The Mena weekly star., 1908-09-10
RATES ARE TOO LOW
JUDGE vANDEvENTER ENJolNS RAILROAD COMMISSION FROM
 ENFORCING STATE LAWS.
\ CIRCUIT JUDGE DECIDES FOR ROADS
A Temporary Injunction Granted, but Railroads Are Required to Give a s2o0,o00 Bond to Protect Shippers Roads Claim to Being Losers on a Two-cent Fare Basis.


 St. Paul, Minn., Sept 5. - Judge Vandeventer In the United States cir cult court Thursday granted the in- junction requested by the St. Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern and three other railroads operating in Arkansas against the Arkansas state railway commission. The injunction restraints the commission from inforcing the new two-cent fare law and from interfering with the railroads in raising their freight rates on interstate traffic.
 Late Thursday afternoon Judge Van deventer filed his opinion with the or der granting the temporary injunction. In his opinion Judge Vandeventer re- cites the history of the case and quotes from opinions handed down in similar cases.
 Each of the four railroad companies is engaged in the transportation of freight and passengers, both intra' state and interstate, in the state of Arkansas, and each has made a prac- tical application or test of the rates in question. The freight rates were prescribed by the railroad commits sioners while acting under the state statutes, and the passenger rate, which Is of two cents per mile was prescribed by statute. The proofs make it quite plain that the produc- ton of given amount of revenue is attended with greater cost in intra- state business than in interstate bus mess; and that this is a generally recognized fact is attested by the de cisions in other cases where the req sons which make it so are fully stated. Here the additional cost is shown to be at least 100 per cent in freight traffic and 15 per cent in the passen- ger traffic and this is practically what has been shown in other cases. Un- doubtedly these differences furnish a standard by which to apportion the total cost between the traffic which is intra-state and that which is inter state and while other standards are suggested the proofs indicate that none of them is as satisfactory or accurate as is the difference in cost. It must therefore be applied When this is done, the result shows that the earn ings of each road from it's intra-state freight traffic is much less than the proportion of the operating expenses and taxes properly attributable to it, and the earnings of two of them from intra-state passenger traffic Is a little less than the proportion of the operat- ing expenses and taxes properly at tributable to it. The conclusion neces- freight and passenger are non-com- pensatory and unreasonable, and that their inforcement although not so in- tended, Is nothing other than taking of the property of these railroad com panies without due compen sation, which is confiscation.
 A temporary injunction will be granted as prayed for, hut it will be required for the protection of shippers and passengers, that each railroad company execute a bond in the sum of S200, 900 conditioned that it will keep correct account showing, as respects every carriage of freight or passen- gers. the difference between the tariff actually charged, and that which would have been charged had the re- strained rates been applied and show ing the particular carriage in ques- tion, the stations between which 1t occurred and the name of the person affected, such record to be made and kept subject to the further orders of the court. and also conditioned that the excess charged shall be returned in each instance to the party in inter est within a reasonable date to be fixed by the court, if it shall eventual ly be determined that the temporary injunction ought not to have been granted.