Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1905-05-24
Railroads and PROGRESS.


Committee on Interstate Commerce at
Washington on May 18th, Prof, Hugo Z.
meyer Of Chicago University, an ex-
pert on railroad management, made
this statement:
Let US look at what might have
happened if We had needed the pro-
tests OF the farmers of New York and
ONO ana pennsylvania Gn the seven
ties when grain from the west began
pouring to the Atlantic seaboardl and
acted upon the doctrine which the In
terstate Commerce Commission has
enunciated time and again, that no
man may be deprived Of the advant-
ages accruing to him by virtue Of his
geographical position. We could not
have west Of the Mississippi a popula-
ton of millions Of people who are
prosperous and are great consumers.
We never should have seen the years
when we built 10000 and 10000 miles,
or railway, for there would have been ,
no farmers west Of the Mississippi Riv-
er VINO could have used the land that
would have been opened up by the
building Of those railways. And if we
had not seen the years when we could
build 10000 and $4,000 miles of rail
way year, we should not have to-day
east Of the Mississippi steel and iron
producing center which is at once the
marvel and the despair Of Europe, be-
cause we could not have built up a
steel and iron industry if there had
been no market for it's product
eve could not have in New England
great boot and shoe industry; we
could not have in New England great
cotton milling industry; we could not
have spread throughout New York and
Pennsylvania and Ohio manufa curing
Industries Of the most diversified kinds
because those industries would have no
market among the farmers west Of the.
Mississippi River.
And while the progress of this coun-
try, while the development Of the agri-
cultural west Of this country, did mean
the impairment of the agricultural
value east of the Mississippi River that
ran up into hundreds Of millions Of
dollars, it meant incidentally the
building up Of great manufa curing in
dustries that added to the value Of
this land by thousands of millions of
dollars. And, gentlemen, those things.
were not foreseen in the seventies. The
statesmen and the public men Of this.
country did not see what part the agri-
cultural development Of the West was.
going to play in the industrial develop
ment of the East. And you may read
the decisions Of the Interstate Com
! merce Commission from the first to the
last, and what is one Of the greatest
characteristics Of those decisions? The
continued inability to see the question
in this large way.
"The Interstate Commerce Commits
sion never G. see anything more than
that the farm land Of some farmer is:
decreasing in value, Or that some man
who has q -four mill with a production
of SO barrels day is being crowded
out. 1t never can see that the destruc-
ton or impairment Of farm values in
this place means the building up Of
farm values in that place, and that
that shifting Of values is a necessary
incident to le industrial and manu-
featuring development Of this country.
And if we shall give to the Interstate
Commerce Commission power to regu-
late rates, we s all no longer have our
rates regulated on the statesmanlike
basis on which they have been regu--
lated in the past by the railway men,.
who really have been great statesmen,
who really have been great builders Of
empires, who have had an Imagination
that rivals the ina gination Of the great
est poet and Of the greatest inventor,
and who have operated with a courage
and daring that rivals the courage and
daring the greatest military general
But we shall have our rates regulated
by d body Of civil servants, bureau,
Gratis, whose besetting sin the world
over is that they never can grasp sit
uation in large way and with the,
grasp Of the statesman; that they new
er can see the fact that they are con-
fronted with q small evil; that that evil
is relatively small, and that it cannot
be corrected except by the creation Of
evils and abuses which are infinitely
greater than the one that is to be COR,
rected."