The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1890-01-21

State Supreme Court, final in jurisdic
ton. Under government control all
this would be changed.
First-class passenger rates need not
exceed one cent per mile and freight
a fourth its present tariff rates. /
hold that railroad managers admit
this to be true. They say in defence
of their absorption policy that the
more railroad connecting, under one
management, the cheaper the tariff
rates and the better the service. This
only proves my position to be true.
Place them all under one management
and the service would be infinitely
better and cheaper, and the only way
to prevent extOrtion is for the govern,
ment to own and control the rail
roads.
CAN WE GET CONTROL OF THE RAIL
ROADS?
This inquiry has been frequently
made since the St. Louis Convention.
It is said they build and own the
roads; that they are chartered CON-
panies; thfo they have vested rights;
that they own under forms of law,
etc.
In reply I answer, so talked the
Tories from 1850 to 1890 they said
the colonies were chartered by the
King, and so they were. They said
the crown had vested. rights; that all
their acts were under forms of law,
and it was true.
But handful of patriots that were
so obtuse as not to see that one gener-
alton could barter away the rights of
the succeeding one, destroyed kingly
charters and vested rights and forms
of law at one Herculean blow.
The people of our country are in
no good temper to see Pinkerton's s
spies or policemen thrust back at the
point of the bayonet, men who are
pleading with plutocrats for wages,
that will be sufficient to keep their
families from starvation.
You may call tn revolutionary if
you will, and so it is, but the people
who are the real rulers will see to it
that like our sister republic of Brazil
that it shall be bloodless one.
! --,-=s-- ---=,1.5 Lee AL. RIGHTS, ------,
How did the railroads get their
forms of law, their vested rights, their
chartered privileges, the lands they
own? Was not the peoples land
confscated for their good? Did not
the farmers whose lands were taken
have their charters, under forms of
law, that ante dated the rights the rail
roads were vested with Did not the
people have patent, charter from
the State itself q? We call these char
ters title deeds.
The railroad companies called our
attention to the fact that the police
powers of the State had always been
reserved, and that as it was for the
"pubic good" to have railroads, and
so the State revoked the charters it
had given US and gave the land to
others with chartered rights attached.
The railroad told us that we would
be compensated for the land for the
number of years the railroad was
chartered for, and by contract the
railroads were to be given these pow
ers for the public good and not for
private gain.
The Constitution of the United
States recognized the right to hold
slaves, and yet there came a time
when it was said that the public good
demanded their freedom, and the
slave holder had his chartered rights
and vested privileges and all the forms
OF law taken away. The Hon. Hannibal
Hamlin said in the u. S. Senate March
10th, 1858: "Forms of law God
knows there is nothing but form in it.
Forms of law Long years ago the
mother country undertook to Cypress
these colonies by forms of law; the
noble patriot John Hampden was per-
secuted under forms of law, and for
his love Of liberty under forms of law
despotis1n is created. Under forms
of law all the wrongs of which the
mind of man can conceive have been
perpetrated. Under forms of law
liberty itself has been stricken down.
Under farms of Law the Son Of Man
was arraigned and stretched upon the
cross.
So say I. Under forms of law the
United States could build competing
lines alongside of every mile of profit
able railroad in the United States
and then, under forms Of law the
present owners would receive nothing.
What fine system of Goube track
railroad we would have then.
Under forms of law we propose to
take the railroads just as they in de.
defiance of our vested rights, in de-
fiance of our charters that antedate
theirs by a century or more, we the
people will take back to ourselves the