The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-06-08
Conference is Held at
 White House. 7
THEY SAT UNTIL MIDNIGHT
Roosevelt and Cabinet Consider
 / Hartman Immune.
Interstate Commerce Commissioners and Special Counsel Participate in the Discussion, As To Meth
 ods of Procedure.

Washington. June That E. H. | Hartman, the railroad magnate, is im- | mune from criminal prosecution as the | result of his testimony before the in- terstate commerce commission in New York recently; that prosecution of bituinous coal carrying railroads should be left in the hands of the at-
 torney general; and that prosecution of the anthracite coal railroads will be-
 gin in Philadelphia probably next week were conclusions reached at a confer-
 ence at the White House tonight. The Hartman case and the cases or the coal carrying roads were discussed | for three hours by the President, five
 members of the cabinet, two members of the interstate commerce commits sion and Special Attorney for the Gov ernment Kellogg
 Following the general conference At torney General Bonaparte remained
 with the President to discuss the so- called harvester trust.
 It is thought that prosecution of that
 organization will be referred to the att torney general
 Those who participated were Presi- dent Roosevelt, Secretary of State | Root. Secretary of the Treasury Cor
 telyou, Secretary of the Interior Gar field, Attorney General Bonaparte, In- terstate Commerce Commissioners
 Knapp and Lane, and Frank B. Kei- l logg of St. Paul, special counsel for the government
 Secretary Loeb was present. Feat
 ures of the Hartman railroad merger
 case. the charges relating to the coal
 carrying railroadss the so-called liar vester Trust" etc. were on the pro-
 gram for consideration. The purpose was to formulate definite plans pre- | liminary to the Presidents departure on his summer vacation. A The conference continued from D. | m., until a few minutes before mid
 night Secretary Taft. on leaving. an-
 nounced that Secretary Loeb would is- ! sue, q statement on the suutects-res I Special Counsel Kellogg, who walk ed from the White House to his hotel
 declined to state what had trapspire6 at the meeting and referred all his questioners to the statement which Mir,
 Loeb was to promulgate.
 Secretary Loeb at midnight issued this statement:
 "The conference was held for the purpose of affording ample discussion
 concerning the matters which have
 been under investigation by the Inter state Commerce Commission. The In- terstate Commerce Commission has not
 yet formulated its report. and all of the discussion was of purely preliminary kind. After a report has been made, the attorney general will. of course, carefully consider it."
 The discussion took a very wide
 range. Much of the time was given to
 the Harriman-Alton deal Every
 phase of that transaction was thor oughly gone over and discussion was participated in more especially by the President MT. Kellogg, Attorney Gen eral Bonaparte. Commissioners Knapp and Lane. The conclusion was prompt ly reached that however damaging the evidence might be against Mir. Harri- man, the testimony he had given in the Interstate Commerce Commissions in- vestigation has given him complete immunity from criminal prosecution.
 After leaving the White House dis trict Attorney Sims was in conference with Attorney General Bonaparte at the department of justice for more than an hour. He refused to discuss this conference and the only comment MT. Bonaparte would make was The conference related to matters pending in MT. Sims's office at Chicago"
 Tho roads involved include the Dela- ware, Susquehanna and Schuylkill, the Philadelphia and Reading. the Lehigh Valley, the Delaware and Hudson, the New York Susequehanna and Western. the Delaawre, Lackawanna and West ern, the Central Railroad of New Jer- sey and the Erie. The Pennsylvania and one or two other roads may be- come involved as the suit progresses but at this time no formal complaint will be filed against them.