BENSON WOOD. cere; that the remedies by them suggested are inadequate; that their arguments are unsound, and that relief can come through the measures it alone proposes, The differences, among the people, seem to extend only to the methods to be employed in dealing with existing conditions. All, except the very few who are believed to profit by special and exclusive advantages, are agreed,-something must be done, and that speedily, in changing and improving systems employed in the production and distribution of the products of industry. It might be, under these circumstances, that a few suggestions, in line with what already has been said, could be tolerated from as unauthoritative a source as the president of a State Bar Association. In dealing with problems of this kind, certain traits of human character, and certain unchangeable conditions, ought to be recognized. Mankind loves power. It loves also wealth, because of the universal belief that wealth brings power, as well as comfort and luxury, and therefore happiness. People love money. They love to acquire it. In order to accumulate it they undergo hardships; they brave dangers; they undermine health, and even risk life. They put the dollar above themselves; sometimes above their reputation; above their liberty. We sometimes question whether our laws do not make the dollar more important than the man. Laws are the creature of government, and the government will always place as high an estimate upon wealth as do the people, and not a higher one. Is not the government "of the people?" All people prefer to get money honestly, and without violation of letter or spirit of law. It is true some of blunted moral sensibilities may be found who love it so well as to make efforts to obtain it in defiance of the legal rights of others. These, however, are exceptions. People of all civilized communities like to engage in large enterprises. It would be safe to say that every business man, at some period of his career, desires his business to be greater PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL ADDRESS. than his own means will justify. He may borrow from others; but he more frequently seeks to join his own with the capital, skill, and influence of his neighbors. In most financial enterprises, the death of owner, or part owner, brings no loss to those whose money is therein invested, nor serious inconvenience to those who have business connections with them. In others, their relations to the public are such, that long duration of life is absolutely necessary to prevent irreparable loss by their ceasing to exist, or being compelled to go into liquidation. Besides the desire and demand for large ventures, in which large capital is required, there is a natural disposition not to risk all one has in any one business so extensive that he may not be able, individually, to control it. Hence, there will always be a demand and necessity for the corporation, with a long period of existence, and with limited liabilities of its stockholders. There will never be a time when such bodies corporate will not be an important factor in commercial life. If one State of the Union will not create them, another will, if for no other reason, because of the revenue which may be derived from the act which gives them being. It is true that the foreign corporation does business outside of its state only by legal sufferance. It may be harassed and annoyed, or the ban be placed upon it; but, eventually, it will be found that each state will, of necessity, treat the natural and artificial persons, who are citizens of other states, as fairly as it does its own. As the limit of human aspiration and endeavor, along proper and lawful lines, has never yet been fixed by positive law, it is safe to say that it never will be. The wisdom of no legislative body has ever yet been, or ever will be, equal to that task. Some things we may do by law; others we can not. We may tax or limit inheritances, or even destroy the right to inherit. We may prevent, or confiscate, devises or bequests of lands, money, credits or chattels, even from parent to child. BENSON WOOD. We may start all persons in life on as perfect an equality, in the matter of wealth, as of civil or political right. We may declare rivers to be navigable, and then, by the power of public improvement, make them so in fact; we may change their course, and cause their currents to turn backward. We may, by statute, set bounds to the sea, and with labor and material, we may make of ocean dry land. But we shall never, by law, circumscribe human effort, impelled by energy, industry and capacity, and fix bounds beyond which it may not go. People of like tastes or acquirements will continue to associate with each other. Each will seek the company of his own choice. The rich and the poor will be with us in the future, as in the past. Want will continue to feed upon the crumbs that fall from tables of luxury. The rich man and the beggar will be factors in the social problem a thousand years hence, as they are now, and as they were nineteen centuries ago. There will always be classes. But in a Republic, there can be no middle wall of partition between them, that those on either side may not, themselves, break down. Will there ever be a legal limit placed upon the aggregations of individual and corporate wealth? Unless there are some very undesirable and dangerous changes in organic law, it is very certain that the individual will never be prevented, by law, from acquiring as great an amount of riches as his disposition and ability will permit, by the use of just and honest means. The time will never come, as it never ought to come, when he will be restrained, by law, from employing, in any lawful business, as much of his own capital as he is willing to risk. He will be taxed, as he ought to be, like other people of perhaps less capital, engaged in similar business,— but not at a higher rate. His property will be protected by the power of the State, the same as that of his neighbors. He will, at times, suffer from the non-enforcement or mal-administration of the law, as they do. He will be permitted to make such lawful investments as he pleases, even to the buying and PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL ADDRESS. holding the stocks and bonds of private corporations. He does not owe his existence to the commonwealth, nor is he entirely indebted to the State for his powers of mind and body. In the pursuit of happiness, which includes the lawful acquisition and use of property, he has inalienable rights, the impairment of which is not permitted, even by as important a body as a constitutional convention. In dealing with the individual and his property, legislatures and courts and executive officers ought not to forget these existing conditions, which are beyond the possibility of lawful, or substantial, change. With corporations, however, we meet with an entirely different state of case. They can be lawfully created only for the advantage of the public. The State gives to them all their powers; it prescribes to them the period of their existence; it determines the amount of their capital stock; it fixes the liability of their stock holders. It may, and ought always to reserve the power to make any reasonable rules and regulations for their government, and the management of their affairs. Indeed, it is doubtful if any corporation can legally be created in any State of the Union, without this reserved right remaining in the law making power which gave it life. It is the mere creature of the law. It may not act in contravention of law, or of the public policy of the State. It is composed of individuals, subject to human frailties. The majority of these individuals, or of the stock owned by them, control its actions. It is due to the public, as well as to the minority of the stockholders, that some higher authority than the officers, should investigate any irregularities that might occur in its management, to the end that its privileges and franchises might not be abused, nor its business conducted to the injury of public or private rights. The Common Law provided the way and method through risitation, by which the illegal acts and irregularities of the civil corporation might be inquired into and corrected. Many BENSON WOOD. He of the States indulge in the presumption that the re-stating, by code commissioners, or the re-enacting, by legislators, of elementary principles of law, very materially improve and strengthen them. It is therefore probably true, that there is no State in the Union, which, under its constitution and laws, is without this common law remedy,-either by virtue of the existence of the common law, or by statutes, which give substantially the same mode of relief. The King, by his prerogative, could create, but not destroy, the civil corporation. was, by law, its visitor, but this jurisdiction he must exercise in and through his own court, of the King's Bench. The State, at the present time, has the same, but no greater, prerogatives and powers. These have generally been recognized in statutes authorizing its states attorneys, or other law of ficers, to file informations against a corporation which does, or omits to do, acts which amount to a surrender, or forfeiture of its rights and privileges, or when it exercises powers not conferred by law. In this manner, and in its own courts of general jurisdiction, the State may visit and inspect the corporate bodies it has created. It may inquire into and redress all their misbehaviors, and prevent any deviation from the end of their institution. Through its judicial, and not its legisla tive powers, it may, wherever franchises have been abused, declare them forfeited, and adjudge that the condition upon which corporate life was granted, has been broken, and the incorporation, therefore, void. It is repeatedly insisted, and doubtless with considerable truth, that corporations, foreign and domestic, create monopolies; that they combine to shut out or destroy competition; that they unite to restrict production, and enhance the price of their products; that they buy the property and franchises of other corporations which result, practically, in many ceasing to exist, except for the purpose of receiving and distributing dividends not earned by their legitimate business. As a culmination of wrongful acts, it is charged that they turn |