Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 22, Number 10, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 October 1900 — DEMOCRATIC RECORD ON THE TRUST QUESTION. [ARTICLE]

DEMOCRATIC RECORD ON THE TRUST QUESTION.

Every Line of Legislation Now on Our Statute Books Was Placed There by the Republicans, and the Democrats Voted Against a Constitutional Amendment to Them Only Four Months Ago. How the Democratic National Chairman Tried to Help the Sugar Trust—Facts from the Congressional Record. * Every liue of legislation now on the statute bouks of the United States directed against trusts and unlawful trade combinations was placed there by the Republicans. .. * That there is not more stringent la w against them is the fault of the Democratic party. 1 The last occasion on wliijfh the parties, as represented in .Congress, went on record on the trust question was on June 1. 1900. •> On that day a final vote was taken oil a constitutional amendment to grant Congress power to "define, regulate, prohibit and dissolve trusts, monopolies and combinations, whether existing in the form of corporations or otherwise.’’ It requires a two-thirds vote of Congress to submit a constitutional amendment to the State Legislatures for ratification. The question to so submit it was lost by a vote of 154 yeas to 132 nays. OF THE YEAS 149 WERE REPUBLICANS AND ONLY 5 WERE DEMOCRATS. The five were Campbell of Montana. Napben and Taylor of Massachusetts, Scudder of New York and Sibley of Pennsylvania. OF THE 132 NAYS, ONL<Y TWO WERE REPUBLICANS, Lour and Me- . Call. 1 ___ Riehardsou, Lentz, Sulzer, Ruppert, Salmon and all the other professional “trust killers'" voted NAY. They declined to give Congress the power to grapple with the Trusts. The Democrats indulged in spasms o*f virtue for two days, denouncing the trusts, and then voted to continue them. In one of Mr. Bryan’s recent speeches he gave the Republican remedy as ths final one be would adopt, in case be was elected and all other means failed. In other words, Mr. Bryan admits the value of the Republican idea, but wants to try other measures first. He has not said what those measures are to be. Some trusts operate all over the country; others, like the New York Ice Trust, operate in a single city. The requisite power to reach each and all and bring them within the Federal law, WAS DENTED BY A MARGIN OF 30 VOTES, ALL DEMOCRATIC. Denouncing is one thing. Doing is another. Mr. Bryan’s trust denunciations, in view of his party’s record, promise no better than the prophecies he made four years ago; and as a prophet Mr. Bryan has not succeeded. Senator Jones and the Sugar Trust. The Democrats made another brilliant pro-trust record during the same session of Congress Representative Richardson of Tennessee, Democrat, tried to assist the Sugar Trust by offering a joint resolution to admit Cuban and Porto Rican sugar free of duty. The remission of that duty would have amounted to about $25,000,000 a year, and the Sugar Trust would have benefited to the amount of at least $15,000,000 per year. The controller of the Sugar Trust is Mr. Henry O. Havemeyer, Democrat. Mr. Richardson’s proposed gift to his friend Mr. Havermeyer was smothered in the Ways and' Means Committee of the House. This was done by the Republican members of the committee. It was also proposed by Senator Jones, Democratic national chairman and Mi-. Bryan’s manager, to return the duties paid on Porto Rican sugar and molasses, not to the Porto Ricans, but to the persons who paid these duties. This amounted at the time to $1,487,866. Had the scheme succeeded, the American Sugar Refining Company and A. S. Lasalles & Co., a part of the same concern, would have benefited by a direct gift of $1,250,774. This is the first instance on record where a direct gift was intended to be made to a trust, and the Democratic manager, Senator James K. Jones, wished to make it. This was also prevented by the Republicans. The money was not to be returned to the Porto Ricans, as the duties paid now are, but to the Sugar Trust. All the facts are printed in the Congressional Record and are a part of American history.