Great Falls daily tribune., 1919-05-02
COOPERATION AND COMPETITION.

delivered before the chamber OF commerce OF
the United States told his audience that "Aneri-
can business in the future will be more COOP
erative than competitive" and he went on to add
that the laws designed to force competition and
prohibit cooperation were out Of date having
served their purpose and needed revision. He
evidently referred to the antitrust Jaws.
Just what the secretary means by co-opera-
tion we are not sure. Be we have come to agree
with him that competition is not in every in
stance, or even in the majority Of instances,
public or social benefit. In former times>lt was
the sole and only defense Of the public against
exploitation and the evils of unrestrained monop-
oily. It was praised by the political economists
and the statesmen of the past age until the gen.
eral public came to regard it as a great virtue
to be fostered and preserved at any cost That
was before the idea of state regulation Of private
business was born at least generally practlced.
It might have been, and probably was necessity
in those days. The same school Of political
economists who preached it so strenuously as
the gospel Of truth, also preached the doctrine OF
sole reliance on competition and the non-inter-
ference Of government with private business,
all business that was not political being private
business in those days. It was the same mis-
take that propagandists often make when having
discovered new truth or an old one in new
clothes, they seek to make it stretch over the
whole realm of social life. 1t is the mistake
made by pioneers in many sciences notably that
of medicine. Seeing good effects follow the ap-
pIication of their theories in some cases they
announce the discovery of sovereign remedy
for all the ills mankind are heir to in the ply
sical or social body.
Competition brings down the price to its nor
NAL level the old political scientists told us just
as quinine cures all fevers. Competition does
sometimes bring down prices of things we need
to normal and reasonable price It also some
times raises prices above reasonable level by
dividing the volume of business into too small
fractions and SO increasing the overheard charges
unduly SO that larger margins of profit are nee
essary to avoid bankruptcy, and the cost of
utilities are increased to the consumer. Compe-
tition is also essentially cruel. 1t relentlessly
pushes the weaker to the wall and in the pressure
labor gets ground down fine where cooperation
among the sellers of labor are not strongly or
ganized and possessed of the power to protect
and defend themselves. In fact it was out of
the cruel operation Of the laws of competition
which demanded production at the smallest pos
sibe cost that the first trades unions in England
arose. Every manufacturer of cotton and wool
en- cloths in England tried to undersell his COM
petitor and in that effort lower wages were a
prime requirement. So in order to meet COM
petition wages in the weaving trade were forced
below the scale of the most miserable existence
Then trades unions were formed to protect the
weavers against the cruelties Of competition
and none too soon at that, for wages were forced
to SO low scale that it became practically i'm
possible for whole family working from day
light to dark and beyond that to get enough
food and clothes and warmth to do anything
more than sustain life. The wage Garner was
the first to learn that competition needed some
restrictions and regulations. The whole social
body has gradually been brought to see the same
truth.
Yet it marks the progress made in an en-
phatic way when member Of a cabinet, and a
part Of the political government Of the nation
is willing to make public announcement of the
fact that antitrust laws designed to prevent CO.
operation and force competition are outgoWn
and no longer suitable for the country. Not
many years ago no responsible man in any gov
ernnlent and no politician would have been will
ing to make such announcement, even though
convinced of its truth, for the axiom that COM
petition was the life of trade and the only pos
sibe protection against exploitation and monop-
oily prices was still current and regarded as re-
vealed truth by great many people. The op-
GRAFTON of the railroads by the government
served very largely to overthrow this idol in the
faith Of the peOple When the necessities of the