Arizona republican., 1914-02-05

mission should expire after two years, in order that the rates of the country might not become one in- | elastic body. But the observation of the last seven or eight years has changed my opinion in that respect. have come to the conclusion that stability is of vastly more import | dnce than elasticity, and that what | the shippers of this country want is | to know absolutely the rate upon which they can depend, upon which | their business is to be transacted, their contracts are to be made. There must, of course. be changes in railroad rates. There are some rates which the gradual process of time makes wrong. There are other rates which should be put in for an emergency. There are other rates which should be periodically changed. There will be continual occasion to change classification rules regarding containers, and all that sort of thing. That question ought to be provided | for But the great mass of our rates, the great mass of the rules under which the traffic of this coun- try moves, ought in my judgment, to be the same year after year.
 Some time ago l became acquaint- ed on the train with a gentleman from New Zealand, who had some thing to do with the railroads of that country, and he volunteered to send | me the railroad tariffs of that coun- i try. l was a little astonished at the rooms full of tariffs, the building full of tariffs, that we had at Wash ington, but l said I would like to see them, and would be glad to have him send them to me Presently I got a | little pamphlet of not over 30 or 40 pages, which contained all the rates and all the regulations under which i the government railroads of that country are operated. l had occasion some time ago to investigate the rates of the German railroads, which are also operated by the government, i and l found, to my surprise, that those rates were contained in a comparatively small volume.
 1 Of course, the fact that we have competing railroads, the fact that there are different lines of railroads, renders it impossible to do in this country what has been done in New Zealand or in Germany, but it is possible to very much simplify the schedules which are published, and it is possible to have a stable and unvarying rate.
 What made those variations? .? Elasticity, my friends. means prefer ence. It means that somebody some where has been able to convince some traffic man that he, or his ilccality, ought to have better rate. I He gets that better rate, and that rate makes a change which runs like a river all over this country from the Canadian line to Mexico. The change nas not benefited anybody.
 My second reason was this: The railroads of this country are owned by private capital. They are de- voted to a public use. The govern ment, therefore, has a right to regu- late them. It does so whether il
 has any right or not. But, while the government must regulate and should regulate these railroads, it
 ought to leave the private capital
 invested just as free as it can be
 left, consistently with the public in-
 terest In other words, the railroads
 should have a right to make any
 rate they see fit. and should have a
 right to maintain that rate until II
 has been shown by a full hearing
 that the rate is wrong. There is nc answer to that argument; that is absolutely true. It is true of rates and it is true of everything else
 which a railroad does
 We ought to interfere in the leasi possible degree with the activities
 of that private property. But, gen. tlemen. the railroads of this cOun-