Los Angeles herald., 1908-02-17
Commissioner Smith vs.. The Standard Oil Go.
From the Railway yortd January >, 1908

to oil were carried at much lower rates than
Is cents, the commissioner of corporations
discusses only with the remark that tho
'reasonableness' Of this rate is not in ques-
tion The question is whether this rate con-
stituted a discrimination as against other
shippers CT oil" and he also makes mucn Oh
the failure of President Moffett to produce
before the grand jury evidence of the alleged
illegal acts of which the Standard OIL official
said that other large shippers in the territory
had been guilty. Considering the fact tnae
these shippers included the packers and eie-
vator men ofeChicago the action of the grand
jury in calling upon President Moffett to fur
nish evidence Of their rong-doing may be
interpreted as demand for an elaboration or
the obvious; but the fact that rate-book
containing these freight rates for other ship
pers was offered in evidence during the trial
and ruled put by Judge Lands was kept out
of sight President Moffett would not, OF
course, accept the invitation of the grand
jury, although he might have been pardoned
If he had referred them to various official In
vestigauons by the interstate commerce COM
mission and ether departments of the gov
ernment.
We come back, therefore. to the conclusion
of the whole matter, which is that the STAN
dard OIL company OF Indiana was fined an
amount equal to seven or eight times the
value Of Its entire property, because its traf-
fic department did not verify the statement
of the Alton rate clerk, that the 6-cent COM
modify rate on oil had been properly filed
with the interstate commerce commission.
There Is no evidence and none was intro
duced at the trial, that any shipper Of oil
from Chicago territory had been interfered
with by the 1S-cent rate nor that the failure
of the Alton to file its scent rate had re-
suited in any discrimination against any inde-
pendent shipper-we must take this on the
word of he commissioner of corporations
and of Judge Lands. Neither is 1t denied
even by Mr.. Smith that the independent"
shipper of oil, whom he pictures as being
driven out of business by this discrimination
of the Alton, could have shipped all the oil
he desired to ship from Whiting via Dolton
over the lines of the Chicago e. Eastern
Illinois to East st. Louis. In short, President
Moffetts defense is still good, and we predict
will be so declared by the higher court.
The Standard Oil company has been
charged with all manner of crimes and mis-
demeanors. Beginning with the famous Rice
of Marietta, passing down to that apostle OF
popular liberties, Henry Demarest Lloyd.
with his ''Wealth Against the Commonwealth
descending by easy stages to Miss Tarbelfs
offensive personalities, we finally reach the
neither depths of unfair and baseess mis-
representation in the report of the commis-
sioner of corporations. TIE Standard has
been charged with every form of commercial
piracy and with most of the crimes on the
corporation calendar. After long years of
strenuous attack, under the leadership of the
president of the United States the corpora
tion is at last dragged to the bar of justice
to answer for it's misdoings. The whole
strength of the government is directed
against It, and at last we told the Stan
dard Oil company is to pay the penalty OF
its crimes, and it Is finally convicted of hav-
ing failed to verify the statement of a rate
clerk and is forthwith fined a prodigious sum.
measured by the car. Under the old criminal
law, the theft Of property worth mora than
a shilling was punishable by death. Under
the Interpretation of the interstate commerce
law by Theodore Roosevelt and Judge Kene-
saw Landis, technical error Of traffic
ofricial is made the excuse for the confisca-
tion of a vast amount of property.