Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1878-06-27
DISCRIMINATION AGAINST MEN,
Pills.

mind your own business, is so good
motto that business men usually admit its
authority; but TO this general rule there is
striking exception. That exception is IN the
case of some of the railroads. The business
of railway is to transfer freight and pas
sengers to their destination. Not satisfied
with mindiug this. which is their business,
the exceptional roads undertake to influence
the course merchandise shall take, so as to
favor one city at the expense of another,
which is minding what is not their business.
Prominent among the violators Of the sound
principle contained in the motto we quote is
the Chicago, st. Louis and New Orleans rail-
road company, which has apparently set it
self to depart from minding its business for
the purpose of depriving Memphis of all the
trade 1t can, and transferring portion of our
business by artificial, not to say artful means,
to other places, where it would no go nat
urally. This proceeding has, of course, ex-
cited the indignation of that portion of the
country which is told, in effect, ''you shall
not send your produce and make your pur-
chases where you desire, but where we
please We find an expression of the feel
ing of indignation that this hiGh-handed
proceeding of the road is producing in the
Holly Springs Miss Reporter, of Thursday
last. That paper complains of an unjust and
extortionate freight tariff, oppressive to the
people and discourGging to their industry.
For its own ends the road is making DIS
elimination in freight charges, thus promot-
ing it's own views at the expense of those
whose patronage supports the road; using the
franchises granted, not for the interest OF
those who conferred them, not in discharging
the proper business of the road, but in car
rying out projects foreign to the purposes for
which the road was built. An extract from
the Reporter s article will show the nature
of the grievance complained of: ''The
railroad company charges more for
carrying freight from Grand juno
ton to this point, twenty-five miles, than the
Memphis and Charleston railroad company
charges from Memphis to Grand Junction, a
distance of 6fty-three miles. 1t charges
forty-one cents for carrying through freight
from Grand Junction to this place, twenty
FIVE miles, when it costs only ninety-nine
cents per hundred to carry the same freight
from New York to Grand Junction, distance
of eleven hundred miles. 1t charges three
dollars and fifty cents per bale fox carrying
cotton from here to New Orleans, when only
two dollars and fifty cents per bale is charged
from Jackson, Tennessee, a hundred miles
further. 1t charges three dollars and fifty
cents per bale from Grenada to New Orleans,
when only one dollar per bale is charged
from Memphis, ria Grenada, hundred miles
Il L. IL
shipped from here, either north or southi
to either terminus of its line, than it charges
for freight traversing its entire length.
All this is done to carry out notions and OBJ
iects that exist among the managers of the
road, of course, but, as the Reporter says, al
whose cost? Who foot the bills, who beaI
the privation, who endure the loss accruinp
from this selfish and unjust interference o.
the company in what is none of its bust
ness?" Who? The very people who ar,
the supporters of the road, and from whose
payments its profits are derived. Such pro
ceeding the Reporter calls unwise-a yer!
mild woodland adds: at. discriminate
against the Memphis market at the expens
of its patrons in q most fragrant manner.
you doubt it see the freight bills our mer
chants pay, and compare them with bills o
freight from other markets. Or go with u
to Grand Junction and wait there long, wear,
hours for train to carry you to Memphis
and you will learn to your sorrow how
this great line is stabblng that market" Gu
contemporary is of opinion that the peculia
and discredItable tactics of the Chicago, st
Louis, and New Orleans railroad compan
will arouse such feeling of popular indig
nation against oppressive monopohes, tina
the next campaign In Mississippi will find tina
question an important one in the minds of thu
people. Legislative protection will be sough
and corporations who disregard right auc