Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-02-11
FEB REPORT OF TIE RAILROAD coz
MIssIoNERs.

The first report of the Railroad Commits
sioners is little more than az explanation
Of the causes which have retarded the
action of that body, and second and more
elaborate report Is promised at an early
day. The Commissioners, as was to have
been supposed, found when they entered
upon their duties that unless they were to
set aside all considerations Of justice and
equity. and forthwith form a cast.iron
tariff of fares and freights without know
ing anything of the business they were
regulating, it would be necessary for them
70 make elaborate and careful researches
INTO the whole situation. Being conscien-
tious men they felt that the extrayagant
powers with which they had been vested
rendered it more necessary that they should
do nothing which could not be defended
Therefore they set to work TO find out the
facts, and they at once discovered that
The transportation problem was a great one.
With every endeavor to complete their
labors, they found that six months was not
time enough to master the railroad situa-
ton, and to learn how to transact other
peoples business better than they could do
II They discovered, also, that they were
really dealing with private and not public
property, and that despite the views of
demsgogues concerning the public
character Of railroads, they can only be
dealt with as what they really are-narne-
ly. private property. The result of their
initial labors has been to convince them
that the difficulties of regulation have not
been exaggerated. aud that they them.
selves have been aided by no special
revelation in dealing with problem which
has batfied all who have undertaken it.
The truth IS that the men who made the
new Constitution, and who drafted the
Railroad Commission clauses, were alike
ignorant and malicious. They belonged to
the class of impracticables for whom
history has no lessons. They could not
see that the plan they proposed was utterly
futile, but they insisted on believing that
their stupid fat could make things possible
which nature had made impossible Rail-
road regulation of the kind sought
through this Commission will never
be obtained The experience of the West
ern States demonstrates this. There is no
doubt of the power of Statesto decree what.
ever they please, but the imprimatur of
Legislature cannot make things practicable,
and so the Changers long since discovered.
The position of the Railroad Commission
ers has been an extremely difficult one, but
they have undoubtedly taken the only
defensible course in resolving to examine
the whole question deliberately, and in re-
fusing to act blindly and in the absence OF
knowledge They append to their report
tables showing very large reductions in
charges between various points, which have
been made by the Central Pacific and its
leased lines voluntarily, and they testify to
the prompt and courteous responses of the
railroad companies to all their inquiries.
As to the second report which they prom
Use. it is not likely to throw much more
light upon the situation, for all who are
capable of reasoning have already become
convinced that The kind of arbitrary regu-
lation proposed by the new Constitution is
simple folly.