Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1905-08-29
GETTING HURT A PROFESSION.
Corporations and Cities Are Fleeeed
Out Of Millions Every Year by

Corporations ana Cities Are fleeceo
Out of Millions Every Year by
Fakirs.
Annually. railroads, corporations,
cities and towns throughout the
United States are fieeced out Of no
less than $15.000.O0O In the settling Of
fraudulent claims and suits against
which the defendants are utterly
powerless. In fact, 80 helpless are
those sued that up to now. legal ad-
visers have counselled to avoid public
ity lest exposition Of the fact train
uninitiated fakirs into these lucra-
tive, easy-to-work frauds. Every
railroad company, every trolley COM
pany, nearly all of our big manufac-
turers and, without exception, all
of our big cities, are made the vic
tins Of this class of sharper. In Chi
cago alone the annual crop Of fake
demage suits brought against the city
amounts to a fortune.
Oran Hoskins. the "paralyzed" youth
of Fort Worth. Texas, had been
been awarded $4,000. True, the Hos
kins verdict was afterward revoked
because an attorney came forward
and testified that long before his acci-
dent the boy and his mother had
come to him and asked what chance
there would be for good damages II an
accident like the one that afterward
occurred should take place, and be-
cause when q doctor who had pre-
viously believed In Hoskins pretended
to operate upon his brain the boy
who had seemed blind, deaf and alto
gether inert sprang from the operat-
ing table and confessed.
There was the case Of the Chicago
woman who claimed to be the sister
Of a prominent lawyer whose partner
is an ex-cabinet minister. She was
suing the street car company for
many thousands of dollars with good
chance Of recovering. There was the
case Of the man who stood on the
platform of q Missouri Kansas and
Texas train, at Hillsboro. Texas, and
saw another man crushed beneath the
wheels. He was suing the railroad
company for $4,000 because Of the
horror and mental anguish" he was
subjected to. There was the Chicago
woman Of shady reputation, who had
injured her thumb on street car,
who had blackmailed more than one
prominent man, and whose father was
serving a life sentence for numbering
her mother. She was suing for big
sum.
The public In general and the
Chicago public In particular had come
to regard batting the corporations as
a purely defensive public measure, in
which at least there was no sin. True,
the city Itself is a corporation from
which every citizen draws large divi-
| dends In free police protection, In
sewerage removal, In free schooling,
and II you bait 1t you simply rob II
of just so much Of its capacity for
giving you what belongs to you.
| True, the street railway company Is
corporation. which gives you more
for your nickel than you could buy
for a dollar In cab service. the rail-
road company more for a dollar than
you could buy for ten In stage coach
service, and II you bait them you re-
duce by so much their capacity for
contributing to your comfort. For, as
prominent railroad official pointed
| out every excessive or unjust judg-
ment that a railroad Is called upon to
pay increases its operating expenses
just that much, and to that extent
prevents a reduction, either voluntary
or enforced. of the rates Of fare and
freight: so that in the end the general
| public, or those who use the railroads,
pay or contribute toward the payment
Of such acknowledgements Maga-