EDITORIALS

...But labor cannot countenance crime, even if it be committed in the name of industrial justice...

...Those who think this an extreme statement, may well read this letter from the editor of a widely circulated publication to a citizen of Madison, Wisconsin, who was about to write some articles about it...

...Only those who are willing to take their lives in their hands or who for some reason feel themselves immune dare attack the postoffice, or "the powers that be...

...with restricting competition in boot and shoe machinery, thus checking invention and improvement...

...leave sacred to the individual all that belongs to the individual...

...They will not in the present instance...

...The Postoffice Department can put any publisher out of business any time they see fit...

...Nobody can know but Hitchcock or those associated with him...

...The whole situation is intolerable and inconsistent with that freedom of the press which is necessary to this nation's existence...

...Perhaps you expected the price of boots and shoes to fall...

...One very good reason is that the boot and shee manufacturers of the country are not free agents, but are held firm in the grasp of a powerful and rapacious corporation, the United Shoe Machinery Company of Boston, which, through its possession of the patents for certain machines required in the present-day processes of shoemaking, controls the entire trade...

...What is needed is a reform of the laws that place unregulated power in the hands of the Postoffice Department...

...And this is a journal—we shall not do it the disservice of naming it, though we know its name and its rank—which' is not managed by boys or imbeciles, but by strong men, who are in terror, for the very good reason that they are in danger...

...Could the expression of opinion be more completely trammeled under the Czar, than under Hitchcock...

...In his message returning the bill without his approval to the legislature, he says: "This bill has been lobbied for actively by members of the Supreme Court actuated by selfish purposes...

...About the only thing that I think we might do is to show how these interests do rule by slipping in jokers, but not especially accusing anyone in particular of putting jokers through, or inferring that there is any ulterior purpose in slipping them in...

...That is the disgraceful fact...

...But it didn't...

...That way lies despotism—after that anarchy...

...While this may be their privilege, it indicates the finite character of our courts, and proves to my mind that any recall law that might be enacted should apply to the judiciary with equal force as to other officers of government...

...Hitchcock "can put any publisher out of business...

...The despotic regulations of the Post Office Department have long been recognized by thinking people as tools made ready to the hand of tyranny...

...and with using its exclusive rights and privileges as holders of certain patents to restrain and injure trade and commerce...

...Could anything be more abject than that letter...

...The publications named as in trouble may or may not have deserved their fate—of that we have no way of judging...

...But right-minded people, also, do not prejudge cases of this kind...

...Canada Awake THE PAYNE-ALDDRICH TARIFF ACT removed the duty on hides and lowered that on boots and shoes...

...That this magazine dares express the sentiments herein written down may be attributed to the caution or the indulgence of the Postmaster General, rather than to any lack of power on his part to put us out of business...

...For such deeds there can be no defense...

...If McNamara and his conferees, acting either as officials of the iron workers' union or as individuals, are proven guilty of participation in these crimes, theirs must be the fullest penalty of the law...

...Or if it appears that the owner or holder of any patent has made use of his exclusive rights and privileges to restrain trade in any article or to limit its production or increase its price, the patent may be revoked...

...But why should we vaunt our freedom...

...Here is a paper, which really desires to serve the people, actually afraid to go farther than to call attention to the facts that "jokers" are slipped into laws, and is even at that afraid to accuse "anyone in particular of putting the jokers through," or to infer "that there is any ulterior purpose in slipping them in...

...WE WOULD SIMPLY take for the community what belongs to the community—the value that attaches to land by the growth of the community...

...The order for the appointment of a board of investigation has been issued, and a decision may be expected soon...

...That the hand of tyranny has grasped the tools, is now a fact which may as well be recognized...

...Until the case is proven against them, let us all withhold judgment...

...So if you write anything for us along the subject of our last Jetter, you will have to steer clear of anything criticizing the government or the powers that be so as to avoid getting us into trouble...

...Osborn for Judicial Recall AGAIN IS THE RECALL, applicable to the judiciary, urged in a governor's message...

...It provides that any six or more persons who believe that a combine exists by means of which prices are increased or competition restricted, to the detriment of consumers or producers, may make application to a judge for an order directing investigation into the alleged combine...

...Our Once Free-Press WE READ with pity and horror of the Russian newspapers which sometimes go to their readers with col-umns of printed matter blotted out because the sentiments expressed have failed to pass the press censor...

...Last year they passed a law intended to reach just such cases...

...Right-minded people do not tolerate violence under any name...

...In Canada the company operates under the name of the United Shoe Machinery Company of Canada, and the Canadian boot and shoe manufacturers are as absolutely tied down to it through its control of patents and its enerous contracts as are those of the United States...

...Trade unionism is the only present hope of the American working man for decent living wages and tolerable conditions of labor...

...It will probably be safer for us, to consider the fact that the steel trusts and other interests do rule, and let it go at that, saying nothing further about it...

...The terror of the publishers is a general terror...

...For he holds all publications in the hollow of hand—not the law, but Frank H. Hitchcock, established Censor of the American Press...

...Why not...

...It refuses to sell these machines, but instead leases them for long terms under contracts by which the manufacturers are forced to buy all or practically all of their other machinery and a large part of their supplies from the company at its cwn prices, in some cases 40 or 50 per cent, above those of similar supplies in the open market...

...If it results in freeing Canada from this trade tyranny, it is perhaps not too much to hope that profiting by this example, the United States may also find means for shaking itself free...

...The first application for an investigation under this act has come from certain Canadian boot and shoe manufacturers who charge the United Shee Machinery Company of Canada with increasing the cost of boots and shoes by placing the manufacturers at their mercy as regards the price of machinery and supplies, thus injuring both producer and consumer...

...This Jetter is published because its publicity may direct attention to the fact that publishers are in terror of the postoffice department, and are afraid to "criticize the government...

...Dear Mr...

...The publisher who wrote the letter cannot know...

...Governor Osborn vetoed a bill repealing the existing law that judges of the Suprenme Court should reside at the state capitol...

...The dynamiting of the Los Angeles Times building last October—if, indeed, it was dynamited—was Crime...

...If there be anarchists within the labor organizations, they must be weeded out...

...this time by Chase S. Osborn of Michigan...

...Let courts and juries be placed between the people, publishers and others, and ruin at the hands of bureau of officials...

...The men charged with these acts of violence will go to trial...

...But the Canadians take less kindly to domination of this kind than we do...

...Similarly the remarkable explosions in iron working plants in Cleveland, Milwaukee and elsewhere, if done with intent by human hands, were Crimes...

...Let publishers be punishable by laws, and not by Hitchcocks...

...Henry George...

...We don't want to give them cause to get after us because we have to build a building this summer and p.ut in a new press, which will cost us a pile of money...

...When the existence of such a combine is proved to the satisfaction af the Governor in Council, he may at his discretion, if it appears that the disadvantage under which the consumer suffers is facilitated by the customs duties, either admit the article concerned duty free or reduce the duty to an amount which will give the public the benefit of reasonable competition...

...Since we got news that the Herbert MyRick publications have been stopped by the postoffice because he has dared to criticize the government, although, of course, they do not claim that is the reason, we have been compelled to change our plans somewhat so as to avoid a like fate...