Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1892-02-05


answers: In the ground instead OF on top
of it. Was not every inducement offered
by the people of the state throughout the
various localities to the railway companies
to come into the statel We're they asked 10
stop at the borderl And now they are in
the just revenue derived from over
a hundred million dollars invested
in state railroads, Q which 1t has
pledged its honor to protect, and use this
immense moneyed leverage as club to
build wall around the border Of the state,
the gates of which are only to be opened to
interstate lines when they have something
to offer which cannot possibly conflict with
any individual industry within the state!
Railroad building of home lines within the
state is dead letter while the commission
lives. The Rock Island, as its president
has distinctly declared, only intends to
build to connection within the state In
order to participate in interstate traffic,
and even this would appear to be a haz-
ardous project under present conditions,
but If 1 believed it possible for present con-
ditions to continue 10 exist after the people
were once educated into the truths bearing
on this question, this letter would not have
been written. II it rained KANSAS salt in
bags into Fort Worth. Dallas, Galveston,
San Antonio or any other city or location
within the state the commission would be
equally justified in compelling the Texas
roads to haul it free to those points from
Texas producing points,as it would be TO re
duce under legitimate conditions. as herein
designated, the revenue of the Texas roads
one fraction of i cent below Just and equi-
table rates for the service performed, TO
meet interstate competition from Kansas
or any other foreign producing point.
It will be recollected that in another por-
ton of this letter it is stated that the very
theory and principle Of the commissions
rate is that the railroads have no right TO
protect, encourage or consider commercial
industries, and that it is their duty to re-
ceiye certain prescribed revenue for the
service performed, and let the industries
take care of themselves under those rates,
and yet they appropriate this right to them
selves, as well as the roads revenue to en-
force it, both on state and interstate bust
ness. They certainly believe consistency to
be 'the root of all evil, s" instead of 1.-THE
tree of all knowledge in traffic.
We all admit that if the state owned the
railroads and operated them at the states
expense, granting free transportation in
passenger and freight traffic to the people,
the state would be Gods selected spot upon
earth for home enterprise. provided the
people after paying the taxes TO the state
such policy would necessitate had enough
substance left to exist much less to
patroniZe home enterprises, and every
dollar drawn from the railroads leading
even remotely to this result below Just and
equitable rates for service performed must
necessarily be construed as robbery in
any fair court of equity in the United
States; otherwise the thief who dispeses of
the goods he robs in charity or gives them
away could not be convicted, nor the party
from whom he stole them have any redress
in law. The present administration is
endeavOring to educate the people up to
this policy of Illegal and selfish rapacity in
ff-N
ambition, with the result that the states
honor is a reproach abroad and is fast
becoming so at home.
THEORIES.
The revenues of the Texas roads to be
confiscated and robbed by the state through
its commissioners in order to kill private
trusts.
The chairman of the commission has
kindly publicly explained that the rates on
cotton seed were reduced in order TO fight
the cotton seed oil trust. 1t does not APP
pear to me that any scientific freight
knowledge should be necessary to handle
this proposition, and no more convincing
evidence could he produced than even the
intelligent element of the state had given
the whole subject up to mysticism, and al
most ceased to study it, than that thousands
of men all over the state having the pros
perity and honor of the state at heart have
not risen up in protest against this outrage
to the states integrity. a few minutes
ago we had the commission appropriating
and squandering the Texas roads, treasures
in order to fight the interstate lines and
give some individual industry an absolute
monopoly within the state, and now we
have them feeling around in the roads
already depleted treasures for the remnants
they can find with which to fight
have determined shall not have mo-
nopoly within the state. Even the gravity
and vital interests at stake to investors,
who feel they have been shared into this
trap by placing faith in the states promise,
can hardly overcome the ludicrouS side of
it. All the inducements we have left to
offer investors is to assure them the web is
still vulnerable for flies to enter IN, and the
spiders sit complacently at Austin await
ing and still expecting them. How long |
can the state bear this CROSSE Is there not !
some room in this letter for the lawyers or |
judges to find that any enactment empow |
ering even the Semblance of this authority |
from a state to commission is unconsti-
tutional. To such man the stake would |
be a mighty one and every hours early re- |
lief from the cross should add to the height |
of his monument.
THE COMMISSION AND THE ARKANSAS PASS |
ROAD.
Commencing nowhere and ending no. /
where, in other words not being an inter- |
with an interstate line (the Southern Pa |
cific), the commission is unable to afford it |
protection and it must take its medicine |
At hearing before the commission given |
General Freight Agent Polk of the San |
Antonio and Arkansas Pass railway, at |
which Mr.. Richard Lord, general freight |
agent of the Fort Worth and Rio Grande |
John A. Smith, general freight
agent of the Missouri, Kansas and Texas
and others were present, in reply !
to Mr. Folks loyal appeal on behalf of his
company for mercy, if he could not get
justice, the chairman. l am advised by |
present and which is corroborated IN
the dispatches from Austin to the press,
notified Mr. Polk that it was unfortunate
his line commenced nowhere and ended no.
where particularly, and under the COM
MISSIONS rates, in connection with the
between his line and the
Pacific railway, he was /
placed in an unfortunate position.
in consequence of which the revenue |
Of the San Antonio and Aransas Pass rail-
way would have to suffer. Here we have a
road comprising over seven hundred miles |
Of its own rails wholly within the state of
Texas, connecting with its own rails such
cities as Corpus Christi, Houston. San An
tonic, Waco, Hoakum and many others,
ramifylng the entire southern portion of
The state, giving direct railway communica-
ion to thousands of Texans, and hundreds
IF thousands of acres of fine land, and vet
he commission states II commences no.
where and ends nowhere, and very frankly
admits that under the commissioners sys-
EN- of rates, on account of its unfortunate
OcatiOn ITS revenue WOnid ha eay;ouSl1- I'M,