The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1889-11-26


you make a contract to do a job of
excavation at a price per cubic yard,
which gives you a heavy profit on the
whole job. have you a legal right to
demand additional paw for particular
parts of it, which you allege to be
harder than the rest2 [ do not say
what claim you might have upon the
liberality of your employer i the bar
gain, taken altogether, a losing
one; | only ask whether you could, by
construction of the contract, charge
more for one yard than another?
Take a ase precisely anal 'g-
Gus. A contractor agrees to pave a
mile of street at SO much per foot,
taxing the owners of the lots for the
number OF feet that front upon each
ones property. Such CONTRACTS have
been often made by the authorities of
towns and cities, and they have never
been understood to warrant a higher
charge per foot against the owner Of
small and cheap lots than against the
p%roprie5ors of those which are more
valuable.
Reasoning fairly from premises
known to be true, you cannot escape
the conclusion that the extravagant
and discriminating charges of these
corporations are a fraud upon their
oWm charters, as well as a gross wrong
to their victims. The contracts they
invoke to save them from the Justice
of the State are as S rong against
them as the Constitution itself.
THERE IS A POWER OF THE STATE TO CON-
TRoL THEM.
But there is a power of the State to
control them, to check their rapacity,
and to make them honest which lies
back o. all this. The police authority,
of which she cannot disarm herself if
she would, enables her to regulate the
use, even of private property, in such
manner that neither the general pub
lie nor particular individuals can be
made to suffer by it unjustly. Upon
that principle you can forbid an ex-
cessive rate of interest upon the loan
of money, fix the charges of hack
drivers, or ferrymen, or tavern keep,
ers, or the n of grain elevators.
THE STATE CAN ABOLISH
Besides all that, the State can abol-
ish a monopoly, or bring it to terms
of justice, at any time by virtue of
her right of eminent domain. All
property, corporeal and incorporeal,
is held upon condition that it may be
Invested whenever the general inter
est requires it. All charters and acts
of interpretations are subject to such
modification as mag be necessary to pre-
cent the owners from doing wrong to the
public. This principle was expressed
in the Constitution by the amendment
of 1856; but that was not it's origin;
it existed from time immemorial as a
rule of public and universal law. It
has always been n of the powers of
every sovereign government, and it
applies with equal force to all char
tiers, whether dated before or after
1855.
These are arguments in favor of
the power. Except in Pennsylvania,
it would not be necessary to state
them. Everywhere else the most
jealous advocates of corporate mo.
nopoly concede the authority in ques-
ton, while they depricate its exercise.
But here the shallow notion still lin
gers, that an act of Incorporation is
an irrevocable license to defraud and
plumber whomsoever the managers
please to select as their prey.
FREE TICKETS
I have hesitated to speak of free
tickets. l can understand how a
thing so cheap might be accepted as a
mere courtesy, like a drink OF a din
ner. Perhaps, therefore, it is not
NAHUM IN Sc. But since 1874 no man
can hold Office without taking an oath
to obey the Constitution, which ex-
pressly prohibits free passes. Can
that oath be violated with a safe con
science? I am a private. citizen, and
I speak with respect for the better
Judgment of others when I say that
Executive and Judicial officers who
have acted thus during the last ten
years ought to be i~mpeached and re-
moved from their places. But that is
easier said than done; for the House
of Representatives, which should pre-
fer the Impeachment, and the Senate,
which has exclusive jurisdiction to try
it, are tarred nearly all over with the
same stick.
The legal predicament in which
this practice places the railroad officers
is somewhat worse The passes which
they distribute are things of consid-
cradle value; worth, perhaps, two or
three hundred dollars apiece, and
hundreds of thousands altogether. If
the agents of the company would
bring up that much money in a bag,
at the first meeting of every Legisla-