Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1886-12-25
a. TRADE WILL BE ABSOLUTELY PAR
ALYZED"

TRADE WILL BE ABSOLUTELY PAR
ALYZED"
We reproduce from a San Francisco
contemporary, this morning, an account
of conversations with railroad managers
in San Francisco, concerning the effect OF
the interstate commerce bill upon the
trade Of San Francisco, should it become
a law. As the subject is one of such vital
Importance to the commerce of the coast,
and affects all trade and industrial inter
ests, and relatively the prosperity of all in
the State, the views of these gentlemen,
who, it must be conceded, are thoroughly
intelligent upon the matter, the report
viii be read with profound interest.
Colonel Croker, for instance, points out
the fact-which has been so often debated
before the people-that to deny the right
to charge more for short haul than for a
longer one, is 10 fly in the face of unchange-
able economic commercial laws. Thus,
it is shown that such rule as the bill
proposes would discriminate unjustlY in
favor of all points east and south of Cali
fornia's commercial metropolis, since it
has no western relations by rail. 1t will
give, as was yesterday pointed out in these
columns, places on transcontinental roads
east of US an advantage in time and rates
that would seriously impair the more west
ern trade centers.
Not long since San Francisco merchants
protested against the transportation equal
ity with them of the tradesmen of Saera-
mento, and which the latter secure because
here ship and rail transportation meet.
That protest was shown to be one without
Justice. vet the interstate commerce bill
proposes to destroy the competitive rela-
tion Of Sacramento in all cases of through
hauls. It IS cited by the railway man
ayers that the new Constitution of this
State, being tinged with Reaganism,'
prohibits any discrimination, such as COM
merce justifes, in favor of any place 1t
compelled the railroad carriers, therefore,
to abandon the low rate from San Fran
cisco to Los Angeles that Heretofore pre-
vailed by reason of ocean competition, and
% adopt the same rate that applied to
other places. This was a necessity, be-
cause to maintain the low rate to that
place would have required all other rates in
that direction to have been lowered to It's
level As a result, the steamboat
freight rates went up correspondingly, and
the new or high rate has thus been forced
upon the people ever since, and no one has
benefited by it. So this arbitrary law in
juriously diyerts the flow of trade directed
by natural advantages, and .confers no cor
responding good:
At one time in the history of railway
legislative agitation in this State, bill
that measured all rates by the geographical
distance of a certain town from tide-water,
was objected to as an attempt to confer by
statute advantages the Creator had denied
the locality. To which an advocate of the
measure responded; Precisely; We pro-
pose by law to give the place advantages
nature has neglected to confer upon it," In
brief, the effect Of the interstate commerce
bill would represent just such superhuman
and impossible attempts,
In the interview, which is elsewhere
printed, It is shown that the trade Of Reno,
in Nevada, is tributary to California com
mercial centers, or competitive points
because they are the nearest places to it
which can avail of the low through rates
from the Atlantic side. Under the new
bill, which it is feared will be passed by
Congress, Reno viii receive Eastern ship
ments al a rate as low as San Francisco,
though she has not the competition of
ocean lines that create that rate. As a
result Reno will buy eastward of her, and
California will lose her trade. The appa-
rent benefit to Reno, however, is dissipated
by another condition that would be
created-the increase OF the through rate
TO that station; and this would be neees.
sity because the roads would lose the local
traffic between California and Reno, and
be driven for support to dependence upon
increased through transportation rates, and
to increased local rates also. The same
would be true of every other point outside
of California, westward from her CONNER
cial depots. The i'll would extend even
further, for every railroad town east Of an
other would cease trade relations with its
westward neighbors, and so the so-called
independent condition would operate
along the whole line eastward
It comes to this, then: If the interstate
commerce bill becomes law, lines oPer-
ating from California into or through