Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1882-01-23
1ancaster fnteIligel1rer,
MONDAY EVENING, JAN. %, 1882.
Rum on the Railroad.

Rum on the Railroad.
The conductor of the train on the
Hudson River railroad which lately met
with so fatal a disaster, testifies that the
accident was due to rum !; and the facts
leave no doubt of the truth of the asser.
tion. 1t was a Friday evening train
bearing from Albany the dead-headed
legislators and politicians at the end Of
the week g session, and it was the habit
of these passengers to carry with them
an abundant supply of liquor to he freely
used on the journey !; which has conse-
quently always been hilarious and drunk
en-. The conductor believes that an
inebriated passenger tampered with the
rope running through the cars which
controlled the air brake, and SO caused
the stoppage of the train. That may be so,
although this is but suspicion founded
on the known condition of many of the
passengers, but not otherwise proved
but while an intoxicated passenger may
have been responsible to this extent for
the accident it is clear that if the brake
man on the end of the train whose business
it was to warn succeeding trains had
done his duty the disaster would not
have occurred. This man was an old
servant of the company, fully cOgnizant
Of his duty and competent to perform it.
The inference is strong that he failed
because he had come under the influence
of the freely dispensed liquor of the pas
sengers.
Upon the company itself rests the re-
spOnsibility for a state of affairs which
rendered probable the lapse from duty
that ended so fatally, Its administration
should have seen such as to secure the
order and sobriety on the trains neces-
sary for their safety. The character of
performances on these Friday trains was
we'll known, for they had been, as the
conductor testilies, of long continuance.
The railway managers knew of the dis
order among the passengers and the
temptation presented to the train hands.
They are reasonably charyeable with q.
knowledge of the probable consequences,
and with the responsibility for those con
sequences when they come to shock the
community. The guilt of the fatal re
suits of this sad accident is plainly at their
their doors. They undertook to carry
passengers with precautiOn and to give
them every reasonable guaranty of safety.
Yet here innocent passengers have been
killed because of the permitted violation
by other passengers of what should have
been stringently enforced regulations to
secure order and sobriety on the trains.
The most pronounced advocate of in.
dividual liberty will not claim that men
charged with the conduct of Il railway
train should be permitted to drink intox.
icating liquor while on duty, or that pas
sengers on a train should he allowed to
drink themselves drunk or uproarious
The New York railroad is not the only
one which is thus culpab1e. The recent
trial in the Philadelphia courts of a
rough character for firing pistol ball
into the foot of a fellow passenger while
returning from political convention and
villainous with whisky, has advised the
public of the occurrence Of like
scenes on the Pennsylvania rail
road to that which ended more
fatally Oh the Hudson River. Prob.
ably there are few railroad companies
which guarantee their passengers I'M
munity from such scenes and dangers
Yet they are easily preventible, and one
efficient means would be to refuse to
carry free of cost the class of men from
whom this trouble largely comes. The
disorderly fellows are generally those
who ride free. If they had to pay their
way they would not be found upon the
trains in convivial crowds. Influential
enough to get passes, they are influential
enough also to intimidate the train con-
ductor who hesitates to treat harshly Il
man to whom his railroad president pays
SO much consideration.
In this state the railroad companies
are forbidden to give free passes yet its
governor and its state officers and Legis-
lature claim and get them from every
railroad in it. 1t is Il disgraceful fact
that there should be such a privileged
class where it is forbidden 10y the su-
preme law and 10y the most obvious con
siderations of public policy. a pass is
a bribe, neither more or less, and the
pass taker, as these railroad disorders
show, is apt to have other vices, beside
the lack of honesty, that make him un-
worthy of being regarded above his fel-
low men whom his folly brings to danger
OIL the rail.
THE investigation which started in to
discover how much money was stolen
from the federal treasury for luxuries
for the clerks and their mistresses seems
to have developed considerable matter of
public interest touching the way in
which John Sherman and his agents tried
to compass his nomination for president.
Nothing more shameless in its unscr1l-
pul0usness was ever known in our
political history. His agents were
sent all over the country to
work up his "boom," while they were
paid salaries and travelling expenses as
government officials. He is rich man.
made so most people believe by corrupt
exercise of his official position, and he
must be as mean and stingy as he is rich,