The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1907-03-26
ROOSEVELT
DEPREcA7Es
ADVERsENEss
OF Some Of the Legislation Passed
by States in Regulation Of
Railways
BUT SEES LITTLE
DANGER OF PANIC
State Legislatures Much More
Stringent Than the Fifty
Ninth Congress
<By n. O. SNYDER,

Washington, March 26.-"Are we on
the eve OF a financial panic?" is q
question that you can hear hundred
times propounded in the hotels and in
business houses of Washington. Are
we on the eve of a financial panic
Is problem which only events can
solve. Not in .25 years has there
been more unrest in the great centers
of trade and commerce as now ex-
lists, and that too in the fact of
prosperity which exceeds far and by
anything in the history not only of our
nation but the nations of the world.
Are we on the eve of financial
panic? 1t is a subject of awful inn
port not only to the corporations, not
only to the commercial life of the
nation, but to the wage Garner and he
includes the farmer, and the husband
man. This unrest began just about
the time congress terminated it's
iabors and contemporaneous with the
meeting of state legislature through
out the breadth of the land. The
state legislatures by their enactments
accentuated and made even more
stringent the laws passed in the 58th
congress. And these laws were pri-
marily directed against the railroads.
Where congress could not fix a rate
the state legislature came along and
fixed the rate which a passenger was
to pay for a miles travel. These
rates varied. Some more and some
less than two and a half cents per
mile. but all looking to reduction.
And when the magnates of the rail-
road world saw what had been
accomplished, dire disaster was
threatened. !
Down upon the head of President
Roosevelt anathemas fell. He was
charged with the ruin of great rail-
road property. Wall street more SEN
sitive to touch than boil is to the
press of finger, responded either
through sympathy or manipulation and
stocks began to tumble. and they
tumbled and tumbled until the men
who had wrung millions out of the
street" and who had framed up the
game of finance so that one party was
In on the bull side and the outs took
to the woods or were mOdestly on the
bear side. came to the conclusion that
the wise thing to do was to see the
president and if possible ascertain if
by his individuality and his great per-
COuOA AOAIOWlu6 TIC
try he would not put stop order"
men of the railroad world, the Harri-
mans, the Morgan's the Mellen the
Yoacums, to say nothing of the lesser
frye came to Washington to see the
president and learn from him what
avalanche of stock depression.
And k1nca vyh~ hn n Lu1ryS, Duor3Jork
Roosevelt in a somewhat perfunctory
way and who had very serious doubts
as to his intimate knowledge of great
railroad properties, to say nothing of
the shady transactions connected with
the manipulation Of the stock of rail-
road properties forcing one set OF
men out and putting another set of
men in, learned that the president,
who knew his American history as
well as any man in the country, who
knew the worlds politics as we'll as
any man in the country, who knew
how to hunt and who knew how to
brand steer, knew also how to
brand the magnates of the railroad
world when they came. to see him
during the past week on the ques-
ton whether President Roosevelt in
his position on the railroad question is
making ready for financial panic.
President Roosevelt believes that
there Is more water than solid rock
in the railroad stocks of the United
States. He knows that there are
good" railroads and dad railroads,
but the proportion of bad to good ac-
cording to one who is very near the
president Is as five to one.
Approaching these facts which have
been furnished him not only by the
department of commerce and labor
but by the Interstate Commerce COM
mission and the attorney general,
President Roosevelt was equipped as
few men have been in public office
on great questions of vast moment
to meet the representatives of the
railroad systems of the United States
who have seen him during the fort
night just passed Some of them
talked after their interview with the
chief executive Others refused to talk
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