The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-10-26
TIE RAILROADS
 AND THE PEOPLE D.A Tompkins Talks on Sub-
 jeCt at Chicago REMEDY FOR AGGRESSIONS MT. Tompkins Tells How the People Become Exasperated By Certain
 Actions and Plan To
 Escape Evils.
REMEDY FOR AGGRESSIONS

CnlcdSO, OClODef z0.-lne lOllOWlnS ad- dress on 'The Railways and the People, was delivered at the conference on trusts and combinations today by D. A. Tomp- kins of Charlotte, N. C.:
 When we find that a department of in- terstate commerce has been brought into much confusion and not order by multitu- dinous state legislation. and when We find also that interstate commerce on land has grown to be entirely beyond the a control of any one state, it is very im- portant that we take steps to bring it under one general control, and to a con- dition of uniform treatment throughout the United States. At present we have two opposing influences to make con fusion and dissatisfaction. One of these is drastic state legislation, inaugurated in many instances by demagogic politicians, but largely supported by good state off cers and many good people, because of evils of railway organization and man. agement. On the other side, the railway companies themselves are indulging many evil practices, such as discrimination, speculation, the issuing of vitiated securi- tics; and as the tendency on the one side is to make legislation more drastic, so the tendency seems to be on the other side to hold with increased dogged tenac- ity to a situation which gives oppor- Ttunity for the evil practices, against which the people are so exasperated, and justly exasperated.
 It is plain that the escape from both Of these unsatisfactory situations lies In some course leading to the abolishment of both. It is as important now to es- cape the confusion and injury of further drastic legislation, as it is to escape the railway evils. It is equally as important to escape the railway evils as to escape drastic legislation. The middle course, by which we escape both of these evils at once, is the same as that adopted by our forefathers to escape the evils of mutitudinous state legislation about the tariff. It is the same which brought good banking system and a uniformly safe currency out of the former confused condition of money issued by state banks under the multitudinous and various state laws. States rights are not in the slight est degree infringed, if a subject Is rele- gated to the general government, which is wholly beyond the control of states. The constitution has wisely relegated to the control of general government things which are national in their character and concerning which legislation by many states leads to confusion, rather than or der. Federal control, examination and publicity would, in my opinion, have the same effect upon the railways that it has had upon the national banks. By this means it would not only be that the oper- ations of the roads would be regulated. mil a finances made public. Thus investment in railway securities would be brought within the reach of the people, and the present com- plaint on the part of railway management about the difficulty of getting money for necessary extension and Improvements would all be gone.
 The people along the lines of the roads would buy their securities, as the peo- pie in each locality now buy national bank stock. A large volume of national bank stock of the United States is now held by widows and orphans, by sane ton of the courts. What court would i'll the present situation, permit the money Of, widows and orphans to be invested in railway securities, or to remain invested, even where the deceased husband and father had already bought them?
 The question of constitutional right for such government control, regulation, and publicity are amply provided in the con- stitution, and on the different counts. The constitution provides for the control by the federal government of interstate foreign commerce. This is ample author ity alone, but the constitution also pro- Nides for the control by the federal gov- ernment of the mail service and post roads. We are prone to forget, in a de- gree that every railroad is a post road, and that it carries the mails. The rail- way people themselves sometimes rememS Der this in case of strikes, but they don't remember it when it comes to obeying the general laws relating to discrimina- tion. rebates, combinations, and the is- suance of watered securities. It is idle to complain of drastic state Legislation, until some remedy has been found for the railway evils.
 It is self-evident that no state legisla- ton can accomplish a remedy for rail- way evils, except by harassment, and this harassment is very dangerous to commerce. It is idle to talk about the railways reforming themselves. They will never do it until forced. The controversy has come to be one of an evil on one side against an evil on the other side. The roads complain about drastic state legislation, while the people of every state are complaining of railway evils and bit terly resentng the idea that railway in- vestments have been put by speculation and fraud wholly beyond the reach of the people themselves. If these railway evils existed in one state only the state could well undertake it's remedy. The best leg islation any state could make would be to request the federal government to inn mediately inaugurate system of con trol regulation and publicity for all the railways of the country upon precisely the same lines that the general govern ment now controls, regulates and make public the affairs of national banks. So far from state rights being infringed. any state would be exercising one of it's highest rights to appeal to the general government to remedy an evil with which the state itself is unable to cope and | precisely as the state would appeal to | the general government in case war was declared against it.
 The usurption by the general govern ment of the control within a state of anything which the state could handle by itself would be an infringement of the states rights. The reference by a state of a matter beyond its control to the control of the general government is one of the highest and most important of The rights of the states which are in the
 American union and while none could be more opposed that I to the surrender of any states rights. none could appreciate more than I the right of a state to call inc general government to it's aid to beIn it in connection with a matter that was beyond its power of handling and control