was at stake and that it was impossible for democracy to continue to exist in a country where accumulated wealth had attained to such

colossal power.

He even hinted at the most drastic means in dealing with this power. In his New Jersey campaign of 1910 one of his favorite passages ran like this:

"When I think of the power wielded by these men and of the manner in which they got their wealth and consequently their influence, I am tempted to take down my old shotgun as the only way to meet the emergency."

Great enthusiasm invariably followed the delivery of such remarks. Men felt that here was a champion without fear and without selfish ambition, but only desiring to rescue the Republic.

In 1911 and in the early part of 1912 Mr. Wilson left his post as Governor of New Jersey and made prolonged tours throughout the country, earnestly preaching the same doctrine. Everywhere he made a deep impression. The dominance and rapacity of the Trusts was his theme, and the urgent need that their abnormal power should be sharply curbed. In his book, "The New Freedom," he had elaborated the same thought, and made of it what might be

called an unanswerable demonstration.

When people listened to the eloquence with which the author supported on the platform the argument he had made so convincing in his writings, the feeling was general that here was a marvelous new leader, a man of unshakable courage and great wisdom.

For thirty years the growing power of accumulated wealth had worried all patriots. Here was the man that saw how to solve the problem and assuredly would solve it if he had the chance.

This feeling of the people was the thing that put Mr. Wilson over at the national convention of the Democratic party. People at large had confidence in him. It is true that he was supported at Baltimore by all the railroads and the railroad politicians and railroad delegates, but even these could not have nominated him without the general belief of the people that here was a man that knew how to curb the Big Business and could not be controlled nor fooled. Other men had been fooled and might be. But not the man that wrote "The New Freedom " and gave to the country that wonderful vision of emancipation from the power that had seized the government.

This is why there was such intense interest in the President's Trust message on January 16. He had been in office ten months then and had done nothing whatever to curb the Trusts nor to diminish the sway of accumulated wealth, but had on the contrary shown many alarming signs of yielding to these powers of evil. It was believed however that he was but waiting to deliver a message that would end all doubt and put to rout the enemies of the republic.

Some of the things he had done had been exceedingly disquieting to his friends and admirers among the people.

When he selected his cabinet, for instance. His Secretary of the Treasury was chosen for him by Kuhn, Loeb & Co., of Wall Street; his Secretary of Commerce was the active head of the Blower Trust, which had been investigated by the very department of which he now became the chief; his Attorney General was a graduate of the office of Paul Cravath, one of the most conspicuous and adroit corporation lawyers in the United States; his Secretary of Agriculture was a beneficiary of the insidious Rockefeller Fund, his Secretary of War had been a judge in New Jersey at a time when the Pennsylvania Railroad ruled the state with ab

solute power; his Secretary of the Navy and Postmaster General were Southern reactionaries.

But this was not the worst of the story. The man that obviously should have been Attorney General was Louis Brandeis, who first had exposed and then had valiantly fought the rotten management of the New Haven railroad. Mr. Brandeis was slated for the place; if it was not directly promised to him his friends were given to understand that he was to have it; and Mr. Brandeis himself was twice summoned to Princeton to confer with Mr. Wilson, when the powers back of New Haven, which were chiefly the great Morgan Group and allies, put forth their influence, and Mr. Brandeis was turned down and Mr. Cravath's protégé appointed.

It was then given out that Mr. Brandeis was to be Secretary of Commerce. Again the New Haven crowd pulled the strings and Mr. Brandeis was sacrificed for the head of the Blower Trust.

In other words, a Trust man was set to catch the Trusts.

One of the first important issues with which Mr. McReynolds, the new Attorney General,

was called

upon to deal with was the celebrated Anti-Trust case that is called the "Dissolution of the Harriman Merger."

Now here was a Trust that had furnished a conspicuous instance of the lawless power of accumulated wealth put on trial.

The late E. H. Harriman had practically combined the Union Pacific and the Southern Pacific, for thirty years rivals and competitors, and in so doing was alleged to have violated the Sherman Anti-Trust law, forbidding combinations in restraint of trade.

This law was passed in 1890 to abolish Trusts. For many years, so far as Trusts were concerned, it was a dead letter, or worse. One Attorney General declared frankly that he had no intention of enforcing it; others said that it could not be enforced, which was another way of saying the same thing. Finally, attention being persistently drawn to the fact that whereas the law was not enforced upon Trusts, against which alone it was designed, it was being strictly enforced upon labor unions, against which it was never designed, the Department of Justice tardily awoke and began to bring suits against corporations that had violated the law. The Harriman merger of the