Morning journal and courier., 1882-11-25
Sournal alrb Courier.
Saturday. Nov. 2S. 1882.
ENLARGEMENT.


 Mir. Henry V. Poor comes to the defense of Messrs. Vanderbilt and Gould in a notable communication printed in the New York E0eniaag Post. MT. Poor contends that rail road managers, be they ever so powerful, cannot do what they please that they are governed by public opinion and cannot make any charges for services rendered by their roads higher than those which the competi- ton of other railroads or lines of transporta. tion permits them to make. He says: "If the public do not like MT. Vanderbilt's charges in the matter of freight they go to some one of his numerous rivals to be sure of a welcome. He pays the price of churlish- ness, or want of proper attention or remiss- ness in his business. in loss of business In other words, he has no more immunity to do as he pleases than has any merchant or man. ufacturer in the country. If he secures bus- mess, it is because he makes it for the ad- vantage of the public to employ him. The public is his master, and he, in the strictest sense, is it's servant, the tenure of his service always depending upon good conduot.''
 Mr. Poor reviews the work of the New York Central railroad for twenty-seven years and says that in no year during this period did the company fail to charge the business passing over it's road all that it would bear. In every year competition forced it to abate something till a net profit equal ling 1929 cents per ton per mile was reduced to O221 cents per ton per mile. ''It struggled to maintain prices," says Mir. Poor, ''but it struggled against fate. Rival ry on every side drove tho company to the adoption of every method, every contrivance and economy that could reduce cost, in order to make up in quantity the necessary amount of net income. By means of these methods and economies the public saved in single year the difference between $2O, ,736, 749 and $S6, 45O, ,S17. But for such boon conferred Mir. Vanderbilt deserves no more commenda- tion than any one who abridges or cheapens processes 8 means of increasing his busi- ness and maintaining the amount of his own income. Self interest, or selfshness, if it be better word, was alike the motive in either case a motive leading to useful results, but void of any moral attribute whatever. In dealing with his customers, Mir. Vanderbilt at all times exacted the last penny in his power. In dealing with him, they withheld the last penny in their power.''
 All this andi more which Mir. Poor says is plausible, but, as the Post says, it touches only those cases in which competition really exists and is permitted to act. He does not speak of railroads that have no competition j; nor of the ways in which competition is neu- tralized by combination nor of the discrim- nations made in transportation rates against intermediate ''non-competing'' points on roads which have competition only as to their through traffic nor of the secret con- tracts and special rates by which discrimina- tion is made in favor of certain classes or in dividuals, and against others as, for instance, the refusal of the Central Pacific company to ! transport freight for merchants who, at any ! time, make shipments by the Isthmus; nor I of stock-watering and similar contrivances \ calculated to deceive the public about the ! business done by railroad companies.
 MT. Poor makes one remark the truth of which will not be disputed by those who | are holding railroad 'securities." This is l that "Moral attributes have no more to do ! with railroad management than they have I with the manufacture of pig iron.'