Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1882-03-01

have for some time past had under con-
sideration the bill of Senator Reagan, Of
Texas, providing for the regulation by
the United States Government of all the
railroads in the United States. This bill
has been discussed pro and con. very ex-
hsustively, and while we have not the
measure before US at this moment, and
are therefore unable to refer to its de-
tails, it, so far as We remember, proposes
to give the government absolute control
over freight rates on all the trunk rail-
way lines in the country. This PROPOSE
ton, it is claimed, is justified by the
United States Constitution, which in
vests Congress with power to regulate
interstate commerce.
We have no idea that the trainers OF
the Constitution ever had the slightest
intention Of indorsing any such step
toward Capitalization as this when they
provided, in Article l., Section VIII.
and paragraph 3 of that instrument that
Congress should have power ''to regu-
late commerce with foreign nations and
among the several States" The only
object which can reasonably be supposed
they did have in view when the above
provision was incorporated in the organ
ic law was to confer upon the
Federal Legislature power to secure
perfectly free, unrestricted and uniform
trade between the several sovereign COM
monwealths which compose this Union,
unfettered or hindered by any unjust or
partial legislation whatever.
If the constitutional provision herein
above quoted was intended to apply to
the subject Of transportation at all it can
only be interpreted to refer to navigable
streams and water routes, which, fire.
quently being natural highways between
various States, may be regarded, to
certain extent, as legitimate objects of
care and protection by the General Gov
eminent, whose duty it is to guard the
interests of the States in all cases when,
from any chain of circumstances,
the State cannot, so readily, guard
themselves. A great water highway like
the Mississippi river, for instance, which
extends throughout the country from
north to south, and is the natural outlet
to the sea for the products of great
portion of large number of States, is a
fit subject for Congress to bestow care
upon, so that it may efficiently subserve
its great end of affording proper facili-
ties for inter State commerce. But with
railways it is very different They are
private enterprises, chartered only
by the various sovereign States through
whose territory they pass, and built
by private capital furnished either by the
citizens of the States by which their con
struction is authorized or, By outside par
ties who are willing to submit to the
laws Of those States. Railroads, therefore,
are private property, and the founders OF
the republic never for moment con-
templated granting authority to the Fed
eral Legislature to usurp control over
corporations which are the creatures of
the various States and the property
either of citizens of such States or citi-
zens of other States, amenable, so far as
this special property is concerned, to
State laws. 1t is sufficiently unjust
and tyrannical for even a State,
after inducing her citizens to invest their
means in enterprises like railroads
which are certain to benefit the State,
even if they bankrupt their promoters
and operatOrs-to come in, and, through
arbitrary commission laws or any other
means, forcibly assert its sovereign
right to take absolute control of the pro
perty of those who have risked their
capital therein. But if this Is grievously
unjust in a sovereign State. it is wholly
uniustifable in the Federal Government,
which, like railroads, is but a creature
of the States. Such action by the gov
eminent would, to our mind, not only
be most fragrant usurpation. but bold
step towards Capitalization, which would
necessarily be fraught with the greatest
danger both to the rights of the States
and their respective citizens, and to the
integrity of the republic itself.
We hope, therefore, that Mr.. Reagan's
bill will be defeated Certainly we
cannot see how any Democrat can give
his sanction thereto for moment. If
there is any just cause of complaint
against lines of railroads, the various
States through which they pass have am
pie power to investigate and provide a
remedy for the evil. Congress could
doubtless assist the States in this re-
spect, and be instrumental in
satisfactorily preventing unjust discrimi-
nations, and correcting abuses by rail
roads if it would adopt some such bill as
that introduced in the last Congress by
Representative Rice, of Massachusetts,,
and known as the Adams bill, which
embodied the recommendations of Chas.
Francis Adams, Jr., and provides for a
permanent railroad commission to act as
an advisory board to hear the complaints
of localities and individuals, and
to give thorough publicity to what
ever abuses they may discover.
This, however, is as far as Congress
has right to go. To do more would be
unconstitutional and tyrannical, and a
destruction of the first principles which
form the foundation upon which our
system Of government rests.
Last years record of railway casualties
in this country, according to a railroad