| Show THE BIG STICK WAVES M wt KIP 1111 I 1 6 WE w 1 I 1 I 1 X im W aw al j V ON 0 ez 31 A A 4 ft government opens new antimonopoly anti monopoly campaign t headed by trust buster busier robert H jackson revives favorite american political custom by JOSEPH W labine la BINE the big stick is being waved once more in washington this time to an accompaniment of sound and fury that makes the trust busters austers in the lusty days day s of 1900 and 1910 seem like so many baa ing sheep by comparison cracking down is pretty much the same old game the terminology the amplification and the size of the field are different trust was the cry almost exclusively clu in the old days now we hear monopolies big business combines princes of privilege and sixty american families mentioned in the same breath A generation ago the antitrust anti trust campaigns were fought in the courts at comparatively small political meetings and in the press today they are fought in large measure over the radio with some of the governments ablest fire eaters stirring up millions of people in a long parade of special broadcasts in addition the current attack advances at one time in a vast number of directions that would have amazed and confounded the old timers but which are characteristic te of the tremendously increased scale of operation which the nation has come to accept from its government in recent years monopolies were originally scheduled to have been dealt with by the special session of congress which closed just before christmas but when it became evident that protracted wrangling was to keep even the wages and an hours bill the executive reorganization bill or any other of the must legislation for which the special session was called from being enacted the antimonopoly anti monopoly drive was switched posthaste post haste from the legislative chambers to the broadcasting studios assistant attorney general robert haughwout Hough wout pronounced haughwout Hough wout jackson and secretary of the interior harold 77 7 4 i X I 1 X I 1 4 AA A 1 V T W wo 1 pk M sen ellison D smith of south carolina shows how he hurled americas sixty families the book which inspired secretary ickes recent monopolies attack to the senate floor durin during a heated discussion sen josiah bailey of north carolina gave the book its first heave to the floor L li ickes were the nos 1 and 2 cheer leaders at this writing jackson is rumored about to become united states solicitor general seek new laws what these two and the president have said has been so widely heard and read that even the remotest hamlet is already familiar with it but what is the government actually doing not saying in in this renewal of the old familiar war against trusts the administration is again demanding that congress pass laws such as that requiring the federal licensing of corporations which will strengthen the campaign against big business and monopoly president roosevelt is seeking the operation cooperation co of heads of large corporations po rations toward a planned economy which may or may not remove some of the alleged evils and the antitrust anti trust division of the department of justice has 29 antitrust cases pending determination deter mi nation by the federal courts these are the evidence on the record of what the government is actually doing their scope defies history to produce a precedent four acts in effect the sherman antitrust anti trust law of 1890 remains still the most important of the rules under which the battle is being fought but there are three others the clayton antitrust anti trust act of 1914 the federal trade commission act of 1914 and the robin son patman law of 1936 to protect small business men from chain competition now the administration seeks more As robert H jackson himself has said the antitrust anti trust law is is an american invention it has served two noble american purposes it has kept the mushroom growth of american industry from killing itself and severely injuring the people in the period of its growing pains and it has provided excellent campaign material for ambitious politicians trust busting as the national political sport died at the opening of the world war from the time the sherman act was passed until the close of the first wilson administration there were a little over suits instituted by the government now since president roosevelt first took office in 1933 there have been 47 suits and more than h half if of them are still pending the in interim between the two eras of trust busting brought out certain inconsistencies in the federal attitude which the administration is determined to clear up jackson speaking before the georgala B bar ar association last may 28 pointed out what he termed one of the most obvious conflicts in our policy when he declared while the nation has forbidden monopoly by one set of laws it has been creating them by another patent laws valuable as they may be in some respects often father monopoly unless we are prepared to reconsider the conditions upon which we will extend patent protection we can have no consistent antimonopoly anti monopoly policy most conspicuous example of this line of reasoning is the aluminum company of america against which the government had filed suit a month before the jackson speech and which had so frequently been sued by the government without any conviction having been obtained that it has come to be known as public whipping boy no I 1 for the trust busters austers robert 11 IL jackson center is the busy director of the governments trust busting forces lie he carries the double burden of prosecuting the governments antitrust anti trust suits in new york federal courts and of campaigning for the governorship of the same state he is shown here with rep william P connery jr left and supreme court justice hill hugo wo L black before black was nam named ed to the high bench the company actually does manufacture all of the virgin aluminum ingot in the country today but explains the only reason there is no other firm producing virgin aluminum is the enormous capital investment required to make it on a large scale the electrolytic process invented in 1886 by charles martin hall made it possible for the company to reduce the price of aluminum from 8 a pound to 20 cents despite continually rising production costs but it is an expensive process the CO company now has such a head start that no group of investors has been willing to risk the capital necessary to set up a competing business paradoxically the same government now prosecuting it protected the hall patents until they ran out in 1909 monopoly charges against the ethyl gasoline corporation earl C webb and john coard taylor also grow out of the manner in which the government protects patents new york headquarters jackson as head of the antitrust division has 20 new assistants costing to help him wield the war club and has opened offices in the new york federal courts building for the big drive western union and postal telegraph systems are due to be tried there and he recently succeeded in obtaining permission to sue the aluminum company already operating under the consent decree of a pennsylvania federal court in new york where he is slated to run for governor this year an idea of the variety and scope of other federal antitrust anti trust cases pending in the courts may be gleaned from a brief summary of a handful of them jackson swears that the party dress guild inc is restraining interstate ter state trade in and misses party dresses monopolies are apparently making it something of a task for odd size ladies to get out at all even to parties for he also charges the half size dress guild inc with restraining interstate trade in and misses half size dresses the protective fur dressers corporation po ration lie he says is skinning the public as well as the more sprightly world of rabbits by restraining and monopolizing trade in rabbit skins local no of the international brotherhood of teamsters chauffeurs stablemen and helpers of america is charged with restraining the fruit trade the united sea food workers with tying up the salt water fish business and the Dairy mens association ltd with fixing the price of milk in honolulu oil defendants several oil company officials recently convicted at madison wis on charges of c conspiring 0 iring to restrain nap gasoline trade a are m making king plans to appeal the verdict federal investigations are being made of suspected monopolies if hi the rubber cement milk and window products industries A federal grand jury in milwaukee wis was investigating monopoly charges against automobile finance companies linked with ford chrysler and general motors but the court dismissed the grand jury without hearing its report much to the chagrin of the department of justice more will probably be heard on this score which of these suits will be won by the government which may bo dropped and which won by the defendants fend ants of course remains to be seen the record for the first era of trust busting up to a time shortly before the war was 42 persons imprisoned 1338 1333 fined and decrees secured in civil proceedings D western newspaper union |
