Another Movement Against “The Greatest Socialistic Corporation”
By L. A. S.
In a recent issue of The Independent Governor Hoch, of Kansas, states the convictions upon which is based the action of the Kansas Legislature in providing for a State oil refinery, to break the monopoly of the Standard Oil trust in that State. The following extracts from his article show that while the present move against the Standard Oil monopoly is, in his view, only a defensive one, he also sees that a continuation of present conditions will sooner or later result in a popular “upheaval” against the strongholds of capital, in which all forms of law will be disregarded. It is significant that while leading men in this country hope and expect that the antagonisms which have arisen between the people and the plutocracy will be quieted by some legal and orderly readjustment of affairs, they nevertheless see that unless the expected solution of the difficulty is found, a second French Revolution on American soil is not far off. The Standard Oil trust declares an annual dividend to its stockholders of from forty to sixty per cent. On this point Governor Hoch says:— Large profits in themselves are not cause for condemnation. But when these profits are secured by the throttling of competition, in a word, by the absolute monopoly of the field of business, they are not only subject to condemnation, 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 forty to sixty per cent is simply extortion of the people. It is exploitation of the many for the benefit of the few. The move to establish a State oil refinery is not socialistic, says Governor Hoch, and he lays emphasis upon the statement. He has no sympathy with socialism. Socialism, he says, “is a preached heresy of extensive literature, both ancient and modern, the fundamental tenet of which, so far as material matters are concerned, is the negation of property rights in individuals, the denial of the right of individuals to hold property. Its profoundest philosophers have all taught that personal ownership of property is a crime.” The people of this nation, he says, do not object to the possession and exercise of property rights, even by the Standard Oil Company, but their objection is to the abuse of property rights. When proper business conditions are restored, the States, he says, “should not only be willing, but be glad to retire from the refining of oil, and leave that business, as well as other lines of industry, in the hands of private competition, where it legitimately belongs, but where,” he adds, “it is now impossible on account of the ‘greatest socialistic corporation now doing business on earth, the Standard Oil Company.’” “No greater question confronts the American people,” declares Governor Hoch, “than the control of the great aggregations of capital, all of them socialistic in character, and which are antagonistic to the essential element of all national progress, the competitive system.” As an illustration of the coercive methods which these monopolies are ready to employ, he cites the recent order of the Standard Oil Company to refuse the purchase of Kansas oil. “If that order had been maintained,” he says, “thousands of good people would have been homeless and bankrupt in a short time. An economic condition which makes it possible for one man with a stroke of his pen to bankrupt thousands of his fellow citizens is inherently wrong, and will not be tolerated permanently by a free and patriotic people. It is a call for the States individually and the States collectively to do some wise thing quickly for the solution of the whole trust problem.” And if this is not done, and present conditions go on a little longer, then, says Governor Hoch, “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 public good that moneyed interests of the Standard Oil class should submit to what is just and right.” L. A. S.