great political parties to incorporate in its platform the principle which I have announced, and which I am sure will commend itself to his judgment, and he will be speedily undeceived. He will discover that any hitherto supposed contest carried on against the Trusts was a mere skirmish. Against this proposal he would see real war. And yet it does not primarily propose to hinder the Trusts from doing whatever they please, nor is there any ultimate intent to hinder them from doing whatever is approved by the moral sense of the community. Years since I myself once proposed this plank— restricting it to quasi-public corporations, like railroads and water companies-in a committee which sat up all night to construct the most thundering denunciation of railroads which human ingenuity could devise, to be adopted in a great political convention then in session. The public mind was thought at the time to demand such a bolt, and it was forthcomingbut there were those on hand to see that it was not aimed at anything in particular. I was not specially uninfluential in the committee in other respects, and so far as I could see had as much force as any other member in shaping the thought and the language of the party platform, but that proposition was voted down without a ripple.

As I have said, I do not expect the present generation to unite on this principle, simple and obvious as it is. It takes too many years to educate the public mind to grasp simple truth. That it will come in time is sure because it is the only way out of the difficulty, and in the progress of our evolution we shall come to it and take it.

This chapter, up to the beginning of this paragraph, was written about 1896. If it had been written at the time these pages go to press, May, 1899, it is quite possible that, under the influence of the growing excitement in regard to Trusts, it might have been written in a somewhat different vein. For that reason I let it stand as originally prepared. Utterances framed under the influence of a strong public feeling are not likely to be very wise, or to be long remembered. Daily, for

some months, the press despatches have told of new Trusts formed with enormous capital, with the apparent intent to victimize the world. The political leaders on all sides see in this movement the opportunity to divert public attention from issues which they do not wish to discuss, and are contriving how their party may most readily be made to appear as the only reliable champion of the people against unholy and oppressive combinations which the "other party" can not be trusted to oppose. So far as either party can manage to put the other at a disadvantage, the question of the Trusts now seems likely to be an issue in the next presidential campaign. What form the issue will take it is not now possible to guess. It is possible that it may be on such rational lines as are indicated in this chapter, but it is not likely. The political platforms will probably contain tremendous fulminations against the oppression of concentrated wealth and rhetorical pledges which will get votes but commit the party to nothing in particular. So long as political campaigns cost great sums which rich men are relied on to supply, political platforms can not contain definite programs for the effective control of capital, until capital itself desires it. This will come in due time, and from the same causes which have already made railroads ready to accept control,-the competition of capital with capital, and the fear of popular disturbances.

If the reports which are now inflaming the popular imagination were true, some part of the basis of the reasoning in this chapter would be shown to be unsound, for the reports indicate that capital is combining, not as the result of unbearable competition, but, while in the full tide of prosperity, with the deliberate intent to become richer, by combining to extort additional and undue profits from a struggling people.

Doubtless there are such cases, usually not destined to succeed, but in the main I place no confidence in the reports. Of course I do not doubt that articles of incorporation are constantly filed, creating corporations of enormous capital for the control of almost every commodity in common use; but the most of them, I am sure, represent nothing but the fact that some party of "promoters" have obtained, or hope to

obtain, "options" to purchase the properties involved, usually at prices far in excess of their value, and have organized corporations to take over the property. If the "promoters can sell the stock of these great corporations they will buy the property, and retire rich. Those who buy the stock will lose all the money paid in excess of the real value of the property In a few instances, doubtless, there will be temporary success, but capital, however concentrated, will never be able to really and permanently oppress the people, for the people will not permit it.

The fact is that the American people, after a few prosperous years, are now ripe for an era of speculation, and those who live by promoting speculation have seized upon the Trust idea as affording their opportunity. The unquestioned success—for the time being-of some of these enterprises, in which the property, depressed by long competition, was bought in at really low prices, and greatly raised in value by organization, has opened the way. Great Britain has just had such an experience. A sharp but unscrupulous person, known as Ernest T. Hooley, organized in this way one or two companies, which were really successful, and for a time brilliantly so, upon the strength of which a craze started, which brought ruin to many, and the speculator himself to the bankruptcy court. Something like this is now "in the air" in America.

At the same time the genuine organization of substantial interests, in a natural way, and under the pressure of competition, is also doubtless going on, and the problem of properly and effectively dealing with them becomes daily more pressing. I think the proper method of beginning is indicated in the preceding pages of this chapter. The next step to take will be indicated by the facts when disclosed. Wild denunciation and programs which do not go to the root of the evil, are worse than useless. They are dangerous. If the people are inflamed, and the cause of their discontent not removed, there is danger to the public peace. No generation has ever been free from this danger, and ours is not. But we can not abolish the possibility of Trusts without paralyzing business. Whoever has anything to sell, whether it be manufactures, farm produce, or

labor, desires to be in a Trust. A law which could suppress the Oil Trust would make effective marketing societies of farmers impossible, as well as associations for the sale of labor. There can be but one law for the rich and poor.

The proper course to take is not to abolish Trusts, but to control them; not to run from them, but to defy them; not to permit them to oppress us, but to make of them our useful servants. To allow a few to oppress the many is absurd, and it will not be long permitted. Society is not going to the dogs; none but the unjust need fear the result. It is not difficult to lay out an effective program, although doubtless it may involve some reconstruction of our habits of thought and methods of procedure. If a Trust is enabled to become oppressive through the protection of the tariff, prescribe the conditions under which the tariff shall, without legislation, be removed from the commodity involved; if by means of a patent, prescribe the conditions under which the patent shall lapse; if by reason of legal technicalities, or the force of logical inferences from constitutional provisions, reform the procedure of the courts, or amend the constitution; if by reason of the impossibility of prompt remedial administrative measures, strengthen the executive authority. The way will open when the people make up their minds to move. And it will be a proper and just way. The people need not fear the money power. Indeed, they can not fear it half so much as the money power fears the people, whose power it knows. But with power goes responsibility. It is the duty of the people having the power, to exercise it wisely. They need capital, and should compel it to be their servant, paid properly, and protected carefully, but still their servant. This they will do as they come to understand the subject. And in this movement the farmers, the conservative class, with something to lose an yet much to gain, should take the lead.

CHAPTER VII.

D

THE FARMER AND THE REFERENDUM.

IRECT legislation by the people was the ordinary method of government in the ancient republics. Representative government is a comparatively modern. invention, made necessary, in nations desiring to maintain a free government, by the increasing territorial areas of states, and consequent impossibility of assembling the entire body of voters. Direct legislation in local affairs, however, has always been a feature of local government in New England, where "town meetings" regulate many of the details of local government. Traces of direct legislation in local affairs continue to exist in many places among the Germanic races.

At the present time there is a strong feeling among a large class in this country, in favor of direct legislation, not only to a much larger extent in local affairs, but in regard to many matters of state and even national legislation. The movement is based on the allegation that the people are better able to judge what they wish than to select men who will perform their will. Of those elected to legislative positions it is found that a certain number will betray their trust, frequently in sufficient number to defeat the will of the majority. The remedy, of course, is direct legislation on such subjects as the people desire to retain fully in their own control. It is claimed that the general intelligence of the people, and the facilities for the rapid diffusion of information, are now such that people can act intelligently and wisely on many subjects, which formerly their own interests would compel them to intrust to the decision of representatives who would be able to act in the light of information which would never reach the people.

The obstacle to the progress of the movement for direct legislation has been the fact that it has been most loudly