The age-herald., 1897-12-29
DESTROYED BY THE SUPREME COURT.
How the Interstate Commerce Commission
 Has Been Deprived of Power
From the Springfield OIass) Daily Republi.

From the Springfield (Iass.) Daily Republi-
 The annual report of the interstate com merce commission reads like postmortem statement from a defunct body on the causes of it's demise. The commission was created by congress to administer the laws of congress respecting interstate commerce. But the United States supreme court and other courts have stepped in and deprived the commission of all real power.
 The United States supreme court has de- nied to the commission power to fix maxi mum rates. It has denied to the commits sion power to prescribe rates or to reduce rates or to say in advance what would be reasonable rates It can only inquire into wrongs done in the past. After a railroad has robbed some weaker locality or shipper in behalf of some metropolis or monopoly or trust the commission can look into the matter but it cannot prevent the roads from repeating such acts of aggression on public and individual rights. "The conn mission can mo longer afford relief in par ticular cases, as it has in the past, for the supreme court confines the commission to orders in respect only of what has been done by the carrier Regulation governing future rates is now unauthorized"
 The United States courts have practically taken from the commission the power to enforce what few orders the courts permit 1t to give and have thus brought the en- forcement of the law into the hands of the courts, to be dragged along through months and even years of customary judicial delay. The courts have thus brought the act of congress regulating interstate commerce down to about this provision, to quote from the commissions report ''If any citizen of the Unted States feels that this law should be obeyed he may apply to the circuit court and if that court is of the opinion that it ought to have been enacted in the first in stance it may enforce it.'
 But shall the law of congress restricting the acts of common carriers, and the com mission created to administer the law, stay scotched by the courts? The commission s answer is of course, a decided negative. It says:
 The act to regulate commerce Was passed in obedience to popular demand and to remedy admitted evils, and the experi- enee of ten years has demonstrated the necessity and justice of such an act. As that law has been interpreted there can be no effective regulation of interstate car riers and if this is to be, the act must be amended. A tribunal which can stand for justice and fairness between these carriers and the people must have power to fix a maximum rate, to fix minimum rate in certain instances, and it's orders must mean something. When amended in these respects it would not have the strength it was originally understood to have, but it would possess some force and would be a beginning to Whlch additions could be made as necessity for them might be de- veloped.
 But how is the law-making power to do all this against the power and disposition of the courts to undo it? The commission says in its report that "hindrances to regulation and checks upon enforcement of the act have resulted largely, if not chiefly, from the discoveries and decisions of the courts giving to the act an interpretation contrary to the general understanding of its scope and purposes" That is to say, the courts have deliberately twisted the law away from its well-understood pur- poses. If the courts have done that in the