The Brownsville daily herald. [volume] (Brownsville, Tex.) 1897-1910, 1899-04-06
GIBBS OHASTaTE
RAILROAD.
Thinks Present Agitation Is Help
f1l Of his Scheme.
Federal Ownership of the Roads
lie Now Proclains as All Wrong.
Has Several Things to Say.

Dallas, Texas, April 2.-Hon.
Barnett Gibbs said to the Post cor
respondent: is very probable
that the discussion Of the ve5oes
and the consolidation question viii
result in better information among
the masses on the railroad ones
ton. Heelfly regulation that don't
regulate, even If sustained by the
courts, doesn't bring any relief to
the freight payer commensurate
with the expense incurred and The
agitation. The great statesmen Of
the country have never believed
either in total ownership by gov
eminent or in fretful, ftfuI regula-
ton OF railroads. Forty-tv7o nations
own just enough railroad mileage
to FIX basis OF reasonable freight
rates to the ships. Bismarck was
the successful promoter of this
policy in his vigorous days, and
was followed by even the pure
Swiss republic. Not only able
Southern democrats ike Joe Brown
and Ben Hill held the same views,
but Calhoun, the greatest of South
ern statesmen, advocated that each
State, have a relief railroad to the
ships owned by the State, and he
took this position before the mon
opoly evils were apparent.
''In the life of John C. Calhoun,
edited by John T. Morse, pages
l5I-152-I53, is found a letter Of
August 3, 1886, from Calhoun to
citizens of Atlanta. He advocated
the borrowing OF surplus money in
Federal treasury pro rata by each
State and building arelief railroad.
Calhoun had neither free passes
nor any stock In railroads, and was
even ahead Of Bismarck in sizing
up the coming events. He, ike
jefferson, foresaw the trouble with
a corrupt Federal Judiciary, aud
was sufficient student Of history
to know that the kings courts
stand b. the kings, whether the
king is great wealth or person.
Calhoun also knew that the States
were able TO talte care Of themselves
in this matter and that it was more
of State than a Federal question.
If Calhoun was alive today he
could not dine with any but Geor-
gia democrats or get into a demo-
cratic, republican or populist pri-
mary.
''Texas is as large as England
and has 5000 miles of seacoast, but
on this railroad question and on
The trust policy she founders Ike
. blind dog in meat house and
whines around the Federal throne
like a hungry dog bays the moon.
Neither the trusts nor the railroads
are Federal questions, especially 50
in Texas. Many politicians in the
South, to avoid responsibility and
labor, abandon State rights and
duties and make everything a Fed
eral issue. just before election
they tell the people what God and
Jefferson would do or have done.
Forty years ago, evez, the
preachers said on eacls,ssde Of Ma
son and Dixon's Inc that God said
kill thel Flows on the other side
of the me; now they say that God
orders rs TO kill the people on the
other side Of the Pacific ocean. In the
Bible the Lord never ordered any
body killed except those near neigh
borS who would not neighbor.
Either dis great State VIII solve
FOR itself 5he railroad and Tie trust
problems or they will not be solved
in fifty years.
~ have no fault to End, with the
vetoes where the governor puts.
them on presumably sound con-
stitstional grounds. Neither the
governor nor the legislature goes
to the root Of the evil as did Cal
houn, Bismarck and the president