WALTER H. PAGE, EDITOR CONTENTS FOR APRIL, 1907 W. S. HARWOOD BADGERING THE RAILROADS THE HATRED OF THE TRUSTS THE SAVINGS OF THE PEOPLE WALL STREET AND THE PRESIDENT AN ACQUITTAL THE ADMIRAL OF THE ATLANTIC COAST WASHINGTON'S ANCESTRAL FARM (Illustrated) ARTHUR BRANSCOMBE RAILROAD CONSTRUCTION IN AFRICA 8715 8744 8749 8754 8763 IV-SALVAGE OF THE TWO PACIFICS (Illustrated) C. M. KEYS TERMS: $3.00 a year; single copies, 25 cents. Published monthly. Copyright, 1907, by Doubleday, Page & Company 1515 Heyworth Building DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY, 133 East Sixteenth Street Who succeeds the late President Harper as the executive head of the University of Chicago [See "The March of Events," page 8711] THE APRIL, 1907 VOLUME XIII NUMBER 6 E The March of Events VERY large combination of capital is nowadays called a "trust." Being so called, it is thereby condemned to execration and reviling. So widely has this term been expanded that it is freely applied to nearly every corporation whose capital runs into the millions. The people, inevitably unversed in the technical terms of law, are fast learning to hate the corporation as heartily as, some twenty years ago, they learned to hate the "trusts." Yet the difference between the "corporation" and the "trust" is as clear as daylight. It cannot be better stated than it was by Senator George, in the debate on the Sherman AntiTrust law in 1890: "It is the combination of these large and powerful corporations, covering vast sections of territory and influencing trade throughout the whole extent thereof, and acting as one body in all the matters over which the combination extends, that constitutes the alleged evil." Much harm may be done by the failure of the people to distinguish carefully between the corporation and the trust. President Roosevelt recognizes this difference difference very clearly. One cannot read his message to the first session of the Fifty-seventh Congress without concluding that he has no brief to attack the corporations, as such. Nor can one read his messages to the Fifty-eighth Congress without coming to the conclusion that he has determined to pit himself once and for all against the trusts. He recognizes that to our commercial growth great corporations are necessary; but he believes that in many cases the trusts must be curbed. The growth of the corporations and the growth of the trusts are two distinct phenomena. It is discouraging, indeed, to find a man of Judge Grosscup's standing falling into this very flagrant error, and preaching that error to the people, practically from the bench of a sovereign court. He seems to use as his premmises a supposition that every corporation is, of itself, iniquitous, and his argument is a collection of statements to show in what ways it is vicious. He declares that the corporation life of this country has destroyed the individual life, that our one-time independent, free, and untrammeled merchants, dealers, manufacturers are becoming mere "corporation clerks," and that even the savings of the people are no longer independent. These startling statements are not theses, propounded to be proved, but are stated as though they were recognized truths, axioms of our national life. Generally speaking, they are not true. Locally, here and there, they are true enough. Yet even where they are true, they fail of the force which Judge Grosscup gives to them. In Pittsburg, for instance, they are true; yet in Pittsburg there are to-day as many laborers as there were before the Steel Corporation was formed, if not more. More wages are paid, more work is done, more wealth is created. Light upon this question is needed, very badly needed. The light cannot be supplied by those who, like Judge Grosscup, start from premises that are inaccurate, or partly false. These men are but blind leaders of the blind, who must, we are told, both fall into the ditch. And the name of the ditch is Socialism. Copyright, 1907, by Doubleday, Page & Co. All rights reserved, |