The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-05-15
INTERSTATE COMMERCE
A CLAIM THAT THE LAW REGULATE
ING RAILWAYS WAS UNJUST,
And that 1t Was Not Intended for
Their PrOtectiOn-AdditiOnaI Gov
nme Aid Desired.

To the Editor of the Indianapolis Journal:
The conditions which led to the interstate
act were dealt with in the Window report
of 1878 and the Reagan bill of 1879, and were
reported upon fully by the Cullom COM
mittee in 1886, which held the railway sys~
tenn to eighteen counts, eleven of which re-
lated to discrimination others to undue
rates, capitalization, management, CLASH
ication and engaging in eXtraneouS bust
ness. Time has nonsuited the last seven
complaints. That report anticipated what
experience has fully confirmed when it de-
clared that a problem of much magnitude,
Importance and intricacy, can be summarily
solved by any master stroke of Legislative
wisdom, is beyond the pounds of reasonable
belief"
The interstate act has nevertheless Sc
cured more publicity of rates. lessened open
rate wars, equalizing long-and-short-haul
rates, has exercised beneficial warning or
police powers, silenced much unjust clamor
against railways, has been mutually edu-
ca tional, and has been judiciously admins
tered, but as secret determinations and
open wars have continued, the law has
failed in its chief object.
Hon. r.. M. Cooley said, when chairman
of the Interstate Commission: THE law
was best observed at the outset, but in a
few months it began to be noticed that
many persons in railroad service were Civ
ing more attention to c~ontrivances for
evadlng the spirit and intent of the law
than they were 10 obeying it. = y y Any
misconduct of this sort on the part of one
road is initiated at once. = = = In the end
the account of profits and losses shows
gains by no one. 1t is all loss, and all the
reads share it,"
1t is due to the law, to it's administrators,
and to frank discussion to admit much of
this charge against the carriers as a whole.
Nevertheless this relapse proceeded mainly
from the national refusal to confirm the
only plan which, less than a year before,
had enable s.rong and sincere carriers and
others less strong in morals or facilities to
equally observe reasonable and common
rates between leading points, by giving all
a joint interest and power to resist demor-
alizatiOn by divisions of tonnage or money,
or both. The interstate act followed for
eign precedents, but only up to the point
which was afterward most essential to the
fulhllment of the prior requirements OF the
act.
Mr.. w. M. Acworth, author of the Rail-
way and Traders CLondon, 1856, wrote
QS92): Your Interstate Commission was
largely modelled on our Railway Commits
sion = = since 1873. and the undue pref
erence clause of your act to regulate COM
merce is copied almost verbatim from an
English act passed as long ago as 1854"
There our law unwisely stopped. 1t was
as if consulting physicians had adopted the
discredited cures known to earlier science,
but discarded the latest and best discovery
for the disease treated, and then blamed
the patient for his relapses; or, as if Con-
gress had failed to enact the leading rec
concentrations of the best army and navy
experts as to matters in which they were
skilled and which were underiably for the
public welfare. This primal error made
other mistakes of the act more marked.
Railway officers and patrons otherwise dis
posed cannot be legislated into mutual rec
titude, especially when their gains are
not done that in any calling.
THE ACT WAS UNJUST.
The act did not intend to protect railways
and was therefore unjust. To stimulate
competition" it exempted parallel water
carriers. 1t regarded the railways as alone
responsible for all the conditions con
demned and devolved their correction upon
them alone, although it applied theoretical
penalties to shippers who procured pref
erences. None of it's provisions were rem
edial, nor did it create mutual interests be-
tween government and carriers. 1t held to
the perversion that railway warfare is
synonymous with peaceful business COMPETE
ton. 1t fostered the ~fallacy that while
rates must be alike via one railway it was
publicly desirable and should be made legal
If they were different upon rival railways
or elsewhere. that, howsoever different in
facilities. rival railways could obtain equal
rates. rlHdily, II encountered lcSdI re-
verses which induced laxity III its observ-
ance. These failures did not proceed from
the administration of the act. Here, more
than in foreign countries, because Of our
greater area and more complex conditions,
mere mandates against determinations
have failed, and will forever fail, because
the principle of giving the parties affected
a common interest to obey the law was dis
regarded, and because the act as ii stands
does not and cannot protect upright car
riers and shippers against the encroach-
ments of others less so.
THE QUESTION OF REBATES.
Railways do not pay rebates unasked, and
the solicitations for them are incessant.
The government has not helped the rail-
WAYS to educate forwarders to regard
freight rates as firm as postage rates. The
opportunities of some shippers. their adroit
intimation as to what other carriers will
concede, and their own suggestions that
they may concentrate or divert their ship
ments unless their wishes are conceded
all devolve upon some companies, not only
constant and strong moral opposition to
them and TO the carriers disposed 10 yield
TO such -persuasions. but also losses of busi-
ness and the protection of their taritf-pay-
ing forwarders. That such resistance some
times gives way is therefore true, because
no company will allow the large and per-
manent depletion OF its business when ii
can be retained by like rates. When, for
example, a new railway opens former rea-
sonable rates are clearly more justified, be-
cause more railways share the traffic. The
newer line, being usually weaker, offers re-
duced rates to divert business from older
routes. and shippers withhold frsights from