TRUSTS. 



705 



being intentionally created for the benefit of persons 

 combining together to accomplish such a purpose. 

 The legal principles that have led lo (lie repression of 

 Midi combinations are those just indicated, and their 

 applicability to suppress such improper combinations 

 cannot be affected by the form with which such com- 

 binations may be clothed. Where the object of a trust 

 is an unlawful act the trust is incapable of being 

 regarded other than as an unlawful combination, and 

 that such trusts exist does not admit of question ; 

 many of the trusts that have brought discredit, on the 

 system are not only of this class but present most dan- 

 gerous instances of such Unlawful objects. Such trusts 

 have been created to monopolize, the food supplies of 

 great cities like New York, and affecting as they do 

 the necessities of life are deserving of the strongest 

 condemnation. 



The most interesting question as to trusts is not 

 concerned with this class just indicated, but relates to 

 such as tend to supply the means of production and 

 transportation. While the trust that is merely a 

 disguised attempt to monopolize trade must be judged 

 according to its real rather than its pretended purpose. 

 one that is actually intended to afford larger and better 

 menus of production ami transportation must be 

 judged by different principles. Such trusts may in- 

 ilirt ctly diminish competition, but if this is the incident 

 or accident of their existence, their character is not to 

 be determined by that fact. 



It is the undoubted right of any number of persons, 

 great or small, to combine their interests for purposes 

 of controlling means for production, even although they 

 should be able to grasp in their control the industry of 

 the continent, and to deprive them of that liberty is to 

 make an encroachment upon individual liberty as it is 

 understood at this day in all free countries, while it is 

 true that if the necessary const qucnccs of filch liberty 

 should impair the social interests, it would be legiti- 

 mate to place it under legal restraint, yet before such 

 a sii p is taken its necessity should be dcmoiiMrated 

 and not merely anticipated. If it is a right of indi- 

 viduals to co-operate thus, it is equally their right to 

 repose the conduct of their interests in any person or 

 jx'fsons in whom they may desire to place that degree 

 of confidence. Whether they own fa'-tories or the 

 stock of such as are incorporated, they have an equal 

 right to unite with i.s many others as may cl" 

 join with them and to commit the management of 

 such property to persons of their own selection. The 

 disposition that maybe made by a stockholder of a 

 corporation of his stock is no more ihc subject of Ic.cal 

 control than is any other kind of property, and if lie 

 choose:- to unite with others to use it as capital in pro- 

 ductive enterprises he is at entire liberty to do so un- 

 der our laws. 



Whet her viewed as a question of law or of economy, 

 no limit has as yet been found to the possible aggrega- 

 tion of capital for industrial purposes ; and if there is 

 such a limil ascertainable, it has not been discovered 

 by the experience ol mankind ; and unless such a limit 

 is found and ascerlaiucd |>y laws, there can be no dif- 

 ference between the ca.-e of a single person trusting 

 the management of his property to one in whom he 

 lias personal confidence and ilie case of such trust.- on 

 the part of any number of such persons. 



Tin- reduction of the number ol persons producing 

 a commodity has no necessary tendency to diminish 

 the amount of that commodity produced, provided 

 the reduced number have the means and dc.-ire of 

 maintaining the supply, while, on the other hand, the 

 lc-s the number of persons produeing a given amount 

 of a certain commodity, the less should lie the cost of 

 its production. Over-production is a social evil, for 

 although it may afford momentary gratification, yet in 

 the end it will react against the social interests. Such 

 a concerted management of an industry as will tend to 

 prevent over-production must be regarded as a social 

 advantage, and the organization of uu industry as a 



whole and bringing it under unity of control has a 

 tendency in that direction. If this tendency is coun- 

 teracted by other causes tending to unduly restrict 

 production where there is concerted management of 

 productive interests, that fact is yet to be demon- 

 strated by actual experience. The tendency of social 

 development seems to lie iu the direction of the inte- 

 gration of industrial powers, and it is not yet clear 

 where is to be the limit to such tendency, and to 

 assume to fix an arbitrary limit before the true limit 

 is ascertained is a step that no intelligent statesman 

 will take. 



The existing popular discussion of the question of 

 suppressing or limiting the great trusts is of too ex- 

 cited a character to reach a safe conclusion. The con- 

 flict of individual interests has a conspicuous place in 

 such discussion, and is not a proper element of the 

 question as one of public law and policy. The con- 

 centration of capital necessarily displaces for the time 

 being individual advantages, and causes popular oppo- 

 sition to new and advanced conditions. In the present 

 instance-this cause is more energetic from the influence 

 of a widely extended opinion and feeling that the 

 object of social arrangements should be to enhance 

 the powerf of the individual by a corresponding de- 

 cicase of ihe influence of corporate and aggregate 

 masses. It is not to be expected that a safe solution 

 of either the theoretical or the practical question sug- 

 gested will be readied while these elements are com- 

 bined in public discussion. 



If it is perceived that the principles that have been 

 stated in relation to productive industries are sound 

 and applicable to the case, it will readily appear that 

 they arc of equal force in their application to the con- 

 ditions of transportation. Although trade and trans- 

 portation are embraced in the distributive function 

 that intervenes between production and consumption, 

 still they are separated by distinct principles. That 

 railway transportation demands concentrated manage- 

 ment is generally admitted, many persons believing 

 that that need cannot be satisfied otherwise than by 

 placing the entire system in the hands of the govern- 

 ment, while others regard that end as attainable by 

 combined individual efforts. 



It is equally true of transportation as of production, 

 that the proper relation between supply and demand is 

 a social need, and that it can be better reached by 

 concerted management than by ordinary competition. 

 What has been said of productive industry on this 

 subject needs no demonstration as to its applicability 

 to the case of transportation. 



It must be conceded by every intelligent thinker 

 that dangers attend the existence of great powers, in- 

 creased with the increasing magnitude of those powers. 

 Our experience with steam at high pressures and with 

 electricity demonstrates this fact, and that such dangers 

 are incapable of being separated from the conditions 

 of material progress. When it is ascertained how far 

 the development of material resources should be per- 

 mitted to go, a limit of the measure of the productive 

 powers ean be determined, but not until that time 

 arrives can such limitations be intelligently imposed. 

 America has the rule of competition with Europe 

 under conditions that render the highest organization 

 of its productive powers a necessity and cannot afford 

 to weaken the sources of its strength, and should not 

 be hasty in imposing political restraints upon the free 

 exercise of its productive powers. 



If the great trusts confine their operations within 

 the limits of a wise administration, they may prove to 

 be a great step in advance of the realizations of in- 

 dustry in the past; but if they abuse their powers and 

 seek to inconvenience rather than to serve the commu- 

 nity, the failure of the system will be due to their own 

 fault, and in the meantime the policy of the country is 

 to keep them within the line of their proper function, 

 and not to impair or destroy their useful powers, (.^eo 

 CORPORATION.) (A. j. w.) 



