Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1884-02-21
LETTER NUMBER ONE.


DEAR SIRs: Your favor of the 29th in-
slant has just reached me, while on the
line. Your letter is an answer to mine
of the 25th, In which I inouire of vour
Honorable Board whether under your
recent decision, which is now being re-
considered, we would be entitled, under
your local distance tariff, to a mileage
rate for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa
Re railroad, and an additional mileage
rate for each of the auxiliary lines tenn
Porarlly operated in connection with the
Atchlson, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad,
or whether on the other hand it was
your purpose to exact a single rate for
the combined mileage, by reason of the
TACT that all the lines for purposes of de-
Velopement were operated as q single sys-
tenn of railroads.
In your letter your Honorable Board
replies not only to this inquiry, but you
have also been good enough to make
some explanatory statements in regard
TO your recent decision. With your per
mission shall make one or two inquir-
les In connection with these explana-
tions, but in a separate letter from this,
and shall confine myself in this letter
only to the immediate question before
as, namely: the opinion which you have
announced that we are entitled only to
a single rate for the combined mileage Of
the main line and auxiliary systems.
Allow me respectfully to ask in the in
'terests of the State and in the interest of
the road, that you reconsider this opin-
ion, for we believe that it is not only I'M
just to our company, but we think it will
prove prejudical to the interests of the
State by making it impracticable to pro-
coed with the construction of additional
auxiliary lines, and making it neces-
sary to change the whole liberal system
under which these auxiliary lines have
heretofore been operated,
You say in your letter in explanation
of your construction of the law, that cit
was not the purpose of the Board to
change the policy and customs hereto
fore prevailing In applying the same sys-
TENS of rates to both the main line and
the auxiliary systems" Permit me to
Say that the steps which your Honorable
Board has recently taken will necessarily
force our company to change the policy
and customs heretofore prevailing The
policy and custom in the past has been
based upon the fact that hitherto our
company has had the right to make its
own tariffs. By taking away this free
dom in the making of our own tariffs,
you remove all incentive to the develop
ment Of business upon these auxiliary
roads. In the past our "policy and Gus
tom" has been to operate these auxiliary
lines year after year at an absolute loss,
waiting for the time to come, when by
Teas n of continued system of reason
able rates upon the main line, larger
business would be established from
which we should in the future receive a
fair return for the investments made.
Under the principles announced in your
70 hea oil oVsiVy
pose to make us no returns for the loss
which we have incurred in the past in
the operation of these auxiliary lines,
and we can only look forward to the fact,
that as the business develops, your Hon
orable Board will make such reductions
In the rates as to make the property con-
tinue unremunerative. 1t does not seem
to US to be good law, nor fair in equity,
that because the Atchison, Topeka &
Santa Fe Railroad has been willing in
the past to operate these auxiliary lines
at an actual loss in order to develop the
country tributary thereto, that your Hon
orable Board should assume the right to
reduce the rates on these auxiliary lines
to figures which will make their opera
ton a still greater loss and then insist
upon the AtchiSon road continuing to
operate them. We appeal to your own
good sense to say whether such a course
must not lead to the entire cessation of
construction of all additional auxiliary
lines, and whether also such a decision
must not force our company to appeal to
the courts for the protection of the inter-
est that we have in those roads already
built, and IN which this company is but
a part owner.
Your Honorable Board gives as the
chief reason for this opinion, that "the
nfeae, do l..
upon the basis of the net earnings of the
systems as whole. If any part of the
system fails to pay its own way, the loss
rs made good out of the earning of that
part whose operation has been more than
remunerative." We understand from
this that you decide that the earnings of
our main line, the Atchison, Topeka &
Santa Fe railroad, must be used to make
good the losses on the operation of the
auxiliary lines, Is this. fair? Is it Just
Are we to regard this as an intimation
that If these auxiliary companies adopt
their legal rights to operate their own
systems as separate and distinct proper
ties, with separate and distinct distances
and rates, that you will exact a penalty
against the AtchisOn, Topeka & Santa Fe
railroad by adopting still lower rates for
this latter line -? we are loathe to be-
heve that your Honorable Board would
proceed to such an extreme measure. It
seems to Us that snch q measure could
only be considered as penalty exacted
against the Atchison, Topeka & Santa
Fe railroad main line. for the enterprise
Il has exhibited in reaching out into far
.6ountries and bringing across the State
volume Of traffic which. while increasing
the earnings of the Il line, has also
enormously contributor to the growth
aud web being of the whole contiguous
cosntry. If such principle be adopted
by your Honorable Board, there must be
an end to railroad enterprise in the fu-
tRre. If the people who own the Atchi-
.Bon, Topeka q Santa Fe main line invest
millions of new money in building new
Readsin New Mexico, Arizona, California,
Mexico. etc. and by these Investments