Excerpt from Address of Honorable Frank S. Black at Carnegie Hall, New York, October 30, 1908

So it must be that things are not always as described. The only thing for us to do, then, is to examine for ourselves. We may not be right but it will pay to be intelligent. I would say that it will pay to be honest, but that word has been used so many times by those who never knew its meaning that I flinch when I come to it lately. The first thing necessary to a fair start is to refuse to be affected by any kind of humbug. This will be difficult, for while in times past the humbug business has seemed so free and simple that most any one could do a little for himself, it has late years been so cornered and improved and the output has been so incessant and attractive that most every one has bowed to the humbug trust because, compared with that, he was ashamed of anything he could do himself.

But while we are in this anti-trust crusade let us start fair by first killing off this biggest one of all.

On examination we find some things to depress but more to encourage. But the present we must take as we find it. We must deal fairly with ourselves, for whoever tries any other way will only waste his time and had better join the crowd and go along with that. The things we ought to know seem plain enough and an hour's time by each man with himself ought to head him out into the clearing.

These things at least are obvious: the unparalleled prosperity, so lately here, has taken wing. The demand for laborers which a year ago could not be met, now finds them by thousands idle on the streets. Luxuries which seemed within easy reach last year have in many cases been exchanged for the necessities of this. The discussion is no longer whether existing plants shall be enlarged, but whether they shall run at all. Organizations of labor, instead of dictating the terms of their employment, are drawing on their treasuries to help the unemployed. Capital, for vears possessed of courage to enter any promising expedition, now deems itself unsafe unless every night it can return to the vault.

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