i8o Presidential Addresses 



concerned. The immediate introduction of substan 

 tial free trade in all articles manufactured by trusts, 

 that is, by the largest and most successful corpora 

 tions, would not affect some of the most powerful 

 of our business combinations in the least, save by the 

 damage done to the general business welfare of the 

 country; others would undoubtedly be seriously af 

 fected, but much less so than their weaker rivals, 

 while the loss would be divided between the cap 

 italists and the laborers; and after the years of 

 panic and distress had been lived through, and some 

 return to prosperity had occurred, even though all 

 were on a lower plane of prosperity than before, 

 the relative difference between the- trusts and their 

 rivals would remain as marked as ever. In other 

 words, the trust, or big corporation, would have suf 

 fered relatively to, and in the interest of, its foreign 

 competitor ; but its relative position toward its Amer 

 ican competitors would probably be improved; little 

 would have been done toward cutting out or min 

 imizing the evils in the trusts ; nothing toward secur 

 ing adequate control and regulation of the large 

 modern corporations. In other words, the question 

 of regulating the trusts with a view to minimizing 

 or abolishing the evils existent in them is separate 

 and apart from the question of tariff revision. 



You must face the fact that only harm will come 

 from a proposition to attack the so-called trusts in 

 a vindictive spirit by measures conceived solely with 

 a desire of hurting them, without regard as to 

 whether or not discrimination should be made be- 



