The herald., 1893-08-12

| condition that absolutely requires from
us most aggressive attempts at retrench.
| ment. The movement of commodities
IL stopped to our great detriment. Our
yards are filed with empty freight cars
and our engines are lying idle in round.
houses. due to ssagnation in business.
Bedrock has been reached, but we will
be compelled to reduce the forces still
| further, and may possibly have to cut
salaries to meet present exigencies.
This last is step which we will discuss
very conservatively before taking &C.
ton, but it will probably have to be
considered.
To the region OF country traversed by
the Union Pacific it holds the same re-
lAtion as that sustained by the Southern
Pacific in the empire 1t has ruled 90
completely for the past 80 years. Added
to it's set purpose of arraying all classes
Of people against it, the Union Pacific
policy has been disastrous through lack
OF plain, ordinary business judg ment.
1t has built long lines of road to far
distant points in order to shut ont possi-
BILE competition, traversing hundreds Of
miles OF desolate, unproductive country
to do this, and neglecting the building
OF branch lines in Eastern Nebraska and
Kansas from which local trade could be
drawn.
We have no fear that q great trunk
road like the Union Pacific. so necessary
o'ths business of the continent, will be
closed up under any circumstances.
But its present difficulties may force
congress to anticipate action on the sub.
jsct of it's enormous debt to the govern
ment. WHAT that action will be it is
just now impossible to foreshadow. II
the Populist doctrine that the owner
ship OF the great trunk roads should be
in the government, and that they should
be operated in the interest alone OF the
people should prevail, there could be
no better opportunity OF tentatively
testing the practical effect of this theory
than is presented by the Union Pacific.
For our part, we have never had any
faith in the practical application Of this
theory to the complete operation by the
government of great lines of railways.
We have, however. been greatly i'm.
pressed with the value OF the suggestion
that the government should be the
owner and regulator of one or more
great trunk railroads transvers-
ing the country on cardinal
lines. The government would
furnish the road beds, keep them in safe
repair, regulate and control the time
tables, and grant wheelage over them to
all companies, private or public, wish-
ing to use them. If the Union Pacific
falls into the hands Of the government
and the wheelsge theory were to be put
in practice, congress would doubtless
make the line complete and continuous
by also taking the Central Pacific road
into the scheme. With wheelage, open
to all roads and all companies owning
rolling stock. across the entire conti-
nent, we might put to fair practical
test, in in it's most important part, the
leading theory OF the Populists about
the government ownership OF railroads.
The wheelage of great trunk railroad
could be superintendsd and carried on
by the war department., by adopting the
quasi-ficton that the government was
performing one OF its constitutional
military and postal roads. But the
other extreme, of the government ope-
rating great railroads in all their
branches and all their multifarious ram
ifications, would lead to system OF
politica, patronage of prodigious extent,
and become source of dangerous de.
moralz alton and corruption that would
lead to the most alarming consequences.