The Caucasian. (Clinton, N.C.) 188?-1913, 1897-10-28

III VII ou8 3 ITO oAhoh6
their various railroads. They refused
to produce the books. They never will
produce them unless SimOnton orders
them to do so, and then the chances are
that they will conceal such books as
show the facts and produce only such
as have been cooked"
And yet these men, convicted by
hone. It public opinion, have impudence
to sa, hat the State has failed to prove
fraud.
TIE UNION PACIFIC STEAL WORSE
THAN CLEvELAND's SECRET
BOsD SCANDALS.
A subscriber, referring to our recent
article on the proposed sale Of the
Union Pacific at loss of over fifty
million dollars to the governments. asks
how the government can help itself
unless some one will bid more than
the reorganization committee has bid.
We thought that we had made this
matter perfectly clear in our former
articles, but inasmuch as the matter
Is one of such great Importance, we will
briefly state the case again.
In the first place, the government
furnished every cent of money to build
the Union Pacific and Central Pacific
Railroads, which, together, made one
continuous through line fl ON the Mis-
souri, river to the Pacific Ocean. The
roads were turned over to a private
corporation to be operated on the con-
dlti0n that the corporation would pay
back to the government, within thirty
years, all of the money invested by the
government, and the interest on the
same, with the further condition that
if the corporation failed to do this, that
the government should, at the end of
that time, take complete control of the
railroads and of all of its equipments
of every kind. To secure this, the gov
eminent took mortgage on the entire
property. 1t is true that the govern
ment has only second mortgage now,
for a number of years ago, we think in
1864, the Union Pacific corporation lob :.
bied supplemental act through Con-
gress by means of bribery and cor
ruption, changing the governm ent's
first mortgage to a second mortgage,
out Of which grew the famous "Credit
Mobilier" scandal, but in spite of this
corrupt deal with the intention of de-
frauding the government, the property
is to day worth over twice the amount
of the first and second mortgages COM
bined therefore the property is more
than good for the governments claim.
Besides, the original act chsrtering
the Union Pacific Railroad Company
and also supplemental act known az
the Thurman act, passed in 1873, pro.
vides and max 3 it the duty Of the
President and the Secretary Of the
Treasury to proceed to take charge Of
these roads upon default of payment
And this is what the President and the
Secretary Of the Treasury should now
do under existing law, and what the
Populist Senators and Congressman
aided by the Silver Republicans and Z
number of silver Democrats, strongly
urged upon the President during thu
last session Of Congress.
This Pacific Railroad corporation hal
never paid the government one cent O
the interest, and TO- day the principl,
with all the accrued interest is due
Under existing law the President ha
no authority to sell this property; bu
it seems that in the closing hours o
Cleveland's corrupt and infamous ad
ministratiOn he entered into score
: deal with certain syndicate of CAPT
talists, who style themselves 9Th
Union Pacific Reorganization Commit
tee" to sell them the Union Pacifl
Railroad, not for the amount of tn
governments claim, but for an amour
, twenty Ave million dollars less. Th
deal did not include a sale of the Cen
trail Pacific, but if the Union Pacific i
to be sold, clearly the Central Pacifi
should be sold at the same time, l
, the government sells the Union Pa
cific, then the Central Pacific will b
, practically worthless to anybody ex
!, cept the owners Of the Union Pacifi,
q therefore the government would neve
. be able to sell the Central Pacific e1
@ cept for whatever amount the owner
, of the Union Pacific might dictate. an
this would certainly mean a loss q
from twenty-five to fifty million dol
lars more on that road to the govern
ment.
As we have said above, this secre
+ deal was made without any knowleds
o Of Congress-, and it was not unit
months afterwards that any membe
i of Congress (unless some Congress.
o men and Senators were in the dea
, knew anything of it, and it was onl
. after the Senate had passed numeror
4 resolutions calling upon the Presider
= to inform that body Of what action
8 had taken in the matter, that IN
It other facts came to light. Presider
Mckinley is simply carrying out tt
deal that President Cleveland mad
= The property is worth two or thre
2 times the governments claim. Their
|. fore If the government sells the 70,
it il the duty Of the government to b
at the sale an amount equal to II