The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1912-04-01
Committee of Governors Files
a Solemn Protest
Against Invasion of Right by
the Federal Government.
As FRIEND OF THE COURT
They Submit Brief to the Su-
preme Bench.
Action Is Taken in Connection
With State Rate Cases.

Washington. April 1.-The governors
of the states as body today filed then
solemn protest with the supreme court
of the United States against the pro-
position to strike down state railroad
rates as interfering with interstate
commerce. They respectfully called
upon the bench, having in especial
charge the Covenant of the Union
to see that the boundaries of the states
remain. 1t was the first time in the
history of the nation that such a pro
test had been made.
The protest took the nature OF
brief, filed as friends of the court
by a committee of governors Judson
Harmon of Ohio, Herbert S. Hadley OF
Missouri, and Charles H Aldrich OF
Nebraska. This committee was select
ed at a conference of governors last
September. The brief was submitted II
connection with the state rate cases,
set Tor oral argument today.
The brief was of peculiar interest
coming so soon after the most recent
decision of the interstate commerce
commission that railroads submitting
to low state rates, must give similar
rates on interstate business.
The Minnesota Decision.
Because the federal circuit court in
the Minnesota freight and passenger
rate cases held the rates invalid not
only as conhscatory but by reason OF
their effect on Interstate commerce
that case was taken as the text foi
the governors protest. II was de-
clared that what was said went di-
rectly to the right of every state to
regulate state commerce, and was de-
signed particularly to be applicable to
the Minnesota, Missouri, Oregon. Ken
lucky Ohio, Arkansas and West Vir-
S1nia rate cases before the court. Tht
governors had nothing to say about the
confscatory nature of the rates, but
confined themselves to the Interstate
phase of the question.
The committee of governors set fortr
the claim that because Minnesota had
required the railroads to reduce their
rates from such cities as St. Pau.
Mimi, to Duluth. Mimi. on the stat
boundary the Interstate business OF
the railroads from st. Paul to Superior
Wis, just across the line from Duluth,
had been affected. Similar conditions,
it was stated, were to be found in Kan
sss City, Kan, and Kansas City. Mo.
East st. Louis, Ill, and St. Louis. Mo-.
Omaha, Neb., and Council Bluffs, Ia;
Cincinnati, O., and Covington. Ky.
The vice of the Minnesota decision,
it was urged, was not in an incorrect
statement OF Minnesota geography, but
in the plain disregard of the provisions
of the federal constitution, which es-
tablished the relation of the nation
and the states by giving one control
over interstate matters and the other
control over state affairs. 1t was ad-
mitted that there might be some ef.
feet on interstate commerce when states
regulate state rates. but it was as
serted time and again in the brief that
II railroad enjoys a reasonable re-
turn under state rates. it enjoys every
right to which il is entitled.
The True Test.
ssrTha teSt rappof he
governors, whether the effect Of fix
ing the local rates may or will be
to lead the railroads to lower their
Interstate rates, but whether the local
rates are fair and reasonable. for il
they are so and the sum of them is
so much lower than the interstate rate
as to lead shippers to take the trou-
BILE and risk OF rebiling or reshipping
at state lines, this is perfectly lawful
condition the advantage of which the
public is entitled to ENJOY. And as the
cost and convenience of carriage in
that way can be no less, but, as is
well known, would rather be greater,
the advantage would remain with the
through rate even if it were reduced 50
as to equal the sum or the local rates.
The railroads cannot invoke the COM
merce clause of the federal cOnstitu-
tion to shield themselves against fair
and reasonable rates fixed by a state
for its own interminal business. The
SnSCl VI lu6St on Interstate rates IS
not only incidental and indirect but also
legitimate under the dual form of gov
through which we enjoy happi
ness and prosperity beyond corhparc.
If the local rates as reduced By
Minnesota are still fair and the re-
duction leads the railroads TO lower
through rates correspOndingly, then
commerce Will have been
relieved of burden instead of having
one imposed on it.; and this would be
not directly by the
states regulation of its own com
merce but indirectly by the action OF
the railroads themselves which would
be only just and right"
Destroys State Control.
Testing the Minnesota decision by
it's consequences, the governors -declar-
ed that il was plain that the inevitable
effect of the idea that business neces-
stiles peculiar location of lines of
ters can make an act of a state
regulating it's local rates a regulation
of interstate rates and therefore in
valid, would be the destruction OF the
state control over it's own affairs.
1.-The right of state regulation ex-
tends to every business conducted
within its borders, though such busi-
ness may also extend into interstate
commerce. Any act regulating or af-
fecting an enterprise having an in
terstate character necessarily affects
with like enterprises carried on in
other states. This will apply to tele-
phones. telegraphs. natural gas and
oil companies and many other enter
prises. And the passage of a law reg
ulating the hours of labor within one