The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-01-16
State Rates for Freight
 Unjust. BRILLIANT ADDRESS OF THE GENTLEMAN FROM ALABAMA Entire Session Yesterday Taken Up With Argument. Judge Jones Delivered Some Pertinent Remarks from Bench--Large Crowd FiIled Court Room
 During Yesterdays
 Hearing.

Former Congressman Sidney J. Bowie. in an eloquent argument, pre- scented the side of the railroads in the Alabama rate litigation in the Feder- al Court Yesterday, before Judge Thom- As G Jones, challenged the constitu- tionality of the rate acts on three separate grounds.
 Mr. Bowie devoted a considerable part of his argument to the claim Mrst made by the railroads and famil- far to the people of Alabama that the rate laws were unconstitutional be- cause they were fixed so low as to he confiscatory and therefore amount ed to taking the property of the rail- roads without due process of law.
 But Mir. Bowie went further and ad- vanced two additional points, to which the mind of the public has not yet been drawn, and argued on them that che rates were null and void. From the &fnphasis and the time he devoted to She exposition of these particular points. 1t Is evident that he and the other attorneys for the railroads be- lieve that hey will have weight witi. the court when the cases are being fi- naIly decided.
 As the second attack on the acts fn his argument, Mir. Bowie went for tho present classificattons of the AL nbama railroads. He pointed out that the only roads in the first class, which was required to make the lowest and smallest charge, were the roads which were defending their property in the Federal Court He quotd figures to show that the Alabama Great South ern had larger gross earning mile than any other road in the State, and get it was put in the third class, where tt was permitted to charge a rate 20 per cent higher than road like the Louisville & Nashville. MT. Bowie took bp one instance after another of what De called the injustices of the clas- ifacation-in5ustices which, he declar- nd, showed that the railroads of Alaba- ma were not given adequate protec- kfon under the law. This was prom ssed them by the Constitution, and he quoted decisions of the Supreme Court to show that the court uniformly up- held the doctrine that all persons and all interests should have equal pro- lection of the law.
 He enlarged upon the significant fact that every road which was seeking help in the Federal Court was be- ing punished by the State authorities for exercising their right of going in- to the court They were all in the first class. He denounced the doctrine of terror which was begun in North Carolina and which was sought to be invoked in Alabama whereby. the rail- roads were deterred fIom going into the courts of their country. Under the ruthless exercise of that doctrine in Alabama he said that more than hall the railroads had been bluffed out of the court and made to surrender to unfair laws.
 For his third claim of the uncon- mtftutionality of the rate laws, MT. Bowie advanced the remarkable penal- ties that were put upon the roads for going into the courts. This point had arisen several times while Attorney General Garber was advancing the po- sltion of the State. It came up again yesterday morning when the Attorney General was closing, and when Grego- ry L. Smith asked hhn if under the law there was way to test the new rates in the courts without subjecting