Wichita eagle., 1889-05-24
MISSOURI MEANNESS.
Kansas City Squeals on Wichita's Freight
Rates.
From the Kansas City Times.

From the Kansas City Times.
The order of the Kansas railroad COM
missioners instructing the railroads to
make distance tariff which will allow
the jobbers of Wichita equal facilities
with the jobbers of Kansas City is aues-
tion that ought to be looked into by Kan
sas City business men. Not so much be-
cause it will give Wichita an equal ad-
vantage with Kansas City, but because OF
an old agreement among the railroads
which allows St. Louis an undue advant-
age over Kansas City in her own territory.
Kansas City jobbers do not object to
meeting ST. Louis on equal terms, but
they do object to st. Louis having a de-
cided advantage. which she viii surely get
as soon as the new tariffs go into effect.
AS soon as jobbing rates are put in effect
for Wichita the other jobbing cities or
Kansas will demand and receive the same
concession, and st. Louis with rate OF 20
per cent of the sums OF the locals to Wlch-
ita, so per cent to Fort Scott and as favor
able rates to other centers, IS likely to
step in and carry off the trade
If the Kansas City jobbers work in the
right way. there is no question but they
can force the railroads to make the rate
between ST. Louis and Wichita the sums
of the locals and control the business
within two hundred miles on the south OF
Kansas City, where today they do not sup
ply one-tenth of the country. Ii Is de-
cidedly live question to the jobbers Of Kan
sas City, and they should act at once.
Let there be gall enough in thy ink, though thou
write with goose-pen, no matter. '-IweIIth
Night.
Wichita nor the railway commission
ers, nor the state of Kansas care one
snap for any ''old agreement" hatched
up between the traffic managers of re-
spective status or the freight rate quarrel
of two Missouri towns. 1t was settled
as far back as 1861 that Kansas was to
be free and independent state and not
a, dependency of pro-slavery Missouri:
that she was to be the seat of an ideal
civilization, not the shadow Of effeteism.
Looked into by Kansas City's business
men," indeed. "Kansas City jobbers do
not object" indeed. kansas City Job
berS can force the railroads 10 make the
rate between ST. Louis and Wichita the
sum Of two locals and thus control the
trade of that country" indeed! Oh, the
gall! And have we only lived and Ia
bored for Kansas for full third of q
century to learn at the last, and
from a scribbler in the Sni Hill Times,
that the prosperity Of a homein the realm
of the suntlower is less to a railway COM
pany than the local pump-room of the
chicane puke: that to a soulless corpora
ton the saltinbanco dollar of the Mis-
souri, decoy-duck is more to be desired
than the dollar made meath the sunshine
: -, : II.
Of fair and virtuous Kansas. The
thrasonic presumption and lofty swag-
ger that would "teach ones grand
mother to suck eggs" pales before the
bumptiouS effrontery of the galiacious
galoot who, at the bidding of horde of
jobbing and self-convicted mercantile
brigands, would thus attempt to make
the world believe that robbery when
openly done is not only excusable, but
praiseworthy.
Well, and so then, Wichita amounts
to nothing, the claims Of her people and
their capital invested nor the ''200 miles
Of south Kansas" only so far as they
'can beforced" to contribute to the NAV
out of all proportion from the tithes,
tolls and outrages laid upon the indus
tries Of Kansas.
Let us whisper something into the
ears of our esteemed contemporary: The
railroads of Kansas, all of them, were
projected in the interest Of this state and
very largely, all of them, were built by
the aid of our municipalities; that Kan
sas people, who are paying the interest
on the bonds which built these roads, !
have more interest in them than any
body else, not excepting their watered-
stock holders and high salaried manage
ments; and that if Missouri merchants
should demonstrate that they have "the
power to force" as boasted of by the
Times, that the EAGLE promises a revo-
luton in the railway laws of Kansas to
which the granger laws" of Illinois and
Iowa will be but milk and water.
Wichita is just as much entitled to be
city as is Kansas City, and more so, if
there can be but one city, and that built
from the trade of the territory of south
ern Kansas. If southern Kansas is to have
a city, it is to th9nterest of Kansas that
such city be located where Kansas can
tax the wealth of such city-on Kansas
soil. The people of southern Kansas
have no direct interest in either St Louis
or Kansas City, and don't care what diff
ferential freight rates may obtain as
between these two Missouri cities, SO
long as southern Kansas can have a city
Of their own with satisfactory freight
rates and satisfactory markets. Nor the
railroads. nor Kansas City, nor st. Louis.
nor any outside or inside power of what
ever character, is going to be permitted
to brow-beat the Kansas railway com
missioners out of their righteous posi-
ton, nor down Wichita in the interest
of the dealers or of the markets of anv
outside city.
The husband of r Ellen E0ctar wants