Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1892-10-26


will voluntarily offer an increase in
wages? On the contrary, is it not true
that all increase in wages has been
forced from unwilling employers by
the united demand of organized wage
workers?
3. A gross Misrepresentation of the
true status of railroad corporations and
theircapitalized fraud-in that it is as
sumed that a reduction of freight and
passenger rates must necessarily reduce
wages. To begin with: The projectors
and builders of railroads never have
any money of their own. The original
incorporators of railroad companies are
generally impecunious exploiters or
promoters. 1t is a fallacy to speak of
railroads as on par with ordinary in
vestments of capital. Railroads are con-
structed with borrowed capital and the
people furnish the security upon which
such capital is borrowed. Such security
consists of charter or franchise and
the permission to acquire a fright
of-wav" by the exercise of the delegated
power of eminent domain" Upon this
security the money is borrowed with
which to build the railroad, and in most
instances the bonded indebtedness ex-
ceeds by thousands of dollars per mile
the original cost of construction. As
rule, all shares of stock represent dis
honest and fraudulent additions to the
capitalization of railroads, in the acqui-
sition of which investors were system
atically swindled and in the effort to
impart some semblance of value to
which the people are continuously
robbed
A few figures must suffice to show
the enormity of this swindle and the
extent to which the people are being
robbed. At the close of the year 1888,
Poor's Manual had this to say: sit is
not probable that the cost of the mile
age constructed in the three years end
ed December 81, 1883, exceeded $50, 900
per mile. The whole increase of the
share capital, S999, 3S7, POS, and por-
tion of the funded debt, was in excess
of cost of construction "a billion dollar
steaD. If it be assumed that the cost
in money of all the roads in operation
| in the United States, did not exceed. as
it certainly did not, the amount of their
funded and floating debt, 50, 7S7 ,41O, 72S,
the actual investment was a most profit
able one. The net earnings for this
year (1SS3) were 1886, ,9G1, ,SS4, sum
equaling about nine per cent. on their
cost
Note the fact that the highest stand
ard authority upon railroad statistics
in the world says that the railroad sys-
tenn of the United States did not cost
more than $4,000 per mile.
Now let us see what Poor's Railway
Manual for 1892 says about the question
of present cost of all the railroads in
| America. quote: while 800, 0O0,-
600 represents the true cost of all roads,
it is only fair to say that owing to the
decline in the price of labor and the
products of labor, the roads could be
duplicated to-day at very much less
expense. Basing the cost of supplies
to-day upon the quotation made and
comparing said cost with the prices
which prevailed fifteen to twenty years
ago when railway building was at its
greatest height, it is reasonably S lfe to
say that every road in the United
States could be duplicated for less
considerably less-than 81, 900, OO0, 900. -
Other eminent engineering experts
have declared that the roads cost s2O,-
900, or less, per mile. Now take a
| glance at the situation at the close of
| the year 1891. At that date the roads
aggregated mileage of 10, ,601 miles,
which at $4,000 mile Ia liberal esti-
mate), cost SIS, 11S, O30, 900. The net
earnings from traffic, rentals and other
sources for the year 1891, above all
costs of operation, including better
ments and repairs, amounted to $780,
100000, in round numbers, or T. O3 per
cent upon the sum of $50, 900 per mile
for the entire railroad system OF this
sum there was 800, ,72o, 900 paid in divi-
dends, 1921, ,26O, 900 paid as interest upon
bonds and s3s, 1920, 900 passed to the sur
plus fund, which, at the close of the
year 1891, had assumed the following
proportions:
Real estate, stocks, bonds and 9TH
er investments. 81, 617, ,031 CSC
Other assets. 239 l59 462
| AoIdl tl, o0o lJU,
If, then, the railroads of the United
States were capitalized, as all legiti-
mate enterprises should be, to-wit, al
the actual cost, or cash investment, the
railroad owners would certainly have
nothing to complain of. But instead ot
such being the case, we find the stocks
bonds and other Indebtedness of the
roads aggregating the amazing sum OF
SO, $50, 1874, 22s-or $50, ,9O1 per mile, and
it is the effort on the part of the rail
road corporations to collect interest and
dividends upon this enormous fictitious
capitalization that constitutes what i:
knows as the railroad problem
The transportation routes of natior
are its arteries of commerce; its nationa
highways. So long as a nation exist:
and is prosperous her railroads must bt
as valid security as she is herself
Whenever commerce dies and trade
languishes so that railroads become un
prosperous, the nation is in bad way
and her bonds are unsafe, If not worth
less investments. The bonds of wei
. built and properly located railroad
should be as easily hoated as the bond.
, of the nation in which it is situated
. and at as low a rate of interest
United States bonds drawin.
only two per cent, are now above pa
in the markets of the world, so tha
two per cent upon their actual cost an,
a sinking fund upon a fifty years basi
is all that the owners of railroads cal
, reasonably expect the people to pay 70
} their use. To be liberal we may pu
the income to which railroad corpora
tions are reasonably entitled at fou
per cent upon their actual cost Fou
per cent. upon the cost Of our railroad
at $4,000 a mile = IS, 11e, ,030, ,000-
: amounts to s204, 721, 200. This is sI55
27s,s0O less than was realized as ne
revenue by the railroad corporations
1891, which sum is just the amour
! which was deliberately stolen from, prt
ductive and distributive labor. Of thi
sum 500, 600, 900 might have been give
E to the producing and consuming publ
: in reduced freight and passenger rate
while s55,27S,sO0 could and ought /
have been given to railroad employees j
increased wages This proposition i,
2 wolves nothing but strict justice an
!, equity to all concerned, and is som,