The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-08-13
RIGHTS OF RAILROADS TO
 CONDUCT THEIR BUSINESS
Reasonable Governmental Regulation is Expected, But Absolute USurpatiOn is NOt--RailrOad Rates Not Taxes---NO Monopoly of Trans
 pOrtatiOn Lines.

use the railroad to the exclusion Of other means of transportation.
 It is, therefore, understandable. in deed it is absurd. to attempt to base any practical, and especially any adj cal, regulation of railroads, involving, as it does. important property inter- ests of the individuals owning those railroads, upon the purely abstract and thoroughly falacious and misleading argument that railroad rates are pub lie taxes. The true basis of the regu- lation of railroads in the matter of their rates. as well as in other direc tions. is that railroad companies are common carriers, and that the busi- ness of common carriers is affected with a public use. Exactly the same right exists to regulate ferries, bakers, millers, wharfingers, Gnn-keepers. bridges. turn pike roads, etc. etc, be- cause all those lines of business are likewise affected with public use. This basis of the right to regulate the rates of common carriers, warehouse men. etc., is clearly shown by the case of Mum vs. Illinois, 94 U. S., pages 124 to 130. It is not necessary to miscall a railroad rate tax in order to regulate
 the right to regulate railroad rates.
 The real question to be decided is
 whether there is a subst antial public
 necessity for the radical step of taking
 the management of the railroads en-
 tirely out of the hands of the owners and putting their affairs into the hands of a public tribunal.
 When it comes to showing the neces-
 sity for such a radical interference with the owners of railroad property, the pamphlet in question fails absolutely to
 make out it's case. It lays great stress
 upon the fact that numerous other | States have made provisions of this character. Obviously this does not demonstrate the necessity for such a | step in Alabama. It may we'll be that many years ago in some of the States,
 the railroads cid not appreciate their duties to the public, and were arbi- | trary and oppressive and, therefore, the State Legislatures deemed 1t advisable to make laws of this character. It is
 more than probable that many States | having such laws have adopted them without such substantial necessity. It | is certainly true that many of the most | uniformly prosperous States in the
 Union have never found it necessary | to make such laws. Whatever may 1 have been the motives or the acts of other States. the question in Alabama i is whether local conditions necessitate
 radical action of this character
 The pamphlet in question, however,
 prefers throughout to deal in specula- | tive theories rather than in actual con- ditions. It declares that railroad com
 petition Is thing of the past, and that
 1t is now within the power of railroads | to arbitrarily advance their rates with
 out rendering any further or additional
 service. This is in the face of the fact that for many years rates have exhib- | ited a steady downward trend.
 The average rate per ton per mile in
 the United States for the past eleven l wears has been as follows: