The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1910-11-23
Guests at Railway Business As
sOciatiOn Annual Dinner.
Hear the Rate Question Dis
cussed From Three Angles.
MENT,S STnE
GOVERNMENTS SIDE.
Is Presented by Commission
Chairman M. w. Knapp.
President of the B. & O. Talks
for the Railroads.

New York, Nov. 23.-Martin A.
Knapp, chairman of the interstate
commerce commission, delivered an ad-
dress at the annual dinner Of the Rail-
way Business association. He said In
part:
If our country is to grow and prosper
we must have railway earnings suffi-
cient for three things:
First. A return on railway invest
ments of such amount and so well as
Sured as to attract the necessary cap
ital to improve existing roads and con-
struct thousands of miles of new lines
in fruitful districts now destitute of any
means of transportation. 1t is a mat
ter of common knowledge that the out
put of traffic for the fiscal year 1907
exceeded our entire carrying capacity
on land and water. Since it is our ma
tional policy-and long will be, 1 trust
to rely upon private capital and pri-
vate enterprise to provide these great
highways of commerce, must we not i'll
the larger public interest, whatever
may be thought by this or that shipper,
make the business of furnishing rail-
road transportation so desirable to the
investor that the necessary funds for
bettermentS and extensions will be
forthcoming, and so attractive as a vo-
cation that the highest ability will be
employed in it's management? Other
wise, must not our country come meas
urably to standstin and face future
of comparative stagnation?
Second. The payment of liberal
wages to an adequate number of COM
petent men. This not only to insure
increasing skill and reliability. but also
because of the great influence of rail-
way wages upon compensation of labor
in private employment. The funda-
mental social problem is to provide
without radical action or injustice, for
a more equable diffusion of the wealth
which the earth produces.
Third. The betterment Of existing
lines without unnecessary increase in
capitalization. Every dollar borrowed
to improve a road now in operation in
wolves a permanent addition to the in
terest charge which the public is re-
quired to pay; the improvement from
current earnings puts no lien upon the
property but by adding to the security
of the capital already invested tends to
a lower rate Of interest upon that cap
ital. This means a national policy in
respect Of railroad rates and revenues
in harmony with our national policy in
other matters, and in accordance with
that enlarging spirit of altruism which
irnpels the present assumption of bur
denS that might be escaped or deferred
in order that another generation may
have an easier task and a larger op-
portunity. Is 1t not in this particular
field a wise and patriotic policy?
B. & o. President Speaks.
Daniel Willard, president of the
Baltimore & Ohio railroad, said in
part:
The roads should recognize in the
future more than they have in the
past that while they are under certain
precise as well as implied obligations
to their security holders. they are also
charged with a public service to per-
form, and there are also certain clear
and implied obligations in that direc-
ton, among which is this:
"To treat all alike, giving as full
consideration as possible to all reason
able requirements. In short, while
giving full and proper consideration to
the rights of the security holders, to
give fair consideration also to the
rights and feelings of the shipper.
1 think the roads should keep out of
politics. This makes it necessary to
take the public into their confidence
as far as possible, so that the public,
being fully and correctly informed,
may act intelligently and fairly toward
the railroads.
There is today in the minds of rail-