The Carlisle independent., 1909-12-09

l recommend legislation providing for the appointment by the president Of com mission with authority to examine the law and equity procedure of the federal courts of first instance, the law of ap- peals from those courts to the courts of appeals and to the supreme court. and the costs imposed in such procedure upon the private litigants and upon the public treas ury and make recommendations with view to simplifying and expeditinG the | procedure as far as possible and making it as inexpensive as may be to the liti- gant of little means.
 Injunctons Without Notice. The platform of the successful party in the last election contained the following:
 "The Republican party will uphold at all times the authority and integrity of the courts, state and federal, and will ever insist that their powers to enforce their process and to protect life, liberty and property shall be preserved inyioiate. We believe, however, that the rules of l procedure in the federal courts with re- l spect to the issuance of the writ of in | junction should be more accurately de- 1 fined by statute and that no injunction l or temporary restraining order should be issued without notice, except where ir- reparable injury would result from delay, 1 in which case a speedy hearing there after should be granted"
 | recommend that in compliance with | the promise thus made appropriate legis- l lation be adopted. The ends of justice | will best be met and the chief cause of 1 complaint against ill-considered injunc- | tions without notice will be removed by the enactment of q statute forbidding l hereafter the issuing of any injunction l or restraining order, whether temporary | or permanent, by any federal court. without previous notice and a reasonable l opportunity to be heard on behalf of the 1 ,;nf,, ,a1. fYfa1a gfaa pear to the satisfaction of the court that the delay necessary to give such notice l and hearing would result in irreparable
 injury to the complainant and unless also | the court shall from the evidence make 1 a written finding, which shall be spread 1 upon the court minutes, that immediate
 and irreparable injury is likely to ensue | to the complainant, and shall define the | injury, state why it is irreparable and | shall alsS indorse on the order issued the | date and the hour of the issuance of the | order MoreoverI every such injunction
 or restraining order issued without pre- | vious notice and opportunity by the de- | fendant to be hard should by force of l the statute expire and be of effect | after seven days from the issuance there | of or within any time less than that pe l riod which the court may fix, unless
 within such seven days or such less pe- | riod the injunction order is extended | or renewed after previous notice and op- | portunity to be heard
 My judgment is that the passage of
 such an act which really embodies the l best practice in equity and is very l like the rule now in force in some
 courts will prevent the issuing of ill., | advised orders of injunction without
 notice and will render such orders
 when issued much less objectionable
 by the short time in which they may
 remain effective.
 New Laws Needed.
 The jurisdiction of the general gov l ernment over interstate commerce has led to the passage of the so-called | sherman antitrust law and the in 1 terstate commerce law" and it's amend
 ments The developments in the oper- ation of those laws as shown by in- dictments, trials judicial decisions, | and other sources of information, call for a discussion and some suggestions as to amendments. These I prefer to 1 embody in a special message instead l of including them in the present com 1 munication, and I shall avail myself
 of the first convenient opportunity to | bring these subjects to the attention of l congress.
 Second-Class Mail Matter.
 The deficit every year in the post
 office department is largely caused by | the low rate of postage of l cent
 pound charged on second-class mail
 matter. which includes not only news | papers but magazines and miscellan-
 eous periodicals. The actual loss | growing out of the transmission of
 this second-class mail matter at l cent | a pound amounts to about S63 900. 900
 a year. The average cost of the trans | portation of this matter is more than
 9 cents pound.
 | It appears that the average distance
 over which newspapers are delivered
 to their customers Is 291 miles. while
 the average haul of magazines is 1.049. l and Of miscellaneous periodicals 1,12S l miles. Thus. the average haul of the | ma gazine is three and one-half times
 and that of the miscellaneous period | ical nearly four times the haul of the
 daily newspaper, yet all of them pay
 the same postage rate of 1 cent a | pound. The statistics of 1907 show
 that second-class mail matter consti- | tuted 63.91 per cent of the weight of | all the mail. and yielded only 5.19 per | cent of the revenue.
 The figures given are startling. and
 show the payment by the government l of an enormous subsidy to the news l papers, magazines and periodicals. and | congress may well consider whether
 radical steps should not be taken to
 reduce the deficit in the office de- | partment caused by this discrepancy
 between the actual cost of transporta- uon ana the compensation eXacted l therefor.
 great saving might be made.
 amounting to much more than half of
 the loss, by imposing upon magazines
 and periodicals a higher rate of post | age. They are much heavier than 1 newspapers. and contain a much higher | proportion of advertising to reading
 matter and the average distance of | their transportation is three and a half l times as great.
 The total deficit for the last fiscal | year in the postofice department
 amounted to s17.5o0.0O0. The branches
 of its business which 1t did at a loss
 were the second-class mail service, in
 which the loss. as already said, was
 63,o000oo. and the free rural delivery in
 which the loss was s2S, 900 900. These | losses were in part offset by the
 profits of the letter postage and
 other sources of income. It would
 seem wise to reduce the loss upon | second-class mail matter, at least
 to the extent of preventing a deficit
 in the total operations of the post
 office
 I commend the whole subject to con 1 gress, not unmindful of the spread of | intelligence which a low charge for
 carrying newspapers and periodicals
 assists. I very much doubt, however,