WAR ON THE TRUSTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15550, 6 March 1914, Page 8

WAR ON THE TRUSTS.

PRESIDENTIAL MESSAGE.

ESSENCE OF THE PROPOSALS. [FROM OCR OWN CORRESPONDENT.] San Francisco, February 3.' President Wilson's anti-trust programme, of which forecasts had been made .public, was stated in definite form in a formal message to Congress read by himself on January 20. The essence of the proposals is contained in the words that the Government and business men are ready to meet each other half-way "in a common effort to square business methods with both public opinion and the law." Of the seven chief recommendations of the President, it is generally expected that Congress will pass five with but little opposition, and practically in the terms set out in the message. These are:—Prohibiting of interlocking directorates or corporations; regulation of railroad security issues by the Inter-State Commerce Commission; punishment of individuals for violation of the anti-trust statutes; grant of right to individuals to use Government evidence as basis for private damage suits under the anti-trust law; prohibition of what are known as holding companies." As to the two other recommendations, they will be adopted if Congress and he can agree upon the terms of legislation, but so far the President is said to be in doubt about the extent to which the legislation should go. The recommendations in question are: —Explicit definition of illegal methods and processes which shall be considered as violations of the anti-trust law; formation of Inter-State Trade Commission which is to aid in helping corporations to conform to the law. The programme, as the President says, is founded upon the conviction that " private monopoly is indefensible and intolerable." He asserted to Congress that the programme will bring new men, new energies, a new spirit of initiative, and new blood into the management of the great business enterprises. "What we are purposing to do," he said, "is not to hamper or interfere with business as enlightened business men prefer to do it, or in any sense to put it under the ban. The antagonism between business and government is over. We are now about to give expression to- the best business judgment of America, to what we know to be the business and conscience of the land. . . . We ought to see to it that penalties and punishments should fall, not upon business itself, to its confusion and interruption, but upon the individuals who use the instrumentalities of business to do things which public policy and sound business practice condemn." The message has been well received by the country, and the President is commended, fox his moderai tion.