The Chanute times. [volume] (Chanute, Kan.) 1897-1913, 1908-09-11
ARKANSAS LOSES
JUDGE vANDEVENTER ENJolNS
RAILROAD COMMISSION FROM
ENFORCING STATE LAWS.
RATES ARE UNREASONABLE
A Temporary Injunction Granted But
Railroads Are Required to
Give Bond to Protect.
Shippers.

st. Paul, Mimi, Sept. 4.-Judge
Vandeventer in the United States cir
cult court Thursday granted the in
junction requested by the st. Louis,
Iron Mountain G. 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 prac-
tical application or test of the rates
Al IL.
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 a given amount of revenue is
attended with greater cost in intra-
state business than in interstate bus
mess; and that this is generally
recognized fact is attested by the de-
cisions in other cases where the rea-
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 Is per cent in the passen-
ger traffic and this is practically what
has been shown in other cases. I'm
doubleday these differences furnish
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. 1t must
therefore be applied. When this is
done, the result shows that the earn
iings of each road from its intra-state
freight traffic is much less than the
proportion of the operating expenses
land taxes properly attributable to 1t,
: and the earnings of two of them from
t04 tra n a
less than the proportion of the operat-
I ing expenses and taxes properly at
q tributable to it. The conclusion neces-
sarily follows that these rates, both
freight and passenger are non-com-
pensatory and unreasonable, and that
their enforcement although not so in
tended, is nothing other than a taking
OF the property of these railroad COM
panies without due compensation
which is conflscation.
A temporary Injunction Will be
granted as prayed for but it will be
required for the protection of shippers
and passengers, that each railroad
vnmpany execute bond in the sum OF
s2OO 600 conditioned that it will keep
"a correct account showing, as respects
every carriage of freight or passen-
gers. the difference between the tarlr
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 whicMlt
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
.p each instance to the party in inter
est within a reasonable date to be
fixed by the court, if it shall eventual
ay be determined that the temporary
injunction ought not to have been
granted.