Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 17.pdf/156

 FEDERAL REGULATION OF CORPORATIONS this is no reason why corporations should not be subject to Federal regulation. It would be a reason for furnishing our citizens and business interests with increased court facilities and more judges. It is not to be expected that these views will be shared by all corporate managers. Too many of them are narrow in their vision, blinded by some special interest, or more often affected with a species of corporate mania which compels resistance to every thing affecting the regulation of corpora tions, regardless of its advantages or disad vantages, and frequently to the great in jury of corporate interests.

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There is an underlying principle in all this which must be recognized, and that is that all large corporations are affected with a public interest, and are not in the narrow sense, private affairs. The character of their business, the amount of their capital, the extent of their powers and influence, and the numbers of their shareholders, all take them out of the purely private class of business interests. If this be true, Federal regulation is to be justified from a broader standpoint than the mere advantage to the corporation, and in time this will be recog nized and appreciated. NEW YORK, N. Y., Feb., 1905.