Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1892-01-31

in moving from some point East to Dallas
to engage in the manufacturing business
Absolutely none. But the trouble IS, as
before stated, Texas manufacturers and
iobbers are not even able to reach the
Texas consumer on equal terms with Tor
elgn dealers and manufacturers, to say
nothing of the advantage of nearness to the
consumer, and instead of men of capital and
enterprise seeking to invest their means IN
Texas factories, those who have already
done so are being drawn to trade centerS
outside of Texas by the discriminating rates
given such places by railroads whose very
existence is largely due to the splendid prl-
vate subscriptions of money and public DO
nations of land given to them by the people
of TEXTS. In view of what Texas has done
for railroads and the facts as they now ex-
list in regard to discriminating rates against
Texas commercial and manufacturing en-
terprises. who will say that the people OF
Texas have ever been more unjust in their
dealings with the railroads than the rail-
roads have in their treatment Of them2
The same discriminating rates have here
tofore prevailed against agricultural
products in this state. 1t cost from two TO
three times as much to move bale OF cot
ton a given distance in Texas as 1t did on
the same road out of the state, but this has,
in a measure, been corrected by the com
mission.
Can the commission afford our mercan-
tile and manufacturing interests similar
relief! is the vital question interesting the
merchants and manufacturers. 1t Is also
the question now engaging the serious con-
sideration of the commission, and 1t occurs
to me that Mr.. Albert K. Greene, amember
of the Kansas railroad commission, lndl-
Gated what will doubtless be the answer OF
this commission in a recent article IN the
Cosmopolitan, in which he summed up the
80 ~ hn Il =
sion as follows:
''By persistent effort, the commission has
secured such recognition, in reduction OF
rates Of the natural resources of the state,
that its mining and manufacturing inter
ests have been immensely stimulated. This
remark is especially applicable to ten cities
of the state which now produce from one to
fifty cars of salt each, daily; also with
scarcely less force to eight coal producing
counties, which supply this and several
states adjoining with fuel, and in marked
degree to the milling interests, which have
a capacity for the manufacture of every
bushel of wheat produced in the state in the
most favorable season"
Texas has salt of as good quality and in as
great abundance. as Kansas. Our wheat
area is larger than the entire state of Kan
sas and quite as productive. Our coal
fields are IN process of development, and in
the course of time will produce large part,
if not all, of the coal needed in Texas.
The Texas commission is undertaking 10
do for these and other local industries what
the Kansas commission claims to have done
for like interests in that state. 1t desires
to do this peaceably and without any I'M
necessary reduction in the revenues of the
railroads if possible. But when the COM
mission attempts to give home enterprises
a fair chance to supply home demands if
las in the case of our salt industries) it is
met with cut in rates from interstate
points that has no other significance than
an announcement that local enterprises
shall not enjoy the advantages in rates to
which their location entities them, then it
will hardly be held responsible by an en-
ightened public for any reduction in rates
and consequent loss of revenue to the roads
that may be necessary 10 shield such enter
prises from the merciless assaults of for
eign interests, whose purpose is TO crush
them and pave the way for a continuance of
their monopoly of the Texas trade.
l. L. FOSTER.