The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1907-08-04
President of the Indiana
Branch Gives Out a Public
Statement in Reference to
The Laidis Decision.
INSISTS THE JUDGMENT
WAS NOT A RIGHT ONE.
Sets Forth the Terms Upon
Which the Rate for Trans
p0rtation Was Granted by
The Chicago & Alton Road.

Inc chicago q Alton KOdu.
New York, Aug. 3.-Presideni
James A. Moffet, of the Standard Oil
company of Indiana, made the follow
ing statement today in reference to
the judgment by Judge Lands pro
nounced in Chicago in which he as
sessed a fine of s29,24o,0OO for rebat-
ing:
"The court having pronounced its
Judgment in the case of the United
States against the Standard Oil COM
pany of Indiana. there can now be no
impropriety in stating our position to
the American people.
"The facts in this case are simple
and easily understood. The Stand
ard Oil company of Indiana was con-
victed of receivingw hat the Govern
ment claimed was concession from
the Chicago & Alton in the shipment
of oil from its refinery at Whiting,
Ind, to East st. Louis. Ill. The con-
tention of the Government was that
the lawful rate was Is cents humid
red pounds between these two points.
The defendant claims: First, that
the lawful rate was 6 cents. and sec
Ondly. if 6 cents was not the lawful
rate it was the rate issued to the
Standard by the Alton as the lawful
rate, and the Standard was justified
in believing from its own investiga-
tion and from the information receiv-
ed from the railroad company that 6
cents was the lawful rate.
The Eighteen-cent Rate.
"The 1S-cent rate was a class and
not commodity rate, and the chair
man of the Chicago & st. Louis Traf-
fic association, the association issu-
ing the 1S-cent class rate, under oath
testified that it was never applied and
was never intended to apply to oil.
thousands of tons of freight have
been shipped from these points dur
ing the last fifteen years under the
same circumstances as the Standard
shipment, and if the Standard is gull
ty in this respect, so is practically
every other shipper in this great man.
ufacturing territory. Is there a pur-
pose in selecting the Standard as the
victim?
.'The Standard Oil company shipped
about one-third of all the oil that went
from Whiting to East ST. Louis over
the Eastern Illinois, the other two
thirds going over the Alton and the
Burlington. On the trial of the case
the defendant offered to show by wit
nesses who were on the stand that not
only during the period covered by
the Indictment. but continuously
from 1895, the Eastern Illinois had a
lawful published and filed rate be-
tween Whiting and East ST. Louis
on oil of cents a 100 pounds. and
that the Standard Oil company ship
ped at such rate over the Eastern
Illinois more than two thousand cars
OF oil each year during said period
Says the Court Erred.
THE uncontradicted evidence show
ed the Standard Oil Company was ad-
vised by the rate clerk of the Chicago
& Alton that this Scent rate was filed
with the Interstate Commerce Commits
sion. The court instructed the Jury
that the shipper must know not only
what the rate was, but also that such
rate was actually filed with the Inter
state Commerce Commission: that is
to say the view of the court was that
a shipper must know absolutely what
was the legal rate at the risk of suf-
fering enormous penalties in the event
either that he was misinformed by the
railroad company or in the event that
he did not exercise as much diligence
as, in the judgment of court, he should
have exercised in ascertaining what
the rate really was.
IF this is the law. every shipper of
freight is in danger of the penitentiary
or confiscation of his property by way
of excessive fines every time he un-
dertakes TO make shipment from one
State to another.
knowing that the rate on the East
ern Illinois was only 6 cents. having
no reason for shipping over the Alton
in preference TO the Eastern Illinois.
and able to ship all of its oil over the
latter road. we insist that the facts,
maiy of which the court did not permit
us to show, not alone demonstrate in
nocence, but inherently forbid the idea
of guilt.
lntimates There Was No Square Deal.
I'VE further insist that whatever
may be ones technical view of the law
relating to the above questions, every |
equitable consideration is with the de- |
fendant, and If the only desire was to |
give this defendant square deal this |
prosecution would never have been |
Instituted.
The American public not only be-
lieves in fair play in the abstract, but /
with all the facts before it, it has the |