How Corporations Fight

HOW CORPORATIONS FIGHT.

When a couple of big corporations get to warring it they smash things in a way that would make most people faint if the same acts were committed under government, state or municipal authority. The Western Union Telegraph company and the Pennsylvania railroad are at war, the latter having canceled a long standing contract under which the Western Union occupied the railroad right of way with its poles and wires. The telegraph company was ordered to move out and after the the usual period of litigation the order was sanctioned by the courts. Thereupon without a moment's delay the railroad company sent out special trains loaded with men and axes, and the Western Union's poles were chopped down wherever found, and the wires were cut and twisted and thrown into the adjacent fields. The destruction of the property was made as complete as possible, and as rapidly as it could be done by the experts in charge of the job. It is estimated that $300,000 worth of property in poles and wires was destroyed in a single day, and without so much as a quiver of the corporation conscience. This the way corporations fight. If a municipality cut as much as a single offending telegraph or telephone pole what a sensation it would cause and what a protest would go up against the willful destruction of property.--Grand Rapids Herald.

A railroad bill now on the general order in the house at Lansing will, if enacted into law allow the Grand Rapids & Indiana. the Grand Trunk on its Detroit & Grand Haven branch and another short road, to charge three cents a mile in place of two and a half cents as at present. It appears that the Grand Rapids & Indiana is still charging three cents a mile although the law requires a drop to two and a half cents. Not only is this road defying the law, but it now desires to have this defiance legalized. The chief reason presented to the house by T. J. O'Brien, attorney for the G. R. & I., for desiring this change in the law is on account of the increase of taxes. In other words, the road desires its income to remain the same no matter what the taxes may be and the road wants the law changed so that the increase of taxes can be legally taken out of the pockets of the people who do business on that road. This is the usual method by which the great corporations meet increased taxes. This is a bill that should be promptly strangled.

The house and senate at Lansing are still by the ears over primary election matters. The machinists in the senate are now, it is said, in a frame of mind to concede something to the advocates of a new primary system, but are not willing to go far enough to induce the house members to stand with them. The senate, it is reported, is ready to pass a bill permitting the people to nominate county candidates by direct vote of the people, but the house desires to add to this at least the candidates for the legislature. A law including all local candidates and members of the legislature would not be a bad starter. It would not go as far, of course, as most believers in primary reform think it should, but it would constitute a good beginning and might not be an unsatisfactory compromise. If the law worked as the friends of the idea believe it would, experience under it would certainly lead to its extension. Better such a measure than none, for it would carry a substantial measure of progress. Still it is by no means certain that even such a law can be enacted. But it would be better to have none at all than one that would be doomed to failure and bring the principle in disrepute. 

Senator Foraker seems likely to force the hand of Senator Hanna by a resolution endorsing President Roosevelt for renomination next year. The feeling manifested by Senator Hanna over the matter indicates pretty strongly that he desires to be a candidate for president himself next year. There is no reason apparent for his opposition to a resolution endorsing Roosevelt except that he does not want Ohio tied up so long beforehand as to presidential candidates. This means that Hanna will be a candidate if conditions are right. Do the people want such a man for president? Senator Hanna is a man of large ability, but he is of very different material from the usual run of presidents. His principal qualification is that he is enormously rich and handled the biggest corruption fund ever spent in a presidential campaign.

The bill just passed by the legislature requiring the bonds of public officials to be indemnity bonds furnished by trust companies at the expense of the public is a step in the right directions and should meet with general approval. Bonds are required to insure the public and the public should pay for this insurance just the same as an individual pays for the insurance of his house or his barn or his life. A citizen is taken up by the public, elected to office and required to give a bond for the faithful performance of his duties and is expected to get his friends to become responsible to the public for him and to make good to the public any loss the public may suffer, but why should the friends of such official be called upon to protect the public in such matters? It is simply a matter of business and should be treated as a matter of business and not a matter of friendship. An indemnity company furnishes bonds for a consideration and understands how much must be charged to conduct such a business at a profit. It understands just as does the insurance company, what its rates must be in order to assume the risk and make a profit on its business. It therefore looks carefully after the risks assumed with the expectation of paying in case of loss. Such a bond is generally much better for the public also than the average bond put up by friends of the official. It is to be hoped that the before mentioned bill will, if it has not already, receive the governor's signature and become the law of the state.

A bill has been prepared by Deputy Attorney General Chase, it is said, after the manner of the recent libel law o Pennsylvania. It is not expected it will be passed at the present session because there is said to be no title of a bill already introduced which can be utilized for such a measure. There is also possibly some doubt as to whether Michigan is entirely converted to Quayism and Pennsylvaniaism. In its blind adherence to anything bearing the republican label Michigan is possibly a pretty close second to Pennsylvania; but Michiganders are not quite ready to concede that the state has as great a degree of this subserviency was the Keystone state.

It is said that the members of the legislature have really had a twinge or two of conscience relative to the great expenditures of the people's money that they have provided for. It is not to be supposed, however, that this will restrain the members from keeping on. Each man of them thinks the other fellow's bill should be cut off and not enacted into law, but each member understands that their respective measures must stand or fall together and so the work of depleting the treasury will undoubtedly continue to the end.