The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-02-18
SMITH EXPLAINS 1T.
Says His Railroad Bill Would Be just
to All Shippers.

OF the senate railroad bill recOmme end
| ed by a majority of the senate COM
| stead of the Carver house bill, recon-
mended by the minority members of
| the senate committee, today made the
Following statement regarding his bill:
The statement in the Capital that
| the shippers had to wait two days in
order to get hearing is wholly false.
/ They did not have to wait an hour
after the house bill was reported to
the senate committee and a meeting
OF that committee could be had. AS a
matter of fact hearings were permit
ted to the federation full and pro-
tracted, both in joint session of the
two committees and in the separate
! session of the senate committee.
The senate subcommittee took the
Carver bill and struck from it section
! f. which gives the board the power to
alter, revise, change or abolish any
rates, tariff or schedule without COM
plalnt and in the place of it provided
that all rates, tariffs and schedules
might be changed upon complaint.
This complaint will be informal, a
mere letter will suffice to set the ma
| chinery of the board in action. and
provides an assistant attorney general
to appear for the complainant, with
out charge, take charge of the case
started by the complainant and prose-
cute on behalf of the complainant as
against the railroads. The Carver bill
contains no provision for the assistant
attorney general on behalf of the
shipper.
Plainly stated, the Carver bill as
it came from the house is prepared
for, and by. the great combinations
like the tobbers, millers, lumber trusts
and the grain elevators. powerful,
compact organizations, with paid at
torneys who are able to set the ma
chinery of the board in motion, en-
ploy attorneys to attend the hearing
and obtain redress of any grievance of
which they may complain. The senate
bill is made for the benefit of the
small shipper who cannot afford to
complaint and must depend upon the
initiative of the board. 1t is incred-
ible, of course, that the board shall
of its own motion take cognizance of
and grievances of which the small
shipper like the retailer, the cattle
men and the Independent elevator
complain of, failure to furnish cars,
small determinations in rates, slight
overcharges, small changes in classi-
ficationS and the like-miStakeS and
tinually suffer in silence because they
cannot afford tc employ attorneys to
appear and prosecute such complaints
The senate bill comes to their aid.
ssUnder the senate bill all that the
shipper needs to do is to write an in
formal complaint, stating his griev-
ance, address and mail it with a two
cent stamp and the machinery of the
ant attorney general at once takes
charge of it and prosecutes it to an
issue without cost to the shipper The
complaint may be SO broad as to cover
all rates throughout the state with re-
spect to a particular commodity such
as grain, lumber, coal or cattle, and
the board upon that complaint has
full power to correct grain, lum ber,
coal or cattle rates everywhere in the
state. 1t is not necessary that the
complainant shall be interested in or
aggrieved by the particular rate; al
that is required is that a hearing shall
be had as to the matters complained |
of, and the board is given the fullest
power to correct. revise or change any |
rate, tariff or schedule complained Of |
It is emphatically the bill for the small |
shipper, for the individual. while the |
house bill prepared and pushed by a |
combination of the jobbers- and the /
mfIlers' trust. the coal combine. the |
lumber trust, the elevator combine /
and other great organizations, is en- |
the bill for the trusts and /
combines. That is the distin ction that I
cannot be too strongly insisted upon.
THE jobbers now have a rate 10 per /
cent below the ordinary shipper. The
nillers have their transit rates which |
give them a great advantage over the |
individual shipper of grain. The lum-
ber trust has a preferential rate. The
coal combine has cinch on railroad |
rates that are ruinous to the individual
operator. They desire power within the
board not to make a maximum rate
which shall apply to all shippers and
which is the Illinois and Iowa law, but
they desire the Texas law which is
embodied in the Carver bill and which
will give to the board the power to
change any rate, schedule, or classifca-
ton without complaint and thus pre-
ate which they now enjoy The pow
erfu1 organizations will secure in state
the nomination of three
neub bers of the board selected for their
,c-f -f1f at HI
ia: three such representatives select
I'd from the millerS, the jObberS and
he fat cattlemen.
1.-THE small shipper should not be de-
,eived by the clamor of the trusts.
Stripped of disguises and subterfuges,
he house bill in the Texas law. Attor-
leys for the Federation of Trusts, the
Topeka Capital and other organs OF
he trusts have carefully concealed this
act They have represented it as the
illinois law when in fact it is the same
Texas law that was exploited by Judge :
Dale endorsed by the Democratic plat :
,orm and beaten at the polls by $1,000
majority 1t is a clever subterfuge
mt the slightest comparison of section
our with the Illinois law viii unmask !
he Carver bill and display its coun-
enance with all the features of the dis {
.redited and beaten Texas law The +
Illinois law gives the board power to ;
make a maximum distance rate lt {
sives no power to make commonly /
ransit, which are the things desired
" the Federation of Commercial
trusts, hence the rejection of the 1lll-
lois law. the substitution of the Texas |
aw. which gives these powers, the re- |
ection of the claims and rights of the
mall shipper, and the whole chain OF 7
Representation made by the fedora l
ion.''
THEY AcRFF OMIT t