The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-01-18
From the Railway World, January 3, 1908

terminate at Dolton. from which point entrance is made over the Belt Line. Whiting, where the oil freight origi- mates, is not on the lines of the Chi cago and Eastern Illinois, which re- ceives it's Whiting freight from the Belt Line at Dolton. The former prac- tice, now discontinued, in filing tariffs was to make them read from point on the line of the filing road, and 1t was also general to state on the same sheet, that the tarin would apply to other points, e. B. Whiting. The Chi cago and Eastern Illinois followed this practice in filing it's rate from Dolton, and making note on the sheet that 1t applied to Whiting. This was in 1895 when this method of filing tariffs was in common use.
 Now let us see in what way the i'm tending shipper of oil could be misled and deceived by the fact that the Chi cago and Eastern Illinois had not filed a rate reading from Whiting. Commis- sioner Smith contends that conceal ment is the only motive for such cir cuitous arrangement" 1. G., that this meth cd of filing the rate was intended to mislead intending competitors of the Standard Oil Company. Suppose such a prospective oil refiner had applied to the Interstate Commerce Commission for the rate from Chicago to East St. Louis over the Chicago and Eastern H. linois he would have been informed that the only rate filed with the Com mission by this company was 1-4 cents from Dolton, and he would have been further informed, if indeed he did not know this already, that this rate applied throughout Chicago territory So that whether he wished to locate his plant at Whiting, or anywhere else about Chicago, under an arrangement Of nd rrh all the industrial towns in the neigh borhood of Chicago, he could have his freight delivered over the Belt Line to the Chicago and Eastern Illinois at Dolton and transported to East St. Louis at rate of IA cents. Where then is the concealment which the Com missioner of Corporations makes so much of? Any rate-from Dolton on the Eastern Illinois or Chappell on the Alton, or Harvey on the Illinois Gen. tral. or Blue Island on the Rock Island, applies throughout Chicago territory to shipments from any other point in the district. So far from the Eastern Illi- nois filing it's rate from Dolton in or der to deceive the shipper. it is the Commissioner of Corporations who either betrays his gross ignorance of transportation customs in Chicago ter ritory or relies on the public ignorance of these customs to deceive the public too apt to accept unquestioningly ev- cry statement made by a government official as necessarily true. although, as in the present instance, a careful ex- animation shows these statements to be false.
 The final point made by President -Moffett that other commodities of a character similar to oil were carried at much lower rates than IS cents. the Commissioner of Corporations discusses only with the remark that the req sonableness' of this rate is not in Ques- tion. The question Is whether this rate constituted a discrimination as against other shippers of oil" and he also makes much of 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 tho terR4-