The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-03-02
COMPLY WITH NINE-HOUR LAW Railroads Arranging to
 Enforce It. BEARS DOWN ON PUBLIC Large Number of Stations Will Be
 Closed. omcIaIs Who Were Heard in wash- inston Unite in Opinion That Return of Prosperity win
 Be Sudden.
BEARS DoWN ON PUBLIC

Washington, March l-American Railways nave made arrangements to comply with the provisions of the nine hour law.
 The operation of the law will mean the employment by railroad companies of several thousand additional opera tors and the closing of a large number of small stations on the fourth of March.
 The discontinuance of railway service at many points, 1t is realized. will in duce at least temporary inconvenience to the traveling and shipping public. but. in order to reduce operating ex- penses which now seems necessary. the operating officials of the railways be- lieve that this Is the ony way they pos sibly can meet the situation with which they are confronted.
 During the hearing of applications for an extension of the nine hour law by the Interstate. Commerce Commts- sion. some astounding statements were made by the operating officials of im- portant railways. A good many lines owing to a reduction in their revenues and to their inability to command the cash necessary to meet their pay rolls have been forced, during the past four months. almost to the point of asking for receivers.
 In the opinion of railway officials. expressed at the hearing under oath, and in private conversation, this condt- ton does not seem to have been due to the enforcement of regulative laws or To the incapacity of railway manage ment. Most of the railroad officials attribute the Adifhculty to the unfortu- nate banking situation which deyel- oped last September. The railways did not feel the stringency In money until about the first of November. In fact the month of October was one of the best in the history of the business oi American railroadipg.
 One railway official ventures ths statement that in the country today there are 100000 idle freight cars and oneNine which he instanced was declar- ed to be hauling empty cars backward and forward because. 1t had not yarc room or sidings to accommodate them.
 Not a single official of single raii' way line who appeared betors the Com. naissfon has expressed the belief that the present industrial depression would be lasting. In the testimony of near ly every witness before the Commission there was a note of confidence because all of. them practically believed that tne stringency in the money market Iron wbIch the country has suffered Is mol due to fundamental causes. They pom out that the crops last year were good that prices were excellent; that inuus trial enterprises throughout the coun' trv were fiourishing. It was merely inc inability to command ready casf ana the hoarding of money by panic stricken individuals which produced st suddenly the remarkable depressioi from which all have suffered.
 They practically uniformly express .orfidenee that the return of prosperitl ,S,II he almost as sudden as the com ,ns % of diversity. and in their argu raspts as to the enforcement of th' nineshour law they pointed out to th' Commission that such return oI psos . DeritT might seriously embarrass then in complying with the law because , would render 1t dimcult 10 co, ~ ., the services of competent opela ead, sufficient numbers to meet the "o'O 1 of nrosperous conditions.