The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1909-06-18

lHS long 10 De remembered as yer.
pleasant innovation socially.
i BY request of the Round Table
members, Mrs. Edmunds interesting
talk is published in full In this issue
1 E8i #
THE TELEPHONE A PUBLIC NE
CESSITY
Courts and legislatures are begin.
ming to give official recognition to the
public necessity Of telephones, even
in out of the way places and fa1
from centers of population. 1t has
long been recognized that the phone
is handy, convenient, even indispen-
sable. Now, however, it is illegal
for certain corporations not to pro-
| vide telephone facilities for the pub
lie. Nothing but public demand
could have brought this about. Re-
personalities OF the people in courts
and assemblies merely are rejecting
| popular opinion when they give Of
| fetal recognition to the call for uni
versal telephone communication.
Iowa's general assembly furnished
perhaps the most striking example of
this, when the following, very broad
in it's scope, was enacted last month:
1T shall be the duty of all rail-
way companies on all lines of rail-
ways operated by them to install a
telephone in each passenger or
freight depot in any city or town
where telephone exchange is main
tanned for public services. Said tele-
phone to be connected with and for
the use of the patrons Of said ex-
change, and it shall be the further
duty of all railway companies on all
lines operated by them to keep post
ed in the waiting room OF each pas
senger station a bulletin plainly
showing the time of arrival and de-
parture at such station Of all trains
carrying passengers"
This provision repealed section
GOTTA OF the supplement to the code
of / 1907.
The governor stamped his official
approval on the measure, and it is
now law of the state.
Something similar, though an iso-
lated case, is found in Oklahoma. The
CORPORATION commission of that state
recently held that 1t Is the duty of a
railway corporation to supply tele-
phone for the convenience of its pat
rons, and the ruling was upheld by
the Supreme court if the state. The
Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe road
was ordered by the commission to
equip its station at Skedee, Oklaho-
ma, with phone. The Supreme court
in unfolding this ruling stated that
the telephone is an indispensable aid
in the conduct of the business of a
common carrier. The State commits
sion had already held that the. tele-
phone is as essential to the comfort
and convenience of passengers as the
operation of the trains.
Railroad commissions in both Vir-
ginia and Nebraska have ruled that
all stations in these states must be
equipped with telephones. So it can
be seen that the new law in Iowa is
not at all an innovation, sweeping
though 1t may be. The demand for
the public telephone, which has thus
been furthered by state officials, has
gone hand in hand with the spread
Of the private phone. 1t is the tele-
phone In the home, on the farm, or
in the Office, whose popularity has
brought about this action in the deg
islature. The telephone at the rail-
road station gives farmers planters,
and ranchmen in rural, sections the
for comMunication with |
the outside world aEd with each other
which no other Improvement could
effect. For thAtfar-sighted man who
has phone <connections it means
keeping inftouch with movements of |
trains and with all the affairs of his
community: the man who has not yet
Installed a telephone in his home has
access to the station telephone at all |.
times, for him it is real boon.
The American farmer has received
. boon whose effects are bound to be I
felt on his condition before very long,
The rural telephone annihilates dis
tances. Perhaps Mr.. Farmer wants
10 buy new agricultural Implements.
The weather is bad. 4. But does that
letter him? Not If he has his phone
On the wall and teven If he hasn't,
heres one at the railroad station.
It has to be. The law says so. SO
,our up-to-date agriculturist does his
shopping by phone.
y But perhaps there's fire. May
,e the hay in the barn is going fast.
Il your farmer runs down the road
o get his neighbors to come to his
lid, nothing will be left when he gets
Jack. If he calls up this man, then
hat, then another, he can still be
lighting the blaze when the good 4
leighbors come Gathering up and
lelp him save his house and perhaps
lis stock. This question of fire pro- |
ection forms the most vital argu-
nent for the telephone. 1t is no idle
to say that thousands of
Tres in the rural sections have been (
Luenched because the owner had
God, reliable phone around the
ouse. There's danger in doing with
ut one and that argument ought to
e driven home before something
appens to cause regret that there
,asn't phone in the house.
The telephone is useful every day;
] helpful very often; is indispensable
t times and is always on duty. One
OuSeWife calls Ii cher friend on the {