The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1889-11-19

~ OO 0Ao0 OnASJ4f6AA0 AOSAS~
will hesitate to curb the career OF this
destructive monopoly by adjusting the
charges according to ONE rule eqult-
able, fixed and certain.
THE WRONG OF DISCRIMINATION.
But even this sinks into insigni6-
canoe compared with the wrong and
evil of their determinations. Com
mon justice, sound policy, every sense
of duty, the whole spirit and letter of
the law, requires them to give every
man equal facilities in the use of the
roads, and to charge them at the same
rates for the same class of goods, &C
cording to weight and distance. There
a be no possible doubt about this.
Every unpreiudiced nan who has
sense enought to know his right hand
from his left acknowledges that equal
ity must be the rule of right; and he
understands this perfectly well with
out looking at the Constitution, where
it is solemnly declared to be part of
the ter legwm, the law of laws, and the
rule of all rules on the subject. Yet
this sacred principle is constantly and
steadily violated, trampled under foot
and treated with heartless contempt.
At the slightest glance you will see
the enormous injury, direct and con
s%equential, which these discrimina-
tions inaict upon the public. A mar
who invests his capital, or employs
his time in mining or manufacturing,
car be driven into bankruptcy at any
time by a discrimination against him,
and in favor of his competitors. This
is done every day, and all the time,
not in a few cases here and there, but
Systematically and regularly, whenever
a carrying monopoly conceives that its
own interests a be promoted in that
n~efarious way; and it will continue to
be done until the prohibition of the
Constitution is enforced by penal en-
actment.
THE FOUL BULK OF THESE ENoRMITIEs.
Instead of breaking the foul bulk
Of these enormities, [ will give you a
sample; convenient, because it is small
and easily handled. A neighbor and
friend of mine lin partnership with
another) became the lessee and opera
tor of a coal mine in .Northumber.
land. For a short distance they were
obliged to carry their product over
one of the branches of the Pennsyl
vania company; they were charged
for the use of the road and motive
power alone-there was no loading or
unloading in the case, and no cars
were furnished by the company-at
about the rate of twenty cents per ton
per mile; while others whom the mo-
nopoly chose to favor were let off at
two cents. They paid the excess
under protest, and brought suit no re-
cover 1t back. 1t was as simple a
case of extortion as can be conceived;
but certain officers of the Pennsyl-
vania Railroad Company swore that in
their judgment it was right to commit
it, and moreover declared that it was
a usual, common and customary prac-
tice. [ blush to acknowledge that in
all this the Supreme Court endorsed
and Allotted the corporation. The
| dialectics of the decision turned on a
prohibition in the charter against
charging more on an Average than four
cents per ton per mile-which was
construed as a legal warrant for any
robbery of one person which the COM
pany could prove to be balanced by
the aggregate of favors shown to all
others. But neither the greatest cor
poration in the State, nor the highest
judicial tribune, paid any respect
whatever to the principle that all
mems rights to the use of a public
highway are equal.
It is known and not denied that this
equality of right Sacred and funda-
mental though it be( is by the com
mon practice of carrying companies
~corruptly disregarded.
If you want to drive business com,
petition out Of the field, bride a rail.
road manager to raise the freights
| upon your rivals and lower your own,
Tor take the whole board of directors
into partnership with you, OF promise
to divide the spoils with the corpora
ton, and they will make you a mo.
nopoly with power to plumber, limited
only by the rage of your dealings.
The loss thus inflicted upon the
worthiest men in the land is startling.
Ay large. By a single one of these
arrangements-that with the Standard
toll Company-the estimated injury
direct and consequential to honest
persons within the State, amounts to
fnot less than a hundred and fifty mil
lions of dollars. For this fact you
have the statement of Mr.. Gowen,
Lwhose veracity no man that knows
him will doubt, and whose faculties Of
observation, sharpened by a persona,
interest in the subject, make him
most intelligent witness.
Tno mn no1vrr~~---