The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-06-14
BURLINGTON GUILTY
 OF GRANTING REBATES
MADE CONCESSIONS ON PACKING HOUSE SHIPME ENTS FOR EX-
 PORT.

Armour, Swift, Cudahy and Morris Conn
 panies the Alleged Guilty Ones--FOur Counts Returned Against Each of the Defendants and All Practically the Same--Agreement to Simplify Case.
 Kansas City, June 13,-The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railway com- pany to-day was found guilty by jury in the United States district court on four counts of granting concessions on packing house shipments for export to the Armour Packing company, Swift i company, Cudahy & Co.,, and the Nell son Morris Packing company, The con- viction carries with it fine of from $1,OOO to $2O,OOO on each count. Judge Smith McPherson deferred sentence until June 22.
 All four counts are practically the same. The case of the Armour Packing company, on which instructions were read to the jury, charged specifically that the Burlington railway on August 17, 1905, accepted a shipment of oleo oil from Kansas City to Liverpool at a rate that included a rate of twenty three cents a hundred pounds from the Mississippi to New York, whereas the regular tariff rate at that time was thirty-fve cents.
 To simplify the case, A. s. Valken-
 berg, United States district attorney, and Judge o. M. Spencer, representing the defendant company, signed an
 agreement of facts, which was, in eff feet, that the Burlington railroad did
 contract with the packers to carriage
 their product at twenty-three cents for the distance named, or rate of forty nine cents for the whole distance from
 Kansas City to Liverpool Half dozen witnesses gave technical testimony per- taining to the tariffs in existence at the
 time covered in the indictment.
 7 o. M. Spencer, in his argument for the defendant, contended that the Bur-
 lington railroad had a joint rate under
 it's contract with the Glover Leaf and
 the Lehigh Valley railroads to carry the : packing house products at rate which 7 would have been valid under the pres
 ent ruling of the court had 1t been pub
 lished. Hence the only crime commit
 ted, if any, was the failing to publish . the tariff under the contract. The evi- dence showed, he said, that the ship ment was a through shipment to a for
 eign destination. The charge in the in, dictment was granting a concession from portion of through rate Sucf : a proposition, he contended, was un . known to the law. If a concession wal
 made at all it was on the entire ol through rate and reduced the through ] rate the amount of such concessions but did not and could not be offered t, U any fractional part of the through rate
 The indictment, he said, is the result o = a controversy with the Lehigh Valle! d railroad over it's keeping its portion 0 5 this contract, and when 1t was unabl n to sustain itself 1t resorted to the gov }. ernment and lugged the Burlington int q court as a criminal. There should, h U contended be no interference by tn : government in such controversies
 DISlTlCL AllUIllGy <As P. NoihShbSAF f
 arguing for the government, said tha
 it was a plain case of violation of tn
 Elkns act. The Burlington railwa Il had made a contract with the packin
 companies at a rate of twenty-thre
 cents hundred, and had continued d live up to that contract after there ha l- been filed with the interstate commerc ic commission an amended tariff of thirty five cents.
 il Judge McPherson, in instructing tn It jury, said that the Burlington ralroa l. had no right to make contract for I period longer than the established raj of twenty-three cents should be in fore
 To have carried shipments for twenty E. three cents after August II, 1905, whe st the tariff was raised to thirty-five cent al must be considered a copcession. Tt |, failure of the Burlington railway to fl
 the schedule of twenty-three cents wa
 lmmaterial.
 IS The jury was out only thirty-five mir ee utes.