The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-08-24
LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE THE STANDARD OIL FINE John W. filling Vigorously Assails the Action of
 Judge Landis.
To Edltor Journal and courler:

To Editor Journal and Courier:
 The Commercial and Financial Chronicle is the leading commercial and financial newspaper in the United States. It seeks no popularity, deals in no sensationalism. and is generally op- timistic. It has had a successful ca reer for now forty years.
 It has steadily opposed the Roose- veltian polltico-economic absurdities, and for now two years or so, has been continuously warning the country that the Rooseveltian theories would work out the results now manifest.
 In It's issue of Aug 10, there is an elaborate and careful examination of the case against the Standard Oil Go. of Indiana, in which Judge Landis has imposed a fine of twenty-nine millions of dollars In its issue of Aug. +, there is a condensed statement of the prin- ciral point of the former article, which l quote:
 "The Oil Go, as we showed last week, was convicted on technicality It may have seriously offended in oth- CT cases; may have had secret rebates and preferences; but in this particular instance, It's sole offense was that 1t shipped oil at the figures given to it by the rate clerk of the Chicago and Alton R. R. Co.
 "The rate schedule, it appeared, had not been filed with the Interstate Com- merce Commission at Washington, or at least had not been filed in the prop CT way. The court said the oil com pany had no right to ship at these figures, unless 1t first satisfied itself that the rate schedule had been placed | on file and posted in the proper man. ner. Also that the question of motive or intent was immaterial.
 Under such ruling the predica- ment of the shipper is a serious one; 1t is no longer safe for him to accept rate quoted to him by the railroad, but he must take pains first to see that the railroad has compiled with | the law in the matter of filing it's schedules. The six cent rate for oil | which was condemned by Judge Landis was a rate which had been In force continuously for fifteen years or more; was rate that could have been avail ed of by other shippers as well as the 1 oil company, and a rate which was in effect over two other roads in addition to the Chicago and Alton.
 Tt should be understood that there was no question of rebates or conces- sions.
 There has been much talk of the legal rate, having been eighteen cents when the oil company paid only six cents. But this has reference simply to the fact that as the six cent or com ] modity rate was not on the official rec ords the general class rate, covering | commodities not specifically enumerat- ed would have applied and this was eighteen cents.
 But no one shipped at the eighteen | cent rate and the oil company gained no advantage whatever. Yet because of technical omission (by the railroad company for which the oil company was not responsible, and in which 1t had no part, it was fined $29000,00 | IH6lG WdS AO ODJCII dHu there could have been ho motive in accept ing an Illegal rate over the Alton, since the oil company. could have shipped at the same rate over the other roads.
 ''The seriously disquietng feature connected with the affair is that if upon technicality one large concern can be mulcted in such an enormous sum, the same rule will apply to other ship pers, who may have violated the law no matter how innocently. Further more, as the railroads, even more than the shipper, must be held guilty, they too, can be fined, at the discretion of the judge, in equally heavy sums; and thus the prospect is held out of rail- roads and other large concerns, pass ing under the control of the courts, for the purpose of working out the penal ties Imposed upon them. This is what has made such a profound impression in the markets
 There is no express provision in the federal statutes requiring the ship per, before entering into a contract about the rate of freight, first to sat-