A SUMMARY AND EXPOSITION OF THE PRECEDING PAGES.
Having familiarized ourselves with the elementary truths concerning the
Trust principle, we have now arrived at that point where we may begin to
shape an intelligent argument, but before so doing, let us summarize.
Perhaps we may now be able briefly to set forth the more important
features of the Trust or Combination.
GOOD QUALITIES OF THE TRUST.
1. It eliminates useless labor and energy.
2. It allays waste.
3. It economizes and reduces to the minimum the cost of production.
4. It reduces the world's work.
5. It tends to lessen the hours of labor.
6. It makes it possible to raise wages.
7. It makes it possible to lower the prices of commodities, and
thus reduce the cost of living.
8. It operates in harmony with the law of natural selection.
9. It destroys wasteful competition, and economizes by eliminating
the useless and the unfit.
10. It includes all of the advantages of co-operation without
altogether destroying the advantages arising out of the natural
instincts of rivalry, contest and emulation.
EVIL QUALITIES OF THE TRUST.
1. It throws large numbers out of employment.
2. It destroys many small dealers, jobbers and middlemen.
3. It tends to create monopoly in private hands.
4. It creates power in private hands arbitrarily to fix exorbitant
prices, to lower wages and to control the market.
5. It tends to create great wealth for the few at the expense of
the many, widens the chasm between the rich and the poor, and
causes concentration of wealth.
BALANCING ACCOUNTS.
We have, then, in the Trust, an immense commercial giant which is both
good and bad at the same time. If one had a fine thoroughbred horse
which balked, or shied, or kicked, should we destroy it because of these
evil qualities, forgetting that it also has an equal percentage of good
qualities? Or, should we try to cure it of its faults by training it to
do our bidding? We do not condemn and destroy a great machine because it
has a defective part, but we rather seek to remedy the defect.
The Trust is doing a wonderful work for the world. Like improved
machinery, it is lightening and lessening the toil of the human family,
and at the same time it is working a great injury. Labor-saving
machinery is also working injury, in that it is making large numbers of
men idle, but this is not sufficient reason to destroy it. Machinery and
Trusts are brothers. To be consistent, if we destroy the one we must
destroy the other. Before contemplating destruction of the Trust, let us
see if we cannot find some way to train and to harness it, like the
horse, so that it will be useful and beneficial. Let us try to devise a
method whereby the good qualities of the Trust can be preserved and the
evil qualities eliminated.