Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 8.djvu/85

 THE TRUST PROBLEM RESTUDIED 73

These illegal privileges confer advantages different in degree, but not in kind, from those enjoyed by the coal-carrying rail- roads in the anthracite region, whose monopoly of transpor- tation made it impossible for mine-owners to retain their properties. There is, fortunately, no difference of opinion as to the necessity of breaking up the alliance between industrial com- binations and railroad companies. The problem, however, is becoming much more complicated under the extension of the community-of-interest plan. The Atlantic shipping combination will have a sort of lien on the freight of certain powerful rail- roads, and it will not be easy for non-trust ship-owners to com- pete with the great combination.

The dependence of trusts upon monopoly of natural resources is less obvious, except in such cases as the anthracite coal com- bination or the steel combination. This is not the place to raise the question of private vs. public ownership of land and natural resources generally, but it may be pointed out that the principle of private property in land does not justify the appropriation of nature's gifts by the few, and the exclusion of the many from the enjoyment of those gifts. There are no agricultural trusts in America, because of the beneficent operation of the home- stead acts and the virtual application of the occupancy-and- use principle. Have the right principles been followed in the disposition of other parts of the general inheritance mines, for example ? Voices have been raised for the acquisition by the public of the anthracite coal mines, and whatever we may think of the merit of the plan, it involves a recognition of a funda- mental fact. If it can be shown that trusts derive their power, not from the possession of capital, but from special privileges related to natural opportunity, will not the remedy have to be sought in establishment of equality of opportunity?

Finally, since there is so general an agreement as to the necessity of preserving potential competition as a check upon actual monopoly, has not the question of credit, the supply of capital to the business community by the banks, been unduly neglected so far as it bears on the possibilities of competition? A rigid, inadequate, crude currency and banking system favors