The Inland Investor from Topeka, Kansas • 7

7 INLAND INVESTOR KANSAS AND THE STANDARD Governor E. W. Hoch, in New York Independent, Commends the Kansas Plan and Advises Other States to Follow. The Standard Oil Company is a national and an international monopoly. It has for years carried on a systematic absorption of the oil interests of this country and of foreign countries.

It has been the cause of bankruptcy to many small investors and threatens to bankrupt all of them who oppose its greedy ambitions. Thousands of people have invested their, hard earned money in oil property, only to see the Standard Oil Company nation, but are a subject for immediate legislation. Taking into account all the unused properties and the endless amount and variety of expense of this great corporation, a dividend of 40 to 60 per cent is simply extortion to the people. It is exploitation of the many for the benefit of the few. If these conditions continue the protests of the people will constitute a cumulative force the release of which will sooner or later be an upheaval.

It is for their own protection as well as for the public good that moneyed interests of the Standard Oil class should submit to what is just and right. I am more than ever convinced of the wisdom the plan of state refineries as a means of combating the hurtful tendencies of Standard Oil invasion. I have the utmost faith in the success of the experiment in our state, and if our expectations here are met, this becomes the national remedy. Since signing the state refinery bill I am in receipt of a flood of telegrams, some congratulatory, others asking for information concerning the state refinery movement. These messages comer from companies and from private individuals alike.

They denote the widespread monopolistic influence of the Standard Oil Company as well as the universal welcome which measures of relief will receive. These messages come in greater or less number all the way from Pennsylvania to California. In my judgment a state which has the oil industry to protect within its borders should not hesitate to take immediate action of some definite sort looking to close state control of the business. If a half dozen states start legislation similar to the action Kansas has taken in the past ten days it would become a most effective check on the greed and rapacity of this giant of trusts. It seems an especially opportune time for legislators to listen to the voice of their constituency.

It is said that the question is too new, that legislators had only a short time to consider the control of these great corporations. I answer that the people have watched and studied the situation for at least 10 years in Kansas, and that in other districts it is a matter of 25 years of observation and study. If legislatures will listen to the people they will find them a unit in demanding relief. I do not advocate oil legislation as a weapon of offense so much as I advocate it as a weapon of defense. The effort in Kansas is protection, not attack.

If such legislation as we have enacted in Kansas becomes an attack by confession of the Standard Oil Company the latter is defeated by its own argument. The people of the country want nothing but exact justice and fair play and they are determined to have both. I wish to emi3hasize and re-emphasize that the state refinery method of protecting state oil interests is not so American principle of a square deal to every man. In many localities the startling condition prevails that the majority of people accept this denial of equality of opportunity as the best condition obtainable. Such a state of mind in the average citizen is the danger point in public affairs.

As yet perhaps this state of mind is limited to sections, but it is the seed of a dangerous growth. More than all the questions of big profits or little profits, monopoly or no monopoly, is the importance of assuring all the people all the time that all men are equal before the law. Wherever this confidence has been destroyed it must be restored. It is but applying to this government the first great law of self-preservation. The action of Congressman Campbell in asking for an investigation of Standard Oil and the very favorable attitude of Congress and President Roosevelt toward this investigation are very timely.

The sooner legislative and judicial remedies are applied the better. Because, first, more than average good business conditions are upon us and the country is prosperous. Sentiment against monopoly is yet reasonable. No money stringency or industrial depression threatens. There is no tendency to a frenzy among the people.

It is the great conservative American citizenship which now, after deliberation, asks a redress of grievances. No denial or equivocation will suffice for reply. The body of citizens will know whether they have been answered in sincerity and with justice. The greatest display of politics and the greatest wisdom that can now occur will be to give the great American conservative sentiment a direct and honest reply from the places of respected authority. The present sentiment is not, for punishment, but for protection.

The sentiment now is for the square deal and for that only. A continuance of parley and equivocation will carry the people beyond a desire for protection only. Second, the power of the Standard Oil Company increases at an alarming rate. Simultaneously with the recent petulant and arbitrary order to withdraw from the1 Kansas fields came an announcement of the quarterly dividend of 15 per cent to Standard stockholders. From 40 to 60 per cent annually have been the recent dividends of this great company.

Large profits in themselves are not cause for condemnation. But when these profits are secured by throttling competition, in a word, by the absolute monopoly of the field of business, they are not only subject to condem GOVERNOR E. W. HOCH. get it on terms of its own dictation.

Working by localities, reducing the price of crude oil and increasing the price of refined oil, has been the history of this powerful and rapacious corporation in all its fields of operation. It owns its railroads, its pipe lines, its steamships, its rolling stock and controls for its own end many of the financial concerns of the country. Time and again evidence has been direct that it controlled senates and entire legislatures. It has been conscienceless and brazen in utter disregard of private and public rights. Ultimately there can be but one result if the methods and ambitions of this great corporation are not checked and made to observe the limits of public welfare.

It will become greater than the state, will dictate terms to the state and force its non-competitive, socialistic, destructive methods into every line of business. It has forgotten and now denies the great A.