St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1895-08-21
WILL NOT SUCCEED.


other ''gentlemen's agreements
which railroad managers have tried
to put into effect. The progress of
industrial development shows that
there is a limit to combination as
well as to competition. Somewhere
between the two extremes the play
of natural forces requires all indus
trial interests to stand. When COM
petition becomes so fierce that profits
disappear and competing concerns
are threatened with general bank
ruptcy, they unite in order to save
themselves from ruin. When their
consolidation is so effective as to
produce tempting profits, some men,
Der of the combine is certain to over
step its requirements in order to seize
for himself more than his percentage
of gain. Back and forth these move
ments play, into and against each
other, with a movement of alternat-
ing attraction and repulsion as regu-
upon as the action of the electro
magnet.
1t is true that if these great rail-
road interests could be so CONSOLIDATE
ed as to operate as if they were con-
trolled by single hand, it would be
to the danger and injury of the COM
that is something which cannot hap
pen. No sooner had the plan been
formulated than it was abandoned.
The next scheme is for some sort
Of general supervision of them all,
by which any one found cutting
rates may be properly punished.
This, too, will prove abortive.- Even
at the time when railroad pooling
was neither prohibited by law nor
regulated in any way by public Off
Gals, it was practically ineffective.
Wherever a-pool was permitted, the
jealous members of it were horribly
suspicious of one another; and all
such combinations went to pieces
sooner or later, when proof appeared
that some member was retaining an
undue share of the business by cut
ting rates. Merely as a matter of
economic fact, the public has no par
ticular reason to fear the success Of
any such gigantic consolidation.
1t is true, on the other hand, that
the agencies appointed to supervise
and regulate railroad rates and
agreements, particularly in the larg-
er field, are mostly impotent. The
railroad commissions of the several
states, as a rule, discharge their du-
ties with reasonable firmness and
fidelity. There are few states in
which roads operating within their
jurisdiction exclusively are not held
down to reasonable rates, and the
interests of the people properly pro-
tected. It is useless to deny, on the
other hand, that the interstate COM
mission, charged with q similar reg
ulation Of railroads engaged in in
terstate commerce, has been a prac-
teal failure. Traffic associations
have been formed and traffic engage
ments entered into and carried out
which are hostile not only to the
spirit, but to the letter of the federal
law. This is not due entirely to the
insufficiency or unfaithfulness of the
federal commissioners. 1t springs,
in the first place, from the law itself.
1t attempted to do too much. The
regulation of interstate commerce in
this country is a colossal task. When
it was approached it should have
been ON broad general lines, with a
view to accomplishing certain def
mite, although limited, results. The
interstate law, as passed, proposed
minute regulation of the details
of railroad business such as it was
not possible, perhaps, for any Off
cial body to carry out.
The commissioners found them
selves overwhelmed and at a loss in
the midst of a multitude of details.
Finding so much prescribed in the
law which they could not accomplish,
they have been discouraged, and
have finally settled down into a per-
functory organization whose prin-
| cipal duty seems to be to collect sta
tistics and put out annual reports
that nobody reads. If the act of con-
gress had simply laid down a few
broad, general rules that could have
been enforced, and the commission
ers had set themselves to put these
into effect, better beginning might
have been made. AS the situation
stands today, it is clear to any in
telligent observer that no regulation
of interstate commerce, properly so
called, exists. This mighty force
operates practically unchecked ex-
cept by laws inherent in its own ma
ture. 1t is fortunate for us that these
are such as have made consolida-
ton over any large section of the
country impossible. There will be
no agreement between Eastern trunk
lines which does not fall to pieces of
its own weight. In the future, per-
haps, when our legislators are less So
licitous about making political cap
ital, and are able to approach the
subject of interstate commerce in a
spirit of earnestness and statesman