The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1910-12-16
COME IN AT LAST.
Orient Finally Agrees to Make
Reports.
Had Refused to Comply With an
Order of Railroad Board.
MIR. DAWSON'S LETTER
1t Produced the Desired Result
in Short Order.
Items OF Interest From the
State Capital.
MR.. DAWSON'S LETTER

Inc Kansas City, Mexico & Orient
haliroad company, which had for some
tlme refused to comply with the order
or the state railroad board and make
monthly reports on train service has
at last come into the fold with the de-
slred report. Some correspondence was
carried on between John Dawson. at
torney for the railroad board. and the
attorney FOR the railroad company in
regard to this matter that is of peculiar
interest Both the attorney for the
state and for the railroad appear to
favor government control of railroads.
or instance, Dawson wrote the railroad
attorney in part as Follows regarding
the first refusal to comply with the or
der of the board:
VIII you pardon my frankness in
SAVING that the Orient railroad, in it's
ATTITUDE TO this very reasonable matter
occupies an unenviable position. The
orient railroad has been something of
q pet OF the Kansas public, not as much
for what it is, but for what we all
nope and confidently believe it will be
In the years to come. 1t is a Kansas
corporation, and yet before it gets out
OF knee breeches and is able to see
over the table without the use Of u
high chair, it begins to prate about in
terstate commerce and federal jurisdic-
ton, and frankly states to the SOW
ere1gn mother which spawned it that 1t
Will not obey such a reasonable order
as the requirement of monthly reports
concerning its passenger train service
The railroad attorney, John A. Eaton
OF Kansas City, in making reply TO
the above sends in the report of train
| service desired and goes on to declare
that the time is coming when interstate
carriers will be under the Jurisdiction
of the federal government and thus at
least saved from the harassing attacks
of the separate states. Dawson makes
rGDIV to the second letter in a
follows:
II am inclined to think there is con-
siderable truth in your idea Of federal
jurisdiction over interstate carriers, and
personally am not averse to bringing
that about; yet many precautionary
measures will have to be a part of such
program and it will necessitate the
provision for a sort of local federal jur-
isdiction, for certainly the endless null
titude of small matters, important only
to the person directly interested in their
dealings with the railroads. cannot be
managed in the faroff city of Washing
ton.
ST am something of a disciple of
Senator Elihu Root, and, like him. I
view with diSmay the marked ten
dency of the states to shift and trans
fer responsibility from the state gov
ernment to the national government.
THE republic is young yet and is
growing so rapidly and its interests
becoming so widespread, diverse and
complex that the human mind of our
day can hardly imagine how a single
government on the Potomac is to be
able to manage it all and do even ap-
proximate Justice to its people.
'As a student in law and govern
ment you must note that the growing
tendency in America to centralize au-
thority in Washington is Numerically
opposed to the British nation, from
which source our fundamentals in law
and government are derived"
After giving the illustration of the
British idea in giving more power to