evils which have arisen
because, for example, the men who
have been the directing spirits OF the
great investment banks have usurped
the place which belongs to lndepend-
ent industrial management working in
it's own behalf. 1t will bring new men,
new energies, a new spirit of initia-
tive, new blood, into the management
of our great business enterprises. 1t
will open the field Of industrial de-
velopments and orgination to scores OF
men who have been obliged to serve
when their abilities entitled them to}
direct. 1t will immensely hearten the
young men coming on and will greatly
enrich the business activities of the
whole country.
I'm the second place, business men
as we'll as those who direct public af-
fairs now recognize with painful clear
ness. the great harm and injustice
which has been done to many, If not all
of the great railroad systems of the
by the way in which they have
been financed and their own distinctive