Arizona republican., 1912-01-18
FAVORS THE PLAN.
Correspondent Thinks Government
Should Own Railways and
Teleprarhs.

The following letter on the subject
Of government ownership. written by
NJ. William White. has been received
at The Republican office. The Repub-
lean believes that n much counsel
there - WISDOM and as Mr.. White
has made probably a good an argu-
ment as can be made IN his side of the
question. his letter is gladly repro
Jnced. L. is - follows:
Phoenix. AriZ. Jan. l6. 1912
To the Editor Of The Republican:
have just read your editorial in
today's issue Of your paper entitled
The Hitchcock Plan" ana trust YOU
viii kindly pardon the liberty l am
taking in asking that you publish the
following in reply thereto.
In regard 10 the publicly owned tele-
graph lines of England have no state
ment Ia make. since J am not preson-
ally acquainted with their rates. on
the other hand | am with the publicly
owned lines of demonstrating upon
two different visits To- that empire as
certained the fact that the rates are
just about one half what they are in
America. Furthermore the American
public do 50 much arger volume OF
wiring, that there is no comparison in
the amount Of business done here i'm
the telegraph line as in Germany and
Vet with a less quantity BY far Of wiz
ing, and tolls One-hslf less. the gov
rrnment statistics 81 ow a profit 1t
is great scheme with those who wish
I" prove government owner public
utilities in Europe ale Improbable to
only show up one side Of the argument
Not long since | read an article which
sought TO prove and did demonstrate
by the facts as produced that the rail
ways of Germany We're not a revenue
producing property. and il was written
10 verify the argument that il was a
bad proposition for our government to
own the railroads of this country. The
author OF this article though did not
mention the amount Of tOnnag. hauled
icy the American lines; was about four
times as great as the German lines
and in speaking of this | mean, mile
Tor mile-as a matter of course the
entire mileage Of the American lines is
50 much greater there is no compari-
son only by the mile when speaking OF
the amount Of freight handled. Fur
thermore TO any one who has ever seen
Inc average German freight car. fully
realizes that the same is merely a TOW
IN comparison to the freight cars Of
America. with only four wheels under
them 10 carry at the utmost only about |
or 10 tons. Compare this with a train |
OF American cars each carrying from |
:" To 40 tons and train Of a dozen |
cars is good sized freight train in |
Germany, needless to mention the i'm |
mense length Of the average American |
freight train, as m after of course. |
one train crew in each country handles |
" freight train-furthermOre the pas |
Senger traffic in America is of so much |
larger volume, the earnings of the |
American road is vastly greater than |
mat OF Germany. Owing to the i'm /
mense power welded by the railways. 1
the sentiment for them t. be owned /
by the government is growing day by |
day. The argument that the govern |
neAt cannot successfully operate them !
: 10 admit that the railways are more /
powerful than the government. and |
inns is tantamOunt to acknowledging |
we have a very weak government. II |
the government had owned the rail |
ways from their inception, such an |
abomnible evil as the rebate. and its
effect the trusts would not now be the |
problem and the perplexity of Ameri- F,
ca Earnestly.