New-York tribune., 1870-04-14
COL. FISK'S PLEA.

We print this morning communication from
Col James Fisk, ,jr., which is not so frank as COM
munications from that ingenious gentleman are
apt to be. Col. Fisk is grieved that we have
innocently relied upon certain statements of
Mr.. Burt's, made to the Legislative Committee
at Albany. These statements were: /. That
there had been more accidents on the Erie
road under the rule of Gould and Fisk than
under their predecessors and 2. That Mr..
Burt represents the holders of a majority of
the shares of the Company. AS to the sec
ond of these points we do not care to join
issue. Mr.. Burt declares that he does repre-
sent majority; Mr. Fisk denies it. We have
given the preference to Mr.. Burts statement,
hut it is q matter OF secondary Importance,
and in the article to which MIR. Fisk excepts
it was only referred to incidentally. Let it be
settled in the proper way.
The question of accident however, is a
question of figures which ought to be easily
decided-Only figures, as we all know, can be
made to prove anything if they are properly
coaxed. Mr.. Burts tables, which we copied
were taken from official returns made to the
Legislature. They showed that during the
years 1866 and 1867 the number of persons
killed and injured on the Erie Railroad was
234, while in the next two years, though the
number of passengers carried was somewhat
less and the aggregate distance travelled a
great deal less, the killed and injured amounted
to $50. In replying to this rather damaging
exhibit Mr.. Fisk sets back the first period of
comparison from 1867 to 1866; this, how
ever, may have been slip of the pen, and we
give him the benefit of the doubt. Next he
takes an odd portion of his own administra-
ton and compares it with an odd period of an
other, very much of course to his own advantage.
But the gravamen of the charge he finally meets
with these two answers First, The Erie
Railroad Company during the last year I" has
"taken special pains to collect information
concerning accidents of every kind happen
"ing upon it's line )" from which we are to
infer that Mr.. Fisk's engineers have special
instructions to find out every day whether
they have killed anybody, and that during the
two years before he came into Office they ran
over about 216 people without knowing it !;
and, secondly, large proportion of the acci-
dents reported occurred without any fault on
the part of the Company. In this class of
accidents Mr.. Fisk places the Mast Hope
disaster, where a sleepy engineer started
his train minute too soon-"an acci-
"dent," he remarks, (which, as everybody
"knOws, would have been entirely un-
"avoidable under any administration what
"ever" We beg Mr.. Fisks pardon, but every
body knows nothing of the kind. The trial
showed clearly enough that engineers are often
kept on duty too long to be wakeful, and that
with a proper system of signalling James
GrifiR's blunder would have been harmless.
Besides, if we are going behind the official
tables to find out how many of the accidents
in Mr.. GOuld's term were unavoidable, we
must of course do the same also in the previous
terms with which the comparison is drawn
Mr.. Fisk hints at nothing of that kind. In any
case, we do not imagine that the public and
the directors would agree as to the RESPONSE
bilty in one accident out of ten. IL a drunken
man is killed in trying to climb upon the cars,
he may have chiefly himself to blame, but
the Company may be to blame also for
the lack of precautions to prevent just
such drunken attempts. If horse takes fright
and dashes across the track at crossing, the
rash driver who came too near the passing
train may be mainly in fault for the accident
that results, but the Company may also be in
fault for not keeping gate or fagman at
that crossing II rail breaks in frosty weather,
it is almost impossible to ascertain whether
proper precautions had been taken to test it.
If brakemen are killed, as they 30 often are,
in making up trains, or vagabOnds sleeping on
the rails are run over, there il seldom q care
full examination of the circumstances, and the
public does not take the trouble 10 find out
lust where the blame ought 10 rest There il