The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1872-03-01


BILE violation of law and public policy. Ger
tain railway men and bankers asked for land
grant. The government consented, and then,
as if ashamed of its niggardliness, as com
pared with the profuse gratuity to the
Union Pacific, turned around and voted q
second grant. Our readers may compre.
bend the extent of this gift when we
say that the owners of the Northern Pacific
Railway have received as much land
from the government of the United States
as is contained in the European area Of all
France! The land thus given belonged to the
people. 1t was set apart for them by our
fathers, to be homes for themselves and their
children. The progress of civilization was
gradually reaching it. In time the irrepressi-
BILE enterprise Of private citizens would have
built railway. But Congress, acting blindly,
we hope, corruptly, we fear, deliberately
voted away the heritage of generations. We
trust. for the honor of Congress, that the books
of this road will not also show 'confiden-
tial" item of half million of dollars sex
pended in Washington.
We refer to this history, to which we might
add the history of the Southern Pacific, the
Kansas Pacific and the half dozen roads which
Senator Pomeroy is said to control, for a
double purpose. We must put an end to this
midnight legislation, with Its reckless and
ignorant squandering of the public domains.
We must tell the legislators who pass bills
like the extraordinary acts creating the
Pacific railways that they are either knaves or
fools-with evidently more knavery than folly.
We must thoroughly investigate the condition
of these roads. Look, for instance, at the
condition of the Union Pacific Railway during
the past winter Here is a road endowed
with money enough to have covered every ex-
posed section of the track with snow-shed,
or at least to have justified the employment of
assistance and machinery enough to prevent
The snow from lying on the track more than
twenty -four hours. If the law meant anything
1t all when the subsidy bonds were given it
meant that such road should be built as would
exhaust the resources of science and engineer
ing to accomplish that result; and yet
hero we have travel suspended, the mails de-
layed, the Continent divided, as it were, for
weeks, and the government is helpless to
remedy the evil. So long as it is possible for
a railway to be interrupted for month con-
tinuously we have no Pacific railway at all.
The damage caused to business by this in
corruption amounts to millions of dollars, and
another season may see it infinitely more
disastrous. So Of truth we find ourselves,
With all of our subsidies, without road to
he Pacific. A pair of iron rails run over
mountain and plain and canyon and stream,
which in fair weather will permit locomotive
Ind train of cars to pass. But in winter we
must make up our mind that communication
cannot be counted upon for day, and that
We are as much separated from California as
Switzerland from Italy.
This Is painful and humiliating circum-
stance. We have paid the money-four times
more than was needed-enough to have built
q double steel track, with sheds covering every
exposed point. Yet month passes without
and Congress, under the drill
of a gigantic Pacific Railway lobby which
holds high court in Washington, does not take
a step to remedy the evil. The Senate can
give weeks to the wrangles of Schurz and
as important as this. What we want to know
is, Why have we no Pacific railway Why
was this money squandered upon a ring of
greedy speculators9 Why, with the princely
endowment voted by Congress, have we a
road only certain during the midsummer
months Why is there no government super
vision of the Northern Pacific Railway How
DO we know that when this road is built we
may not find that our enormous land grant
has been thrown away? The whole system of
government subsidy to railroads has been
managed, and under an exact
and rigid operation Of the law-were Con-
gress to do its duty-the private directors,
the government directors, the examiners
the road, would be called upon to answer for
this manifest abuse of trust before committee
of Congress, and perhaps before jury of their
As the evidence stands we feel
that these men, each and all, are morally as
guilty of offending the law as Mr.. Congressman
Stokes, who is now in Jail, and Mr.. Congressman
Whittemore, who passed within the shadow of
the Jail. If we had statesmen in Washington,
if we had simply honest business men, instead
of incessant demagogues like Schurz and roar
ing demagogues like Morton, if we had legis-
lators above the destinations Of the Pacific Rail-
way lobby, this whole matter would be re-
formed. The reckless men who have squan-
dered the public treasure would be punished,
the whole railway system would be governed
by sound logical principles, the corporations
80 richly endowed would learn that they were
under the law, not above it, and the great
West, instead of falling under the dominion Of