The Richmond palladium. (Richmond, Ind.) 1906-1907, 1906-07-08
WILL ENFORCE
NEW RATE LAW
Interstate Commerce Com
mission to Meet in Wash
ington This Week.
UNIFORMITY OF SYSTEM
RECORDS OF THE ROADS TO BE
KEPT IN WAY THAT AFFAIRS
WILL BE PLAIN TO THE GEN.
ERAL PUBLIC.
(B. w. A. CrawfOrdl

Washington, July THE Interstate
Commerce Commission will meet here
next week TO make plans for the en-
forcement of the new rate law. At
this meeting consideration will be Civ
en- to the kind of bookkeeping that
shall be done by the carriers The
new law authorized the commission
TO require the railroads of the country
to adopt a uniform system of book
Keeping. Profe ssor Adams, statisti-
clan of the commission, has been as
signed to the work of originating a
uniform system of bookkeeping. He
announces that he will call in a large
number of railroad accountants with
view of perfecting a system that
will be satisfactory to all
The commission prepared a formal
notice to railroads today that the new
law will go into effect August 20. 1t
is expected that many complaints of
discriminatory rates will be filed as
Soon as the law becomes effective. No
small part of the preliminary work of
the commission will relate to the en-
forcement of the interstate commerce
law against pipeline companies, ex-
press companies, private car lines and
sleeping-car companies.
~ x x X
It is up to the State Department to
issue notice to Americans preparing
to travel in Germany. that red cloth
ing of any description is tabooed in
the land of der KAISER" and that
the wearing of it may lead to compli-
cations. In the light of latter day
liberty this may have medieval
sound, but a case is just reported of
school boy, who was arrested be-
cause he refused to take off a red tie,
which, after his trial, was confscated
The whole affair was due to what
roughly corresponds to our blue laws;
that is a law passed in 1S49 prohibit
ing the wearing of red clothes of any
kind, even including socks, since red,
the republican color, was calculated
to offend loyal subjects and incite a
breach of the peace.
%N%
Washington, for the first time in
more than a year, is today absolutely
free from smallpox. This delightful
state of affairs must not be taken to
indicate that in the past the capital
has been plague-ridden. Quite the
contrary, for smallpox is almost I'M
known. But in the poorer quarters
there are always two or three sub
merged cases, and it is to these that
the health inspectors are pointing
with such justifiable pride.
X X X
The pride of Washington has receiv-
ed a severe bump through an article
on Glasgow, by F. G. Howe, in the
current issue of one of the large mag
azines. Washington has always rath-
er prided herself on being the model
city, but in the article in question,
the inhabitants of Glasgow are pictur-
ed as asserting correctly that their
city is the best in the world, and all
because of municipal ownership of
various public utilities No wonder
Washington is grieved! But though
grieved, she is unwilling to yield the
palm, for, although the article in ques-
ton describes as an existing condi-
ton state of affairs which has long
been an ideal in American politics, it
neglects the more important social
side. Washington does not feel quite
so badly when she remembers that
according to figures compiled in 1871,
out of a total population of 100000.
there were T. the city of Glasgow
81, 200 persons living under the crowd,
ed condition of from three to twelve
in one room, with $4,000 living from
five to twelve in two rooms. Nearly
two-fifths of the whole population liv,
ing in such an indescribable and I'M
healthy compression-this is the So
cial development of the bugbear of
municipal ownership. Washington
has nothing like that. Indeed, this
dangerous concentration of its popula-
ton makes Glasgow seem like a wall
ed town of the middle ages, the con-
filming wall in this case being one of
poor transportation facilities and grad
ed fares. Washington may have her
graft, but she has not Glasgow's ter
rible social congestion, and remember
ing Mr.. Dalrymples report on the dan
ger of copying Glasgow's policy in
this country, she still holds up her
head, although shorn of Congress, the
President and most of her foreign