Los Angeles daily herald., 1876-03-07
Night Dispatches.
GFROM THE SPECIAL REPORTER Oh
THE DAILY HERALD.
Legislative Proceedings.

SACRAMENTO, March 6th.-The Sen
sisting of Farley, Chairman, Graves,
Gibbons, Evans, Shirley, Satterwhite
and Mccarthy, met on Sunday morn
ing to take testimony and hear state
ments for and against the passage of
the Archer fares and freights bill. The
committee room was filled by Sena-
tors, Assemblymen and persons con-
nected with the railroad Companies of
the State, persons inimical to railroad
interests and lookers-On. Gov. STAN
ford and several representatives of the
Central Pacific railroad were also
present.
Alfred A. Cohen, of Alameda, APP
peared on behalf Of the bill and made
lengthy statement in support of his
nasiton He said that the Archer bill
would afford to any railroad company
designing To do business in legiti-
mate manner a fair and proper return
on the capital invested. He said:
would take any road that the Central
Pacific has to-day; l would pay the
ACTUAL cost and give fifteen per cent.
per annum on it from the time of the
Investment to the present day and
wogld accept the provisions Of the
Archer bill, / consider fair return
on the capital invested to be: First,
the cost of operating the rOadj next,
the interest upon the debt; third, the
proportion of wear and tear; fonrth,
liberal dividend. Now, this road has
done laoro than this. 1t has received
subsidies which nave made its owners
enormously wealthy, and this veal lh
they have not only used to buy up
contracts and monopolae all other
roads in the State, but to reward
friends and punish enemies by the use
of this great wealth and the power it
confers. The company has brought
the people into servitude from which
they now ask release. TO build an
other road parallel To this would be
useless, for then we would have two
blood suckers instead of one.
a. D. Moore, OF the n. =, Coast X.
r., being sworn, after making state
ment said that under the Archer bill
all that his company could do would
be to pay its debts as best they could
and abandon the road. 1t would be
simply impossible to operate the road.
Gov Stanford then rose and subipit-
ted sgyefaI documents to the conf
mlttee
j. G. Stubs, General Freight Agent
of the Central Pacific road, was called
and sworn. He advanced practical
reasons why the Archer bill should
not pass. First, it is founded upon
misstatement and misapprehension of
facts; second, the provisions of the
bill and It's classi ifcatipns of freight.
are ambiguous, confused and contra
dictoryI third, that the rates proposed
by the bi are rpinously low. No ar
gument was made oh these three
heads, and statements and statisticsI
in great number were adduced in sup
port of the foregoing propositions.
Mr.. Slubbs also submitted +, view o
the bill based upon comparison be-
tween the rates of the Union and Gem
tral Ppclfic roads. He pointed out a
great pumbeg Gf errors as to figures
and statements in the report of the
Assembly Corporation Committee.
A. d. Towne General Superintend-
ent of the Central PACIFIC railroad was
sworn. He corroborated IN toto the
statement of Mr. stubbs, and stated
further that under the bill the carni ug
# the Visilia Division would not per-
init the company to realize enough to
sustain its operation at this point.
The committee adjourned.
Az this porning's session Mr.. S ubbs
made coinparlspn beIWeen the Free
man bill of last sessionand Ihe Ateher
bill, showing that the latter was even
worse than the former, because it low
cred the rates.IG AZ extreme degree
below all possibility of running the
road. He proceeded to show that it was
nconsiderate aud unfair beyond meas
uie.