Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1873-03-21
REGULATION OF RAILROAD
CHARGES.
Report of the Massachusetts Com
mfssioners.

! mfssioners.
We regard it as certain that thu
next Legislature of our State vii
be favorable to Legislation to regu
late railroad fares and frcights.-
This point settled, it is essentia
that the people, as well as those
who make the laws, shall examine
carefully and discuss intelligently
the plans and theories upon whicl
such Legislation shall be founded
We therefore make no apology fol
making liberal extracts from the re
cent report Of the Ma sachusetts
Railroad Commissioners upon this
subject. The report is emphatic in
condemnation of the principle Of
uniform rates per mile for all dis
tances, which is the principle of the
Keables amendment, SO called, offer
cd in our Legislature last winter
1t says:
GIN the earlier days of the rail
road system, and especially in
America, the acts regulating fares
and freights were very simple, and
apparently there could be no diff.
Guilty in thci: enforcement. They
limited charges to so much per mile
for each passenger and for each ton
of freight: adopting what is known
as the equal-mileage rate. Econom-
ically, there can be no doubt what
ever that this Legislation was found
ed on wrong principle. If the
amounts paid by the public are in
any degree to correspond to cost of
the services rendered by the corpor-
atoms, then the distance that a per-
son or thing is carried has very
little necessary connection with the
cost of carriage.
"This principle is perfectly well
established, and has been repeated
ly dwelt upon in the reports Of this
Board. Its truth can be made very
apparent by a simple illustration
Linn is ten miles from Boston and
Chicago is thousand. An article
of merchandise going to the one
place or the other has to be received
handled, stored, placed on car and
forwarded; on reaching its destina-
ton, it has to be unloaded, stored,
and delivered to the company, or
received and unloaded by the con
signee; in either case the car is
necessarily subject to delays during
which it earns no freight. Under
these circumstances it is very APP
parent that the fixed cost incurred
by the railroads in the work Of
transportation,-that cost which is
common for all articles or persons,
no matter how long or short dis
lance they are carried,-must con-
stitute a very considerable part of
the whole cost. SO obvious is this
fact, that it is well known that the
corporations earn large net profits
on their long business at third or
quarter that rate per mile which is
barely rcmuneratiye on short bust
ness. The simple and obvious fact,
that wheels earn money only while
they are in motion, and that they
earn it as long as they are in mo-
ton, has constantly been disregard
ed by those seeking to frame laws
regulating fares and freights. If a
car be loaded with passengers or
goods and started on journey of
1000 miles, the wheels of that car
are steadily earning money for days
though moving, perhaps,
at low rates; il, however, the cost
of starting that car, including the
fixed outlay of the corporation in
officers, employees, ation-buildings,
real estate, rolling stock, and road
bed,-an outlay which is in large
degree the same for long Transport
tation or for hort,-if this cost has
to be distributed over few miles
only in which the wheels are in mo-
ton, then it is evident that the cost
Of transportation per mile must
largely increase. If it is limited
by law and not allowed to increase,
then the long traffic must pay 4 loss
on the short traffic.
Gas regards merchandise, this IS
so apparent that it needs only to be
stated to be understood: OF course
this economical principle must not
be confused with the abuses perpo-
trated by the railroad corporations
in charging heavier rates to inter
mediate than to competing points,
or with the extortions practiced at
times on local business.
AS regards the carriage Of pas
sengers ii is equally true. The
longer the distance travelled the
greater the profit on each passenger
and, numbers being equal the cheap
er he can be carried. In practice
tice it is apparently otherwise, as it
is notorious that fares for short dis
tances are the lowest; but this is
apparent only, and is due to the
numbers transported. The accu-
mutation Of small profits, by divi-
ding the cost of running the train
among vast numbers Of persons, OPP
crates exactly in the same way as if
it were distributed over great dis
lance measured in miles.
"The equal-mileage laws were,
therefore, founded on the erroneous
principle that the fare or freight
should be proportional to the cost
of carriage, and the cost Of carriage
was held to be uniform without re-
gard 20 distance. An lnfin tie mum
Der Of acts based on this principle
are to be found in the statute books
of this country. Nowhere, howev-
er, has the system been more per-
sistently followed out than in Ohio,
In that State there are at least nine
distinct rates for the transportation
Of passengers and freight, author
lied by law, and yet others are I'M
der discussion. The matter has
been necessarily legislated upon,
and yet the State Railroad Commits
sioner, in his report for the year