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wrong-doing, be broken up, but it 
should be made the business of some 
administrative governmental body, 
by constant supervision, to see that 
it does not come together again, save 
under such strict control as shall in- 
sure the community against all repe- 
tition of the bad conduct—and_ it 
should never be permitted thus to 
assemble its parts as long as these 
parts are under the control of the 
original offenders, for actual exper- 
ience has shown that these men are, 
from the standpoint of the people at 
large, unfit to be trusted with the 
power implied in the management of 
a large corporation. But nothing of 
importance is gained by breaking up 
a huge inter-State and international 
industrial organization which has 
not offended otherwise than by its 
size, into a number of small con- 
cerns without any attempt to regu- 
late the way in which those con- 
cerns as a whole shall do business. 
Nothing is gained by depriving the 
American Nation of good weapons 
wherewith to fight in the great field 
of international industrial competi- 
tion. Those who would seek to re- 
store the days of unlimited and un- 
controlled competition, and who be- 
heve that a panacea for our indus- 
trial and economic ills is to be found 
in the mere breaking up of all big 
corporations, simply because they 
are big, are attempting not only the 
impossible, but what, if possible, 
would be undesirable. They are act- 
ing as we should act if we tried to 
dam fhe Mississippi, to stop its 
flow outright. The effort would be 
certain to result in failure and dis- 
aster; we would have attempted the 
impossible, and so would have 
achieved nothing, or worse than 
nothing. But by building levees 
along the Mississippi, not seeking to 
dam the stream, but to control it, we 
are able to achieve our object and 
to confer inestimable good in the 
course of so doing. 
The Nation should definitely adopt 
the policy of attacking, not the mere 
fact of combination, but the evils 
and wrong-doing which so _ fre- 
quently accompany combination. 
The fact that a combination is very 
big is ample reason for exercising 
a close and jealous supervision over 
it, because its size renders it potent 
for mischief; but it should not be 
punished unless it actually does the 
mischief; it should merely be so 
supervised and controlled as_ to 
guarantee us, the people, against its 
doing mischief. We should not 
strive for a policy of unregulated 
_ competition and of the destruction 
of all big corporations, that is, of all 
the most efficient business industries 
tion and not one of destruction. 
in the land. Nor should we per- 
severe in the hopeless experiment of 
trying to regulate these industries 
by means only of lawsuits, each 
lasting several years, and of uncer- 
tain result. We should enter upon 
a course of supervision, control, and 
regulation which we should not fear, 
if necessary, to bring to the point 
of control of monopoly prices, just 
as in exceptional cases railway rates 
are now regulated. Either the Bu- 
reau of Corporations should be 
authorized, or some other govern- 
mental body similar to the Inter- 
State Commerce Commission should 
be created, to exercise this super- 
vision, this authoritative control. 
When once immoral business prac- 
tices have been eliminated by such 
control, competition will thereby be 
again revived as a healthy factor, al- 
though not as formerly an_ all- 
sufficient factor, in keeping the 
general business situation sound. 
Wherever immoral business prac- 
tices still obtain—as they obtained 
in the cases of the Standard Oil 
Trust and Tobacco Trust—the Anti- 
Trust Law can be invoked; and 
wherever such a prosecution is suc- 
cessful, and the courts declare a 
corporation to possess a monopolis- 
tic character, then that corporation 
should be completely dissolved, and 
the parts ought never to be again 
assembled save on whatever terms 
and under whatever conditions mav 
be imposed by the governmental 
body in which is vested the regula- 
tory power. Methods can readily be 
devised by which corporations sin- 
cerely desiring to act fairly and hon- 
estly can on their own _ initiative 
come under this thoroughgoing ad- 
ministrative control by the Govern- 
ment and thereby be free from the 
working of the Anti-Trust Law. 
But the law will remain to be in- 
voked against wrong-doers; and 
under such conditions it could be 
invoked far more vigorously and 
successfully than at present. 
It is not necessary in an article 
like this to attempt to work out such 
a plan in detail. It can assuredly 
be worked out. Moreover, in mv 
opinion, substantially some such 
plan must be worked out or business 
ehaos will continue. Wrone-doing 
such as was perpetrated hv the To- 
haceo Trust. should not onlv he nun- 
ished, but if possible punished in 
the persons of the chief authors and 
beneficiaries of the wrong, far more 
severely than at present. But pun- 
ishment should not be the only. or 
indeed the main, end in view. Our 
aim should be a nolicv of construe- 
Our 
aim should not be to punish the 
men who have made a big corpora- 
tion successful merely because they 
have made it big and successful, but 
to exercise such thoroughgoing su- 
pervision and control over them as 
to insure their business skill being 
exercised in the interest of the pub- 
lic and not against the public inter- 
est. Ultimately, I believe, that this 
control should undoubtedly indi- 
rectly extend to dealing with all 
questions connected with their treat- 
ment of their employees, including 
the wages, the hours of labor, and 
the like. Not only is the proper 
treatment of a corporation, from 
the standpoint of the managers, 
shareholders, and employees, com- 
patible with securing from that cor- 
poration the best standard of publie 
service, but when the effort is wisely 
made it results in benefit both to the 
corporation and to the public. The 
success of Wisconsin in dealing 
with the corporations within her 
borders, so as both to do them jus- 
tice and to exact justice in return 
from them toward the public, has 
been signal; and this Nation should 
adopt a progressive policy in sub- 
stance akin to the progressive policy 
not merely formulated in theory but 
reduced to actual practice with 
such striking suecess in Wisconsin. 
To sum up, then. It is practi- 
cally impossible, and, if possible, it 
would be mischievous and undesir- 
able, to try to break up all com- 
binations merely because they are 
large and successful, and to put the 
business of the country back into 
the middle of the eighteenth cen- 
tury conditions of intense and 
unregulated competition between 
small and weak business concerns. 
Such an effort represents not pro- 
gressiveness but an unintelligent 
though doubtless entirely well- 
meaning torvism. Moreover, the ef- 
fort to administer a law merely by 
lawsuits and court decisions is 
bound to end in signal failure. and 
meanwhile to be attended with de- 
lays and uncertainties, and to put a 
premium upon legal sharp practice. 
Such an effort does not adequately 
punish the guilty, and yet works 
great harm to the innocent. More- 
over. it entirely fails to give the 
publicity which is one of the best 
by-products of the svstem of eon- 
trol hv administrative officials: 
pnbheitv. which is not only good in 
itself, but furnishes the data for 
whatever further action may he 
necessarv. We need to formulate 
definitely a poliev which. in dealing 
with hig eorporations that hehave 
themselves and which contain no 
menace save what is necessarily po- 
tential in any corporation which is 
