Kansas City journal. [volume] (Kansas City, Mo.) 1897-1928, 1899-01-02
life in this commonwealth. Missouri is not
known to her own people.


~ catS anu lac
transportation Of persons and property over
em."-Jrdge Thomas VI. Cooley.
Daring engineers. backed by equally dar-
ing capital, have pushed the railroad al
ways far in advance of civilization ami
business. SO that we who are still on this
OF 80 have always had the railroad.
Inc people have not always made the rail-
road. but they have always shown a dispo-
sition to dictate to it.
Certain inferior brands of very cheap
Pcit'cians have deemed 1t their duty 10
array the people against all corporations,
especially against the railroads. This feel
ing hnally got to be SO general in the West
That the employees of the railroad actu-
ally came to regard the company which
gave them a livelihood as a common enemy.
fortunately for itself more than for the
corporation, the great army that operates
the road is beginning to think for itself.
and has stopped taking its opinions blindly
from others.
A branch of industry which directly fur
nishes employment to 2.OO0.OG0 people, and
indirectly TO 1000, G0 more, ought 10 be en-
courased. The railroad cannot be called
a monopoly. Wherever there is too much
business for one road. a competing line is
sure to be built. and the laws passed by
the people prohibit the consolidation of
competing or parallel lines. As one result
OF parallelins. aided by adverse legislation.
there are in the United States nearly 100, 900
miles of bankrupt roads. The American
railroad earns 81, 2oO.o Co., 600 annually, and yet
nearly two-thirds of the mileage is in the
n of a receiver. or ought to be. Then
why should the people combine against the
railroad, which is not allowed to combine
even to save its own life? To be sure, no
patriotic citizen of this expanding republic
would wish to see the railroad run the gov
eminent; and yet there is no more reason
the government should run the rail-
road than there is for its interference with
packing houses, flour mills. or the millinery
business. Those who advocate the govern
ment ownership of the railroad point with
pride to the splendid management by the
government of the railroad mail service.
Well, that service is the direct result of
the enterprise of and sharp competition be-
tween the various railroad systems.
When young William H. Vanderbilt told
his father that the postofice department
wanted the company TO build and equip
twenty postal cars to run over the VAN
derbilt system (the New York Central and
the Lake Shore between New York and
Chicago. and that the department had
promised to support the road. to give it
all mail matter originating at or coming
into the New York postoffice, provided the
could be delivered at its destination
by the Vanderb!lts as quickly as by any
other line, the old commodore shook his
head. DO it, If you want to-" he said,
and II Chauncey wants 1t. but I know
the postoffice department. They will break
with you within the year"
The commodore was a bad guesser. They
broke" within a month. Said ex-Post-
master General James: within three
weeks. despite the Indignant protest OF
Colonel Bangs, the mails of three states
were ordered to be taken from this and
given to another road"
President Scott. of the Pennsylvania, not
to be outdone by his splendid rival. now
put on a similar service, whereupon con-
gress, seeing the rivalry between the two
began the parsimonious work of
cutting down the already inadequate COM
pensation. And then the roads most in
terested withdrew the service.
Here is a fair Illustration of the treat
ment accorded the railroad. 1t shows also
the difference between politics and bust
that if a train is going over the road
once a day it might as we'll so quickly,
and have done with it, but it costs some
thing in fuel. in the strain on machinery,
and the rack and wreck of the roadbed
to run at a high rate of speed. The peo-
pie do not know, or else they forget, that
the resistance of a train is four times as
great at sixty miles ar hour as it is at
thirty miles an hour, and the amount OF
steam generated and power exerted must
be eight times as great in the one case as
in the other. The comforts of travel have
continually. while the cost has
decreased. This fare in the Rocky noun
tains, in little. narrow. cramped cars. used
fN hn IN ~ - ~~,1n- ~1-- I. l. ,~- III
to ) cents in a palace car.
Private enterprise, witt a few exceptions,
has created within ~three-quarters of a
4 splendid system of railroads in
the rails of which, it is said.
would reach all the way from the earth
to the moon; whose locomotives and cars,
together. would make three solid
trains across the continent from New
York to San Francisco.
Every safety appliance that money can
buy or inventive genius can turn out has
been added to the locomotives. cars and
signal systems. until it is almost absolutely
safe to-day to travel by rail. More people
perish annually by falling out of windows
are killed in railroad collisions or
wrecks. Travelling night and day. a man
according to statistics. to get killed
once in every 400 years.
EVERY Sldhe StuCh la d pTOpOSeu TOdu Is
a prospect hole. every station along the line
a mir and every new road a klondike to
he country through which it passes. All
he gold in the world would not buy a half
interest in the American railroad, which
earns as much money annually as all the
and gold mines in the United States
yield in ten years. From the spring to
the autumn of 1887 a little army of 10000
Hen. commanded by General D. c. Shep-
ard. added Ss0,000.0W to the wealth of our
country by the rapid construction of 545
miles Of road in Dakota and Montana. This
is on the principle that every
iollar invested in railroad construction is
worth SO to the country through which the
Dad passes. The American railroad is a
Big thing. 1t employs one out of every
of the working people you pass. Its
work is equal to the moving of
iO0. 600, 900. 600 tons a mile every year. If
,ne man did all the travelling. he would
he tail lights of his train round the earth
1t the equator every fifteen minutes, but it
take him $1,000 years to do the years
work. with no stops for meals.
The SEQ independent companies that run
he American railroad pay their employees
nearly 500. 90 90 dollars Il year, but pay
interest only on 30 per cent of its securities;
he other 20 per cent earn nothing.
As early as 1885 the American republic
lad over half the railroad mileage of the
world. In all the West the railroad has
,een the pioneer. Although the federal
states. and in a few instances
and municipalities, nave helped
he railroad. it has. on the whole. been dis
outraged by the peoplee. The good people
If the state of New York as late as 1855
we're holding public meetings and resolving
hat the New York Central had no RICH
o compete with the Erie canal. Verify.