The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1905-05-12

II not, lie Senators should Be told and
warned.
In resisting the pretsnslons Of the
{ Interstate Commerce Commission, e.
poused by President ROOSEVELT and
/ Secretary TAFT, THE Sun has not ex-
tenuated the defective execution OF New
York laws, and other State laws, by rail-
way owners and directors when the
shareowpers choose directors who can
not, or do not, direct, but fancy they
discharge the obligations Of the trust
they have assumed regarding rates
when they appoint president Of them
selves, with power 10 select freight and
| traffic agents having full discretion. II
that were the only duty OF directors,
their existence we're superauous.
The President, in these sentences Of
his recent Denver speech, had evidently
such a condition in his mind when he
said:
we see railways grow Up. each OF which Il con
,rolled by q single corporation Individual, Doms-
times several OF them being controlled In oomblnA.
ton by corporations or BY . fsU tHdiEdgalt. Wren
sueh Is ne case. In my judgment II IL Absolutely
necessary that The nstlon--toT the State cannot
possibly do it--should sssume = supervisory and
regulatory function over the great corporations
which practically control the highways Of COM
! meTos."
A great part Of the popular prejudice
against railways has come from the pop
ular feeling that neither the shsreown-
ers nor the directors really rule, but one
or two or three individuals control, who.
by proxy voting, manipulate the votes
Of shareowners, whereby the corpora
ton stands on its apex and not on it's
base. II would. for example, shock
common sense to be told that Senator
DEPEw can on the same day be such a
director Of a half hundred railways as
the law contemplates, and at the same
time be an impartial Judge, as Senator,
between those fifty railways and the
demands Of President ROOSEVELT.
Neither State railway laws nor Fed
eral railway laws are efficiently executed.
II they were, all would probably be we'll
between shippers and railways.
II the railways will, between now and
the meeting OF Congress, ponder the
Presidents Denver HAT, and the share
owners will carefully select masterful
men for directors who will conscien-
tiously do a directors work, and the
shareowners will remonselessly weed out
the well meaning but laborless dunn
mics, who only say ditto" 10 the trafic
agents or the president, the situation
will be cleared. As it is now, the public
has difficulty in understanding why it Is
that railway tariffs, published and filed
by the railways, are not, in the words
of the Elkins law, strictly observed by
the railways, and why secret rebates and
determinations exist that the Inter
state Commerce Commission, the Presi-
dent, and his Attorney-General, MOODY
do not prosecute and punish.
The keen tussle over rate making at
the dinner given in Washington last
Tuesday evening by the railways to
their foreign guests, between the Cabi-
net officer representing the President Of
the United States during his absence
from the seat Of Government and the
president Of the Illinois Central, illus
trates the foregoing. The railway presi-
dent is reported TO have answered Sscre-
tary TAFT by saying:
That the Law TO prevent discrimination. double
dealing and secret rebates was ample. and he Wig
orously called for the enforcement OF that law
Mr.. TAFT might have retorted by ask
ing why the Illinois Central directors
did not stop any double dealing and
secret rebates existing on that road, il
lecturing American railway managers
by a high Government officer on festive
occasion in the presence Of their foreign
guests would have been in good form