ANTITRUST LEGISLATION

SPEECH

OF

HON. MARTIN B. MADDEN

OF ILLINOIS

IN THE

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

MAY 22, 1914

WASHINGTON

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

1914

The House in Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union had under consideration the bill (H. R. 15657) to supplement existing laws against unlawful restraints and monopolies, and for other pur

poses.

Mr. MADDEN. Mr. Chairman, those accepting responsibility as Representatives should not treat lightly the duties which go with such responsibility. We can not afford, when acting the rôle of statesmanship, whether with great or small capacity, to proceed impulsively or rashly or hastily. True statesmanship consists in a large percentage of deliberation and a very small percentage of action.

What, then, shall be said of a measure reaching into the very vitals of every industrial and commercial enterprise in the Nation, from the railroad systems, whose lines extend thousands of miles, and the banks, whose affairs are the direct interest of all, down through all gradations to the smallest-a measure introduced in January, discussed in committee superficially and spasmodically, and reported the first week in May?

The pending bill not only regulates the managements of carriers and the directorates of 350,000 corporations, including banks, but touches the private affairs and contractual relations of every citizen. It prescribes new and untried methods of carrying on private business, breaking up and displacing those which, having stood the test of experience, are normal and acceptable to all. The sum total of the country's business transacted in conformity to existing rules and methods is incalculable. The billions representing bank clearances do not tell half the story.

Who are those who, after a few weeks consideration, with constant interruptions due to other important legislation coming up, have recommended to this body a voluminous code of busi ness morality? Are our colleagues on the Judiciary Committee mechanical engineers or experts in finance, manufacturing, and transportation? Can they exhibit credentials or diplomas which justify our confidence in their familiarity with all science and all human affairs? Are they better fitted to build and equip railways, steamships, engines, and cars, or to operate them by the application of steam and electricity than those now so employed? Should we now, after such a brief schooling, take their word for it that it is a crime if a man owns stock in two corporations or is a director in both, or as a producer sells to A at a certain profit, while selling to B at a greater or less profit, or sells a customer an article at a dollar and offers it to him at 90 cents on condition that he be given the customer's continuous orders? Even if I thought I could ever be convinced of the wisdom and justice of such changes by

statute I would require better authority and more competent witnesses than the estimable gentlemen who have joined in a favorable report on this bill, for however sound their judg ment in legal matters, however successful they have been as politicians, I can not believe they have been able in four short months to master the intricacies of the 10,000 branches of business affected by this legislation, or to give convincing sociological reasons for severing the close relations that men have built on mutual confidence in dealings running through the years, and decades of activity. We are no more justified in accepting their judgments, so contrary to common knowledge and experience, than the railroads of the country would be if they employed at a princely salary some brilliant theorist and doctrinaire who asserted that he could show them where and how to save a million dollars a day.

Before entering upon the separate provisions of the bill I wish to call attention to the short period of hopeful feeling and renewal of confidence in the business world between the presidential deliverance on the 19th of January and the publication of the so-called "tentative bills" early in February—or, rather, to the deliverance itself-in order to emphasize the wide divergence between promise and performance.

The President said in his message that—

Constructive legislation is always the embodiment of convincing experience and of the mature public opinion which finally springs out of that experience.

He further said:

*

What we are purposing to do, therefore, is happily 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. And fortunately no measures of sweeping or novel change are necessary; what we have to do can be done in a new spirit, in thoughtful moderation, and without revolution of any untoward kind.

If it could be shown that there was a widespread or even any considerable demand for this legislation, still it would well become us, in view of its drastic character, to pause and consider until senseless clamor raised by the few mad and restless innovators who have prompted it had reduced their temperatures.

But, in sober truth, it has been concocted and sprung so unexpectedly, so suddenly, and demand or reason for it is so utterly wanting, that the action of the majority can only be accounted for upon the theory of supposed political advantage. If that theory be correct, then, however mistaken the Democratic opinion upon the political effect, no one will doubt the desperate nature of the emergency. The new tariff act has failed to reduce the cost of living, as was promised; the new currency act has not accelerated the wheels of industry, as was expected, hence this sudden tactical shift. The conciliatory message has been whispered into limbo in select presidential conclaves, and the dogs of war have been unleashed to tear and cripple the fabric of business and industrial life in its essence and structure to satisfy the clamor of the malcontents within the party. I again ask, Where and by whom and by how many is such legislation desired? It is a question that can not be answered, or if at all not satisfactorily, by naming shallow-pated doctrinaires and partisan opportunists.