The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-11-30
Extension of Time Ask
 cd by State. COUNSEL FOR STATE HOLD AN INFORMAL CONFERENCE First Arguments Expected About
 December I5 or 20. Attorneys for RaIIreads win Not Op- pose Any Reasonable Requests
 By States Lawyers for
 Time to Prepare Their
 Answers to Petitions.

The restraining order Issued py Judge Thomas c. Jones. upon bills hied by the Louisville and Nashville and allied lines and made returnable on Monday. December 3. will not be ar gued on that day, as the attorneys for the State will require and ask for further time.
 On that day. however, a conference will be held between the attorneys for the State in the pending litigation and Governor Conner. At the confer- ence a day will be determined upon at which the arguments will be made. This will be on some day between De- cember Is and December 20.
 Attorney-General Garber, Judge s. D. Weak1ey and Horace Stringfeilow, of counsel for the State, held an in formal conference yesterday over the pending litigation. After this confer ence, Attorney-General Garber called up Judge Jones and asked that the attorneys for the State be given fur ther time. as they could not properly make an answer in the short time in- tervening between yesterday and Mon- day This was granted, and the un- derstanding was reached that the re- straining order and the hearing of the supplemental bills would come up for argument on some day between the 18th and 2etn of December.
 Judge Weakley returned to his home in Birmingham on an afternoon train. He will come back to Montgomery Monday morning, when he will meet in conference the Governor, the Attor- ney-General and counsel for the State
 When President Milton H. Smith and General Counsel H. L. Stone returned to Louisville two days ago, they went with the purpose of returning to Mont an t.an, ,Ax It Is possible that they will be present Monday. if nothing more Is done than the making of request for further time by the State.
 VIII Not oppose Request.
 This. however. has been agreed upon : in advance and no effort will be made by the attorneys for the railroads to prevent the granting of a reasonable delay for the preparation of the case of the State.
 It will be recalled that the restrain ing order issued upon the request of the Central Trust Company of New York in it's allegation that It's inter- ests would be seriously Jeopardized if the Central of Georgia should put in the new rates. was made returnable on December 16.
 No movement of any sort is expected to be made by the State until after the conference of the attorneys and the Governor on Monday.
 It was the talk yesterday that the State might move by some sort of mandamus proceedings. This gossip presaged some sort of trouble. but as the day wore on, it developed that there was nothing definite or authoritative in 1t.
 We'll informed attorneys did not take 1t seriously. They said that it was just as easy to dodge the restraining order in some other way as by q man damus. They held that all the man damus provisions were just as much tied up. as any other provision of the nti-railroad code.
 They did not regard it as at all prob able that any attempt would be made in State Court to secure a mandamus directing the railroads to put the new laws into effect
 WoaId Be Contempt of Court.
 It was plainly shown that any at in direct conflict with the restraining order issued by Judge Jones and that any officer who attempted to serve the papers would undoubtedly be guilty. of contempt and subject to the penalty
 So the possibility for developments. presented in the mandamus rumor, faded away before the certainty that attorneys for the State and Governor Conner had conferred \
 The attornevs on both sides, while industriously at work in preparation for the actual fight before the court.
 It was not thought that the both by Monday. The time given was too short for the State to make prepara- tion Monday December 2, was named as the return day for the restraining and custom of the Federal Court. Monday was the first Order Day after the issuance of the restraining order.
 Will Not Crowd Matters.
 IT said then hX th4 0ttnFnaYa for the railroads that they had no wish to crowd the attorneys for the State and though Monday December 2, could be named as the return day. the State would be given such time as it was thought necessary.
 Lawyers and State officials, since shape. have been discussing the once famous case Of Reagan vs. Farmers Loan and Trust Company, passed upon by the Supreme Court and reported in sss sss. i'''" on''e' ''"'e' 'sp''' p~
 The application of this ease to the pending controversy ss in ths fact that it embraces the issuance of whole sale injunction to prevent the enforce met of new set of railroad laws in Texas. In that case every person in to A enforce the new rates rates estabiished by the Texas Legislature
 This case. practically parallel to the one in Alabama 1,nts6 went & t9 the supreme me 
 action of the Federal Judge in the is- suance of the wholesale injunction was upheld in every respect by the highest court dn the United States.
 The same principle Is expressed in the celebrated case of Smyth vs. Ames, the Nebraska case so often quoted in the discussion of the right or a state to enforce laws which may or may not be confscatory and the right of Fed eral Court to protect property from the enforeement of laws which might de- stroy that property.
 Texas Case in Line.
 The Texas case Is. however. held to troyersy Texas was one of the first States in the Union to adopt oppress- i've laws against the railroads At that time Hon John H. Reagan. formerly Postmaster General in the Confederate Cabinet. was chairman of the Railroad Commission of Texas.
 After the acts had been passed great ly reducing freight rates in Texas, the railroads went into court to secure an