The sun., 1904-12-07

| called TO the lact tnat tIle duoptioh ny tH0
Congress of this recommendation would
4 in no wise operate against the great
trunk lines, but only against the lesser
and more feeble roads whereon the con-
ditions as to rates are in no two instances
identical. 1t is appalling to think OF
the chaos that would ensue among them
when the Interstate Commerce Commis-
sion undertook to exercise such a power.
We have always held, just as the
President does, that the giving OF re-
bates by the railroads, always neces-
sarily more or less secret, was nothing
short of a crime. We do not think
the law can deal too severely with this
practice, and we believe imprisonment
as we'll as heavy punitory damages to
be the proper and the only remedy. We
are convinced that it is as much to the
interests of the railroads themselves as
it is to the interests of the public that this
view should prevail More corporate
rottenness and criminal rapacity OF
individuals has been engendered by this
single cause than by all others. We
approve heartily of every word that the
President says about it. Furthermore
we equally welcome the Presidents de-
termination to bring coastwise commerce
within the Federal jurisdiction in the
same degree in which the railroads are
therein included.
When, however, it comes to clothing
the Interstate Commerce Commission
with the rate-making power, because,
probably without his intending it, that is
unauestionably what the Presidents rec
ommendation to the Congress amounts
to, we are forced to dissent. In our GER
tain Judgment it could lead only to grave
disaster and injustice.
The commission is not, and can never
be, of the temperament and intellectual
composition that would qualify it for
such a task. Constituted originally in
obedience to an ominous popular demand
that intolerable wrongs and gross out
RACES Of common rights should cease,
the commission, although clothed, as we
believe, with superabundant powers, has
accomplished little of what it was Gre
ated to accomplish. The railroads which
,,,oIo1roaI ha npnic al
and cooperated earnestly in its work
have been gratuitously antagonized and
made from the very beginning to feel
that, instead OF being helpful, hopeful
and wholesome corrective, the commits
sion was actuated only by motives of
narrow hostility and aimed only to
harass or destroy, and never to conserve
or reconstruct Does MIR. ROOSEVELT
seriously propose to give this body
power 80 stupendous, a power which
neither it nor any other body which he
can create should be ntrusted with,
and launch it upon course which can
be marked only by the direst dis
turbance? We admit Mr.. RoosEvELT's
power; We admit that he can do this
thing if he will; but we cannot believe
that he sincerely desires to Russianize
so important part Of the body cor
porate.
The President urges Congress to con-
slider carefully whether "the power of
the Bureau OF Corporations cannot con-
stitutionally be extended to cover inter-
state transactions in insurance. That
the Congress will act on this recommen-
dation we see no reason to doubt, and re-
cent events point to the improbability
that the Constitution will offer any
serious impediment. We would re-
spectfully suggest that the banking
| business be included with the insurance
business. Indeed, it would be a singu-
lar oversight il it were not, for in its
| extent and Importance and in its essen
TALLY interstate character il even more
than insurance comes within the pur-
view Of the Bureau Of Corporations.
We are sufficiently conversant with the
! Constitution adequately to apprehend
the degree in which the intent Of its
trainers included the business of banks
and life insurance companies. 1t is,
however, futile to ascribe any bounds
to the present elasticity Of that monu-
mental instrument When the Federal
Government reserved to itself the right
to regulate the commerce between the
several States it was too generally ac-
cepted that its only design was to pre-
vent one State from establishing a GUS
tom house against another State, to the
end that there should never be created
any barriers to the complete freedom OF
trade between the States. II was great
mistake to assume so narrow a construc-
ton. Under that simple phrase there has