The Washington herald., 1914-05-10
LA TOILETTE AN EXPERT.
Text of His Utterances Is Railroads
Must Be DESTROYED"


Letter by z. w. Paul. Of washingtons
ID. C.. in New York Sun:
i In his latest paroxysm in the Senates
on May 5. Senator La Toilette declared
that there Is evidence of widespread
conspiracy to influence the Interstate
Commerce Commission to grant EastA
ern railroads the increase in freight rated
they have asked for. He declared that
the very general advocacy Of the IN
i crease by newspapers. bankers and man
ufacturers was a part of this conspiracy
4 to secure an increase which he thinks
wrong. In other words, nearly all thu
| well-informed people In the country ara
in agreement against the views of ths
more or less distinguished Senator, and
| therefore. in his opinion, they must all
| be mistaken or corrupt
/ Senator La Toilette spoke in advocacy
of his bill to make it criminal offenss
to seek to influence the commission's
decision. Then he talked for more than
/ two hours in his own EFFORT to influences
II. The only logical inference from this
is that he considers IL crime for any
on the subject or perhaps even to have
one The Senator's only oversight seems
| to have consisted In not including in his
bill a provision making 1t a crime to
| go into the railroad business.
| Why II should be wrong for the rail-
| roads and related business interests tn
present arguments in defense OF their
rights, and right for persons less di-
rectly concerned and with little or moth
ing at stake to make vicious attacks on
them, is not easily perceptible to minds
not inoculated with La Toilette progress
iveness since the only difference in the
pertinence of the statements Is that those
| Of the railroads are based on experience.
exact knowledge and truth, and thos5
OF their assailants are not
Not satisfied with the much lower rates
and higher wages of American railroads
as compared with foreign ones. the toy
| reformers have brought about conditions
under which customers of the roans
virtually flN their own rates. and II Is
impossible to go much further without
compelling the roads to pay people Tor
using them. Railroad baiters. II success
full, would deprive the community of the
best service in the world. on which pros
perity is largely dependent In demand
ing the impossible when they already
have what other nations have found Z
impossible to equal or approximate. they
are like children crying for the moon
Mr.. La Toilette aspires to be the Cato
of the railroads and behind all his utter
ances is visible the text, The railroads
must be destroyed.
Senator La Toilette has now qualified
as an expert" The only alternative
his policy leaves is government owne--
ship: and the incapable. extravagant and
arbitrarily arrogant methods noticeable
in much government business would hH
peculiarly fatal to success in railroad
management. This is especially true 81
professedly reform administrations. Sen
ator Thomas. Democrat. recently declared
in the Senate that his party ought to re-
tract all il has ever said about Repub-
lican extravaganza. and other responsible
Democrats in Congress have made similar
admissions.
By reference IN his speech to "the suC-
gestion that the political party that did
not preserve prosperity re-a rdless of jus
tice could Not retain power" the Sera-
tor practically admitted that granting
the railroads the increase in rates would
add to the public prosperity: and so far
as Justice" is concerned. few people
will share Mr.. La Follette's ideas Of
justice as stated by him Moreover. IL
is positively known that the Interstate
Commerce Commission has received hrrn-
dreds of letters from railroad employees
favoring the increase and blaminG the
delay in granting il for the nonemplov-
msnt of scores of thousands Of railroad
men.
Mr.. La Toilette is political Don
QuiXote and thinks he is attacking cap
italistic giants when in reality he is tilt
ing against windmills of labor and IN
dustry. Railroad and other corporats
securities pay the interest from which
the 100000 or 10000 of savings bank
depositors and life insurance pOlicyhoid-
ers derive the interest and other bene-
fits they get from their Investments. In
the ultimate analysis these people are
the vast majority of capitalists. and tie
Senator is attacking them and the work
ingmen when he assails the railroads and
trusts"
Having berated almost everybody and
everything else. Mr. La Toilette could
not refrain from taking a fling at the
President. He pointed out that newspa-
pers friendly to the administration 'have
published that the President is known
to favor the increase in transportation
rates. The Senator intimated that the
President should have let it be known
that he resented this imputation: but. as
no such imputation ever had been made
until Mr.. La Toilette made it in his
speech. it is hard to see how the Presi-
dent could have done so.
Many men of undoubted integrity am
intelligence have inferred from rh.I-
talks with the President that he would
like to see the request OF the railroads
granted. but tine President has Ca.er-Ty
r"frained from ,making any positive dec
laratiOn that might be distorted into a
hint to the commission. The Judgment
and reliability of these men who have
conversed with the President and con-
cluded confidently that he favored and
ought to favor the increase will he at
least as highly regarded by most read
ers as Mr.. La Follette's.
In his favorite role. as the cutest lttIa
harry of modern times. the Senator has
mussed up the feast of reason to tho
fullest extent of his ability His speech
was practically an expression of resent
mont against public opinion