Omaha daily bee., 1884-08-16
POINTERS ron WILSON

POINTERS FOR JERRY WILSON
jeremiah Wilson, whose efficient ex-
posure of Credit Mobilier frauds in con-
press, secured him the lucrative client
age of the Union Pacific railroad, is now
in the city taking dispositions concerning
the alleged exorbitant charges for
transporting mails and government sup
plies over the Union Pacific. A few sug-
cestions may assist Mr.. Wilson in his
arduous labor of examining the traffic
manager, general freight agent, and cor
p~oration employees. Under the act of
1866 congress has prohibited any rail-
road or bridge company from exacting
a greater charge for the transportation
of government supplies, troops, or en-
ployes of the United States across a
bridge spanning any navigable river than
the mileage rate over the road leading to or
from such bridge. This act applies to
the Union Pacific bridge at Omaha,
which was chartered subject to congress-
ional regulation of rates. For a period of
nearly ten years the railroad comp
any, which owns and operates this
bridge, charged the government ten
dollars per carload, or five
cents per hundred pounds for
all the military and Indian supplies
transported across this bridge. 1t has
also exacted fifty cents for transferring
every soldier, officer or employee of the
government back and forth, when the
mileage rate for the alleged distance OF
four miles should have been twenty
cents going westward and sixteen cents
going eastward. But the actual distance
between the Omaha depot and the Union
Pacific transfer depot, on the east side of
the river, is not over two miles and a
halt. The pretended measurement
of four miles between these
two points was a Credit Mobilier fraud.
In order to get a subsidy for a fictitious
mile Of road, the original starting point
in Omaha was measured from a point a
mile north of the present bridge, and the
temporary tracks laid down on the river
bank were subsequently taken up. The
so.called official point, go" as fixed by
General Dodge on the east side, is nearly
a mile east of the Union Pacific depot.
The four-mile measurement between
Omaha and the "''initial terminus" So
called, includes the distance from the old
telegraph, poles, one mile north of the
bridge, to the point CO." So much for
that swindle.
If Mr.. Wilson will take the trouble to
examine quartermasters, commissaries
and their clerks, he may be able also to
get light on more outrageous impositions
even than the bridge frauds. For in
stance, Rock Springs coal, which has
been sold in the Omaha market by the
Union Pacific railroad at from 81 to IS
per ton, has for years been hauled to
Omaha from Rock Springs, Wyoming, as
we are told, at one cent and a half
per ton per mile. The distance from
Rock Springs to Omaha being 800 miles
the government has paid to the Union
Pacific $12 per ton for carrying coal to
Omaha, which the company sells at re-
tail in Omaha for 81 to So. In other
words, the government has bought coal
at So per ton at Rock Springs and paid
$12 for its transportation, making SD
per ton for what can be obtained for 81.
BY a peculiar system, which Mr.. Will.
son may be able to explain, this greater
proportion of supplies that are intended
for Omaha or points beyond, are billed
to Council Bluffs, and then re.billed to
Omaha. The through rates to both
points are the same for carload lots, but
by tliis re.billing an extra charge is ex-
acted for the so.called haul of four miles
from the point 60" or point mix"
These are a few pointers which Mr. Jer-
emiah Wilson might profit by. They show
that the Union Pacific managers regard
Uncle Sam as a ''chump," who can be i'm
posed upon at their pleasure. Mr.. Kim
ball and Mr.. Shelby, of course, have
never heard of these little discrepancies.
They will probably charge it all up to
poor Vining, who was so deeply absorbed
by the question whether Heimlet was a
woman, that he did not have time to COM
pute the ''differential calculus" between
the Union Pacific and Uncle Sam.
BsFoRE any member of the last legisla-