Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-06-27
IN CONCLUSION,
Mr.. Towne sums up the whole situation as
follows:

|
The railroads have from the beginning and
| everywhere. been the great creators and dis
| tributorS of the nations wealth. They are the
potent agencies which have transformed worth
| less and uninhabitable places into empires OF
| wealth and population. They have wrested an
| empire from the wilderness and supplanted the
| Indians W gwam with the white mans home
more eGectually than could the pioneers rifle
| or the national arms. With their facilities for
| transportation they have made possible and
profitable the settlement Of all sections of the
| republic, which otherwise must have been con.
| fined TO a limited area along the great water
| ways. Their operation has made us exception
| ally rich in all that goes TO make nation great
| and prosperous, and they are in this respect
/ greater coDguerors than the sword. They have
| become the arteries of our vast commercial sys-
| tenn and as such are entitled to worthy recOg-
| milton. They should not have to sue as suppl
| ants for Justice; but, their existence and en-
| couragement ever going hand in hand with the
nations prosperity, they should be freely granted
what measures of relief and p election Congress
| in its wisdom can Weld. To the need of such
measures have aimed in this letter to call at
tention. so far as the limits of my subject allow.
| l believe that this Government should not
| grant any concessions 10 foreign carriers that
| can be used to the prejudice of our domestic in
| terestS.
! Apropos of this point my attention has lust
been called to an issue oil the Japan Daily Herald
dated Yokohama, May Is, 1889, in which find
| the following:
"The new Canadian Pacific line seems at last
| to be getting into practical shape. on the 18th
Canadian House of Commons, at Ottawa, three
resolutions. The first provided for a subsidy for
a fortnlghtly line of steamers between British
| Columbia ard Australia: the second was to
grant subsidy of $500 600 per annum for
| weekly fast line of steamers between Canada
and the United Kingdom contract for these
has, ii is since reported, been made with Ander-
SIN * Co, of the Oriental line, who are TO pro-
vide steamers OF over twenty knots speed thus
bringing the trrmini within six days of each
other. The third resolution provided that If
Great Britain gives not less than Gas, 900 per
| annum for a monthly service, nor less than G75.-
COO per anuum for iOrtnightly service between
British Columbia, China and Japan the Gov
ernorGeneral in Council may, on behalf of
Canada, add els 900 III the one case, or eos, 900
in the other, 10 the sums granted by Great
Britain"
l believe that a railroad system built by a
foreign power a military measure, and with
an avowed object of promoting trade between
the provinces of the country that created il, by
withdrawing their trade from the United States:
whose further object is, by subsidies on land
sea, 10 divert from us 10 the Canadian route
the traffic belonging to the North American
Continent and the Orient on one hand, and Eu-
rope on the other, well as that between
transpacific and transatlantic countries,
should not be favored where favors can be with
held. Ii should not for example. be permitted
TO promote its cherished objects by the use, or
rather the abuse, of our customs laws regarding
transportation. These laws were intended to
facilitate the handling of exports and imports
by American merchants and carriers, aud
should not be defeated by the unpatrio;ic pur-
pose of turning into Canadian channels the
current of traffic in American bonded mer-
chandiSe.
would emphasize my belief, also, that
American carriers should be relieved of the
onerouS restrictions laid upon them by the
fourth and fifth sections of the interstate com
merce law, thar they may not be denied
any reasonsb e iaeil ty To enable them to con-
test their own ground against Invading carriers,