The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-08-20

mously Important franchise of furnish ing transportation to the entire coun- rty. They have constructed 230.0oo miles of road. In certain respects they have done marvellous work and have afforded transportation at cheaper
 rate, per ton, per mile and per passen- ger than in any country in the world. They have. however, many of them,
 shamelessly violated the trust obliga- tion they have been under to the pub lie of furnishing equal facilities at the same price to all shippers.
 The watering of stock and bonds
 and the oyer-capitaiization of some or them for the profit of their managers have prevented the needed improve 1 inent of their railroads in construction and equipment The tremendous de- mand foresincreased facilities due to; the enormous growth of buisness shows 1 the inadequacy of their equipment and construction. While they might not l have been expected to meet m | full such an extraordinary demand, tne | obligations some oi them have assuinve San s,a | no doubt that, had the money they represented been put into the roads ln ! good faith, the shortage Of cars anu | equipment and Inadequacy of road bed | and track would not be so great. They l discharge a public function. They nave been weighed in the balance and found lswanting. The remedy for the evils ! must be radical to be effective IT | 1t is not so, then we may certainly ex- neet that the movement toward gov | ernment ownership will become form- | idable one that cannot be stayed | Objections te Government Ownership. T am opopsed to government owner- | ship | railways are not managed with either l the efficiency or economy or privately l managed roads and the rates charged I are not as low and therefore not as | peneneial to the public;
 Second, because 1t would inyolve | an expenditure of certainly twelve bil- l lions of dollars to acquire the inter- l state railways and the creation of an l enormous national debt.
 I Third, because 1t would place tn | the hands of a reckless executive a l power of control over business and pol l itics that the imagination can hardly l conceive, and would expose our popular | institutions to danger.
 | "The supervision proposed need not 1 materially reduce the legitimate opera l tion of lndividuaiism in railway en- | terprise. It will indeed limit the op-
 portunity to accumulate enormous for I secret rebates, but the legitimate prof | it which comes from close attention | to operation, to efficiency of service and | conceptions of new methods of reduc- | ing cost without impairing the service | will not be disturbed in the slightest There Is no attempt to Ike away the | l there is no furnishing of public mon | ey to the enterprise and no public of I ficers are required to administer the I property There is no more attempt 1 government business than there is in 1 the national banking act to making
 banking a government business.
 The movement of competing rail- | originally from fear that the anti | trust act forbade them to make agree
 ments as to uniform tariffs. If they | were now permitted to make such i agreements subject to the approval oi
 the interstate commerce commission, l such tendency would lose much
 of its force. It is impossible to
 prsyssnt pssys5t competing mps,n a Tailwagss, from ] form in order to prevent an upend- ing and disastrous tariff war and 1 though such agreements are against the law. it is perfectly apparent that 1 tst These arrangements do not pre- l vent the operation of competition, from time to time,f as one company finds
 that 1t may acquire new business with. l insists on it, but they do prevent q
 tarin war which helps neither the pub
 He nor the railway by violent fluctua.
 'As the public now asserts the righi | to fix maximum rates and thus tc | eliminate one phase of competition fl l IS ,loBical 70 permit an agreement or
 rates, if approved by the interstate
 commerce commission, the tribunal an. l pointed to fix rates. The President aiff
 the ~commission both recommend <
 provision permitting such agreements. l In this way, there would be Festorel
 that respect for law which many rail. | road men in the last decade seem tC | have lost Moreover. every company
 under such a system would be a po- 1 liceman~to see to it that every other company oheyed the agreement and the
 law and strictest obedience would be | secured
 l Physical Valuation.
 MT Bryan Is most insistent in dis