The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-08-09
ACTUATED BY PATRIOTISM
 IS CLAIM OF OFFICIALS
Result of Agreement Between the Gov ernor and Railroad Is That Public Will Benefit and Other Roads
 Will Fall In Line Also.
BY HERVEY w. LAIRD.

Montgomery August S.-tSpecial.)- After three days of conference the state came to an agreement with the Southern railway this afternoon as result of which the license of the company, recently cancelled. is to be restored, and in re- turn the road puts into effect, beginning September 1, the 21a-cent passenger fare and the law fixing freight rates on llo commodities. The result is complete victory for the state. securing the en- forcement of two acts out of which the people expect to realize large savings in freight and passenger charges.
 The final conference was held at the of flee of Governor Conner this afternoon. Be sides the governor the following railroad officials were present: J. s. B. Ihomp~ son. assistant to President Finley of the Southern; Alex P Humphrey, genera counsel at Louisville, and E. L. Russell, vice president of the Mobile and Ohio. After going aver the ground it was given out that the agreement along the lines mentioned had been reached. An order will be entered in the United States court tomorrow providing for a modihea- ton of the restraining orler now in force against these acts in order to allow the agreement to become effective.
 Patriotic Grounds.
 The railroad people put the case on pa triotic grounds. They said that long drawn out litigation would be an annoy ance and inconvenience to the people and the disastrous possibilities of stop page of intrastate business could not be
 
 loss to the pstrenseafs the. line.
 A test case on the law by which the H. cense was revoked will be made in order to determine the validity of the act ana to establish certainty of procedure in the future along this line.
 A law. in every essential feature the bill under which the license of the Southern railway was revoked has been declared illegal by the federal court or the Fifth circuit, Judge Thomas G. Jones holding that it violates that section of the constitution of the state which guar antees the corporations the same rights before the courts that are enjoyed by pri- vate citizens.
 The case in point is that of senate bill s6. which provides that when any ccr-
 
 federal court, the license of said corpor- aton is automatically revoked. The Southern moved suit July 30 as result of which Secretary of State Julian re- Voked the license. It is now restored and no indictments will be made or stand for violations during the time a settlement was pending.
 Other Roads Must Follow.
 The action of the Southern railway in putting in the freight rate bill and the passenger fare act will make it all the more difficult for the other roads to re- fuse to apply the same tariffs. The fact Is. the officers of the state indicate to- night that the others roads will be eX- pected to come in and obey the laws even if they are restrained by order of the fed eral court
 W. D. Nesbitt member of the railroad commission. was greatly pleased with the outlook. "Fhe Southern has shown a pa triotie desire to obey the laws" he said, "the same as any other citizen, and they will be protect in every way by the laws. l am quite sure it will be required of the other roads of the state to obey the laws in like manner. They are cele- brating Greater Birmingham in Birming- ham tonight. Today we have come into a Greater Alabama. a state where corpora tons as well as citizens obey the laws.
 Lines Benefited.
 The lines which will get the benefit of the reduced rates will be the Rome and Selma. the Rome and Attalla, the Selma and Mobile. the Georgia Pacific division, the Akron and Selma, Marion branch. Blocton branch. Birmingham and Selma and York, Sheffield and Florence Mobile and Oho The Northern Alabama is not included. The Alabama Great Southern is expected to come into the agreement at once.
 After the settlement of the differences between the road and the state the fol- lowing indorsement was placed on the stub of the license:
 "The cancella tion of the license of the Southern railway to engage in business within the state of Alabama is hereby revived. under authority of the laws of the state and py the advice of the at torney general
 FRANK N. JULIAN,