The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1891-01-31
"THE FARMER, THE INVESTOR AND
THE RAILWAY

THE RAILWAY"
The most comprehensive, incisive and
able paper ever prepared, by any writer,
in our judgment, on American railway
management and manipulation, is to be
found in the February number of 1.-The
Arena" This courageous analysis Of the
methods of the great railway magnates
of the country is from the pen of our
fellow citizen, C. Wood Davis, who is.
by education and by taste, not only, but
, by experience, wonderfully well
equipped for the work he has so thor
oughly done. 1t covers twenty-three
pages of the magazine. every paragraph
of which bTistles with facts drawn from
the most reliable and authentic sources,
rounding up with successive conclusions
and logical sequences that have the ire
sistible sweep and the overwhelming fall
of a cataract.
This article was offered to and refused
in succession, by five Of the leading mag
aZines of America. Not single editor
of them was ignorant of Mr.. Davis
claims and standing as writer. The
answer returned by one, probably, was
the true one for all, and was, in sub
stance, viz: 1--WE dare not publish this
paper"
We cannot give even a readable syn
Opsis of the article. It is one Of those
productions so full of meat as to defy
condensation or any other process of
contraction. Mr. Davis, in fact, en-
plOyed weeks Of time, covering a period
of months, in the accumulation of facts
and figures bearing what he, through
practical experience as a former traffic
manager and railway promoter, knew.
He starts out with a statement Of the
total aggregated value of the railway
properties of the United States, q sum
which appears, nominally, to equal 60
per cent Of the value of all the farms in
the United States, but which he conclu-
sively shows does not. in fact, equal 30
per cent of such farm values. Mr. Da-
Wis does not ignore or belittle, in any
sense, the great benefits arising from
railway construction in the way of de-
velopment, but he hesitates not to 60 to
the very bottom Of watered stocks, fund
ed debts, guaranteed mortgages, com
prising total capitalizations, and Of all
the major and minor fixed charges, the
interests and the dividends on which can
only be paid as they are squeezed from
the patrons of the roads in the way of
transportation rates. Some of these
facts, and which were handled editorial !
ly by the EAGLE few months ago, such |
as the process of initiating the various |
kinds of stocks, the construction of |
branch lines TO secure money to pay divi- |
dends, the payment of dividends when
none have been earned by borrowing |
and further loading down the properties, /
are more fully elucidated an I explained |
than we, probably, possibly could have
done.
In all Mr. Davis tables and data, and |
in drawing deductions from the same, he /
leans to the safe and conservative side. |
For instance, he comedies an average |
cost of $4,000 for every mile of road in .
America, which Is a most liberal conces-
sion. He takes up also the municipal
bond aid feature and the systimatic way
resorted to in freezing out the stock is
sued in lieu of such aid, etc, and winds
up with ten propositions which the |
American statesman, the railway man
ager, stakeholder and the security-owner
will have TO solve and answer to the
of the American people
within the compass of not very remote
date, and the fundamental point of
which answer must be, ''the Interest of
ess than five million people, however in
nocent as holders they may be, cannot
md must not stand for ali time as
against the rights of the other tifty-five
millions of people, comprising the in
1ustrial users of the American highway
known as the railroad