The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1880-12-16

| it at all. The determination to charge
as much as the traffic will bear he pro-
nounces in the aggregate to be "the
most enormous, oppressive, and unjust
tax that was ever laid upon the indus
try of any people under the sun" and
maintains that all the States have ga
clear and indefeasible right to protect
their people against such wrongs and
to exercise the power as sacred duty.
Below will be found
THE LETTER.
YORK, PENN, Nov 16, 1880.
Committee on RAILROAD Transportation of the
New York Chamber of Commerce:
GENTLEMEN-You propose a movement
in favor of some legal regulation which
will compel railway companies to perform
their duties to the public on proper terms.
| will answer your questions as directly as
possible, but without observing the order
in which you put them. You desire above
all things to be Just The legally vested
rights of railway companies, like other
rights of property, are sacred, and no vio-
lation of them comes within the scope of
your design. But on this question railroad
men misunderstood their situation. They
believe, or pretend to believe, that railways
are the property of the companies author
lied to run them, which is a cardinal error
and the parent of much false argument. A
public highway cannot be private property,
and a railroad laid out and built by the au-
thority of the State for the purpose of
commerce is as much a public highway as
a turnpike road, canal, or navigable river.
1t is the duty of the State to promote
intercourse and trade, by making highways
of the best sort through her territory. To
this end she may take land and materials,
which is an exercise of the power of emil
nent domain. She can build a railway at
her own expense, using the direct agency
of her own officers and after it is built she
can make it free to all corners, or reimburse
the cost by special tax on individuals who
have occasion to use it. She can delegate
the taking and the taxing powers to cor
poration or a natural person, and that is
what she always does when she grants
railroad charter. But in either or any case
the road belongs to the State, and all the
people have a right to use it upon compli-
ance with the necessary regulations and
payment of the proper tax. The corpora
tions who have got into the habit of calling
themselves the owners of the railroads have
no proprietary right, title, or claim to the
roads themselves but a mere franchise
annexed to and exercisable thereon. They
are the agents of the State for the perform
ance of public duty. If the franchise be
forfeited or surrendered, or if it expire by
efflux of time, the State takes possession of
the road and runs it herself, or employs a
new agent. The company cannot keep the
road any more than an outgoing Collector
of Port can appropriate to himself the
Custom house where he did his official
work.
The State, having need for public high
way at particular place, makes contract
with a corporation to open and put it in
condition to be used and by way of reim-
bursting the builders and operators she au-
thOriZes q tax upon those who travel or
carry merchandise over it. But this tax
must be reasonable, just, uniform, prescribed
and fixed, so that every citizen may know
before hand exactly how much he must
pay, and so that when he pays or tenders
the proper amount he will acquire an alb
solute and perfect right to the use of the
road. The amount of the tax, toll, or
freight in any case is not a subject of bar
gain between the shipper and the corpora
ton, but a thing to be settled, fixed, and
prescribed by public authority. If the
company may charge what it pleases then
the road is not public highway, the pub
lie has no rights in it at all, and the charter
it is unconstitutional and void. These
principles were stated by Judge Baldwin,
in Bonaparte against the Camden and Am
boy Railroad Company, Il Bald, Rep. 252.)
You will find a more extended discussion
of them by the Supreme Court of Pennsyl-
vania, in Casey against the Erie and North
east Railroad Company. e Casey's Rep.
287.) / do not think they are opposed by
any high authority, but no doubt they have
Oft haoF nt-cH in iol
and forensic arguments. The railroads be-
ing public property, in which all the people
have equal rights, and the companies that
run them being public agents, it is absurd
| to say that the State has no right to regu-
late and control them in the performance of
| their functions by such laws as will prevent
partiality, plumber, and extortion. This is
| power of which no free State can disarm
itself by any act of its judicial, legisla-
| tive, or executive officers. They could as
lawfully sell the State out and out and
| deliver up the entire population to sack
and plllage. But are not the franchises prop
erty in which the company has vested
| right Yes! The privilege of taking a GER
tain fixed, prescribed, uniform, reasonable
rate of toll from all persons alike, according
| to the use they make of the road, is power
that the State may bestow upon any person,
natural or artificial. But no lawful fran
chise to take toll on public highway can
exceed those limits A charter that goes
beyond this is void. Those companies will
oppose any effort to bring them down to a
reasonable rate with the argument that such
reduction is a violation of the contract be-
| tween them and the State. But on the prin-
ciple laid down by Judge Baldwin in the
| case above mentioned a charter is inopera-
/ tive which authorizes maximum of toll or
rate 30 high that the company is able with
out exceeding it to exclude the people from
that the companies might fix their own rates
/ But the Supreme Court of the United States
held that subsequent Law to restrain
/ them within reasonable limits was no viola
ton 81 the original contract. Thia princis