The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-05-11
THE PASS. 2

The custom of giving passes on rail-
road and steamship lines to members
of Congress and of Legislatures is not
SO old as that of giving free theater
tickets to newspaper men, but it is old
enough to have acquired some of the
dignity of vested right. We do not
believe that free transportation is Of
ten given to lawmakers with the idea
Of getting some specific franchise or
other privilege in return, any more than
free entrance to a theater is given the
press in expectation of puffery or in
discriminating blindness to defects in
the show. Indeed the railroads and
steamship lines know trick worth two
of that. 1t is their habit, in most of
the great States and in Congress, to be
represented on the floor by party lead
ers. who, in their private. capacity, are
either on the corporate pay roll as at
torneys or are owners of stock. In
every law-making body are from three
to ten men who absolutely control it,
They lead the parties, rule the most
important committees and own the
speakership. When these men agree
upon any definite course of legislation
the other members usually fall in be-
hind them without question. 1t is al
ways the wish of great corporations to
control these principals, and they often
succeed in doing SO by identifying
them, outside of Congress and the Leg
islatures, with corporate interests. Few
speakers of the House of Representa-
tives since the war have gone out of
office poor. They turned up. when their
public careers were over, in possession
of large blocks of stock which they had
got in their private capacities as law
yers and business men. but which ac-
counted on the whole for their "broad"
and liberal views while in office of
corporate responsibility to the people.
Perhaps in cruder and rawer days it
was the habit to buy Legislatures OUT
right, but nowadays the corporations
seek the leaders only and show great
illnesses in getting them, as presumably
honest men, into such relations with
the world of business that they cease
to hold jaundiced ideas about those
special privileges in the manipulation
of which the biggest fortunes are made
Originally the giving of passes may
have been phase of the blunt meth
DDS of Legislative control by outsiders:
but with the lapse of time and the adop-
ton OF newer methods, it's earlier sig
nif1cance has almost disappeared. Law
makers have come to look upon the pass
as proscriptive right. If it is given.
the average legislator takes it without
thinking of quid pro quo; If 1t should
be withheld he would feel both as
tonished and angry. The transporta-
ton people do not want him to feel
angry, and so they see that passes are
put at his disposal, irrespective of any
particular value he may have as their
friend. Possibly the corporations feel
that, with q pass in his pocket, he will
be more likely to let them alone; but
we doubt that there is ever any under
standing to that effect, and we have
noted instances where a free-riding
Legislature has deemed 1t duty to the
public to pass measures. such as those
providing for steam-heated cars, block
signals and lower fares, even though
the railroads were opposed. In such
cases even the corporation attorneys on
the floor did not intervene.
OF course fine point of honor would
compel the abolition Of the pass sys-
tenn. But It is one of those things
which are so strongly entrenched in
custom that 1t Is useless to inveigh
against It. Even the Interstate Com
merce law broke down In its anti-pass
clause.