THE GREEN BAG derstanding the principles about which he is talking. But I do believe, for the con servative, conscientious lawyer and citizen, there is a work to do in limiting the power of individual and corporate wealth. Man has ever been abusive of power, and he can no more be trusted with unlimited power, when it takes the form of wealth or corporate power, than when it takes the form of gov ernment. Free government has ever been a struggle between unlimited power and unlimited license; and there is a middle ground along which people may travel; where the right of the many is superior to that of the few, and where a limit is placed upon power, to the end that all may enjoy greater freedom of action. Whether large aggregations of wealth, corporate or individual, tend to the perma nent benefit of the race; whether they add happiness, individual prosperity and good to the whole community, is undoubtedly a question about which political economists will differ. But, however this may be, one thing is certain, — and about this there can be no dispute, — it is necessary that cor porations shall be subservient to the law; for, when the time comes that they are greater than the law, they are greater than the government. Competition has ever been recognized as the right of every Englishspeaking people. Competitive forces have not only developed our country, but our manhood, and my judgment is, that aggre gations of wealth, either individual, in corporate form, or otherwise, may become so large as to endanger the right of the people to engage in all employments with equal opportunities, and unless they are curbed by the laws now in force, more drastic means will be found. We recognize that large aggregations of capital are necessary to certain industries, especially that of transportation. No indi vidual has, or should have, wealth sufficient to build and operate the great railways which have become a necessity in our complex, modern civilization; and it is .
with no hostility to such legitimate enter prise that we have passed laws, and are enforcing them, regulating railway cor porations. This is one of the great achieve ments of the day. The time was when transportation was largely a matter of con venience for the people in traveling from place to place. Much of the products of the country was exchanged in the village markets; was used in the immediate vicinity of production, and transportation was not such a vital factor as it is to-day. But the time has come when everything which the farmer raises, the merchant sells, the manu facturer makes, and substantially every article we use, bears a tax or charge for transportation. The village artisan has disappeared, and all that we buy or sell is transported upon the railway. The con struction of great lines of railway is beyond the power of the few, but is carried out through corporations, which can be managed by few but owned by many. It therefore becomes necessary and vital to the life and prosperity of the people that this public tax for transportation should be regulated by law. I do not agree with the remarks of the distinguished President of the American Bar Association when he said: "The recent session of Congress pushed the legislative power granted by the com merce clause of the constitution a long dis tance beyond any point reached before in that direction. Whether it went beyond the granted power, and by addition and enlargement asserted an authority not war ranted by the instrument, is another ques tion." I believe that the enactments of Congress, regulating the rates for transportation, are grounded on constitutional principles thor oughly established by the decisions of the Federal courts; that they are also in har mony with the progressive policy of the times. It is not for the best interests of the country to injure the railways. The millions upon millions of money invested in them are the savings of the people. The
