The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1908-02-08
FRON OTHER PENS
HOW SECRET OIL RATE FILED.

11OW oI1IhE4I JILL 1s<A1 r. l. l4<I1l)s
The Standard Oil company has been
deeply stirred by the statement which
Mr.. Herbert Knox Smith, the Commits
sioner Of Corporations, prepared some
weeks ago by direction of Secretary
Straus in answer to the Standards pro-
test against the fine imposed by Judge
Lands. In a new argument, first printed
in the Railway World, and since
widely circulated as an advertisement.
the corporation has undertaken to
crush Mr.. Smith. Its chief point Is the
one 1t depended upon in the trial,
namely that the six-cent secret rate it
received from the Chicago & Alton
could not have been an unfair dis
elimination in it's favor since there was
in existence at the same time an open,
legally filed rate Of six and a quarter
cents over the Chicago and Eastern
alleged open rate was IAN additional
wrong in ITSELF" being quite as secret
as the Alton rate" and merely one
more instance Of the ingenious and de-
Hberate attempts of the Standard to
evade, or violate with impunity, the
law 1t was filed in the form of "a
single mimeograph sheet, stating that
the rate on oil from Dolton, ILL.,, to
East st. Louis was six and a quarter
cents per hundred pounds" and there
was mo evidence that this sheet was
the Standard Oil Company" But the
Independent shippers did get a con-
spicuously printed class tariff, show
ing, like that Of the Alton. a general
rate of eighteen cents on a group OF
commodities including oil.
The Standards latest advertisement
maintains warmly that Independent
shippers could have found out about
the six and a quarter-cent rate on
the Chicago and Eastern Illinois. But
it does not offer to explain the curious
facts presented by Mr.. Smith that
every way bill for oil shipped over the
Alton at the cheap rate was falsely
billed" at eighteen cents while the
charge actually collected from the
Standard was only six cents, that In
the contemporaneous shipments OF the
Standard over the Chicago and East
ern Illinois every waybill was disguised
by being blind billed" that no such
classifying and blind billing were found
in other cases, and that instead OF FOL
lowing the usual method OF collecting
freight charges through the local
freight agents the railroad settled pri-
vately with the Standard through their
general offices.-CoIlier's Weekly.
CANADA TO PROTECT SHIPPING.
The Canada Gazette has published
an order in council repeating the
coastwise shipping privileges hitherto
Denmark and Hungary after January
1, 1909 The order, which gives for
eign shipowners ample time In which
to prepare for changes in their en-
gagements, is aimed principally at
Norwegian shipping, which are said
to have driven Canadian craft out of
the coastwise shipping trade of the
provinces.
After the date fixed by the order,
foreign vessels which sail from Cana
dian ports will be under restrictions
similar to those which have Injured to
the benefit of the American coastwise
service of the Great Lakes. They will
be unable to carry freight or passen-
gers from one Canadian port to an
other, and will be compelled to con-
fine themselves to the foreign trade,
or abandon service in Canada alto
gether. The enforcement of similar
regulations on the Great Lakes pre-
vented Canada from engaging in the
grain trade between upper lake ports
and the receiving ports on Lake Erie
and Ontario, except Kingston, port
in Canada that formerly handled
large amounts of grain annually, and
having noted the effect of this restric-
ton upon the American shipping In
dustry, the Canadians naturally look
for an upbuilding of their coastwise
shipping In the provinces as a result
of the order in council.--Milwauke
Wisconsin