294 Missoun Agricultural Report. 



attitude of the American people when they demand that business 

 should be honest and honorable, even though they admire busi- 

 ness which is great and magnificent of proportion. They simply 

 demand that those old-fashioned principles of common honesty ap- 

 ply in large corporate affairs as they apply among individuals in 

 small affairs. 



Now I would be insensible and violate the conditions which 

 are incident to youth and the future which belongs to youth if 

 I should attempt to pronounce a hopeless prediction as to the fu- 

 ture. I say to you that I believe that the American people will be 

 capable in the future, as they have proven themselves, to be in the 

 past, of dealing with any question our national life can produce. 

 I believe they are prepared to approach the consideration and set- 

 tlement of these great questions produced by the conditions of our 

 commercial and industrial life. I believe they are prepared to 

 approach this consideration and settlement with caution and de- 

 liberation; the pitfalls and the obstacles that vested wrongs, mas- 

 querading under the name of vested rights, may place in their 

 pathway cause them to seem to falter and to hesitate ; but they will 

 not falter, they will not hesitate, they will proceed. They will 

 proceed in such a way that no one can truly say that a single dol- 

 lar invested in honest enterprise has suffered diminution in its 

 value. 



I do not believe that socialism or governmental ownership 

 offers a solution or a remedy. I do not believe that we would 

 benefit ourselves by resolving ourselves to that natural state in 

 which each would give to all the produce of his own labor and his 

 own mind. But I do not believe the present condition, in which 

 a large part, if not the larger part, of our trade and commerce is 

 unlawrful both in its plan of organization and the methods in 

 which it is conducted, can continue. I do not believe that our 

 present industrial system can continue half lawful or half unlaw- 

 ful. It must be legally and fairly conducted if it hopes to survive. 



I do believe that the American people, rising equal to 

 this emergency, will see that the unlawful shall cease and conform 

 itself to the laws that represent the experience of centuries and 

 the moral judgment of eighty millions of people. And I believe 

 that this result will be accomplished not by any legerdemain or 

 trick of finance ; not by any radical departure from the beaten paths 

 and the precendents of legislation and executive action. I believe 

 it will be accomplished as the result of the application of the old 

 time principles of common honesty and the demand that they shall 



