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Show SHARP RETORT BY DR. GLADDEN. COLUMBUS, O., April 1 Dr. Washington Wash-ington Gladden. moderator of the general council of Congregational churches of the United States, - has given out the following reply to the statement of H. H. Rogers, vice-president of the Standard Oil company: "Mr. Rogers alleges that the vat sums extorted In rebates by the Standard Oil company from Its competitors were 'legally' 'le-gally' taken because no law explicitly forbade for-bade them- What I eaid was that the money was 'flagitiously', acquired. To coerce the railroads Into an arrangement by which it received a large rebate 4n not- only Its own oil. but , on aU the oil sent by Its competitors, to force the railways rail-ways to rob Its compeUtors for its enrichment, en-richment, was, I submit, a flagitious policy, pol-icy, a shameful policy. If there was no law at that time by which that particular particu-lar kind of robbery could be punished, the robbery was no leas flagrant and outrageous. out-rageous. It was by this means' that this enormous power was created. "I am not a lawyer, but I should think It altogether possible that, even .under the common law, such an iniquity as this might have been punished. Railways which are chartered under publlo law must be required to render to all the people an equal service. If auch use of them as was made by the Standard Oil company could not be punished, our legal machinery would be very defective. "The denial that rebates have been extorted ex-torted since the interstate commerce law was passed Is not credible. I know, from statements made lo myself by parties Implicated, Im-plicated, that such rebates have been exacted ex-acted by other corporations. I doubt U the Standard Oil company to more virtuous vir-tuous than the rest. But It Is true that It has now gained a power in the classification and control of rates which makes It unnecessary to use the system of rebates. "Some of the apologists of the trust) are now asserting that the money under discussion has been, legally acquired. 'Legally,' 'Le-gally,' says a New Tork paper, 'there la no question that the money is Mr. Rockefeller's Rocke-feller's to give. If there is no such question, ques-tion, why to the United States Government Govern-ment now Investigating the operations of the Standard Oil company? It is not the morals of. the company Into which the Government Is looking;. It to the legality f Its practices. Some of us think that if legality Is the only test we have to apply to such transactions, It might be as well to wait and see whether they are found to be within the law." |