The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-02-05
HEADS OF SOUTHERN RAILWAYS EXPLAIN
 PROPOSED CHANGES
Declare Necessity for Re- vision of Freight Rates Is Urgent-Water Compe-
 titiOn Important

Official notice was given yesterday by various railroads in the south that an effort would be made before the various state railroad commissions to readjust the freight rates applying in this section. The statement is signed by the presi- dents of several lines that touch Birming- ham. It follows:
 To the People Served by the Railroads of
 the South:
 An order of the interstate commerce commission. pursuant to requirements of federal laws, compels d general re- vision of southern freight rates. It is proper that the people of the south should be informed as to the reasons for this revision and the principles upon which it is being made.
 Excepting the Norfolk and Western, Chesapeake and Ohio and Virginia rail ways, which lie in official classification territory, the railroads of the southeast receive virtually no part of the per cent increase in rates recently acquiesced in by the interstate commerce commission. While the need of the carriers of the south for increased revenue is certainly no less than is that of the northern and eastern roads, that need is in no way re- lated to the revision of rates now in progress which arises solely from the necessity of more nearly conforming to the so-called long and short haul clause of the law as amended in 1910, and as now construed by the interstate com merce commission.
 'The original act to regulate cominerca forbade the making of lower rates for a longer than for a shorter distance within the same line or route under substantially the same circumstances and conditions The carriers were free to meet compe tition as they found it and were re- qured to answer only upon complaint as to the reasonableness of their acts. "The amendment of 1910 deprived the carriers of the right to initiate depart ures from the long and short haul re- | quirement and they may no longer meet competition as they find it if the long | and short haul requirement of the law | is involved, unless they can first obtain | the approval of the interstate commerce commission.
 ''They were furthermore required, b,
 this change in the law, to apply to the
 commission for authority to continue ir | force rates existing ar the time of its | passage which contravened the long anc
 short haul principle.
 Explained by Geography l "The existing rate structure of the | south is not the creation of traffic
 managers of this generation. It is al
 inheritance from those who built ths
 roads, and finds its explanation large l ly in the geography of the south, ane
 in a public policy which encouraged | it's creation. The changes now in pro | gross are not of the carriers choice. i, Water competition, the most imr
 ant factor in bringing about depaTtur' | from the long and short haul principle of the law, has been peculiarly influ ential on the rate adjustments of tn,
 south, surrounded as it is on thre'
 sides by navigable water and pene
 trated by navigable streams. Tcrmin
 of the first roads were on nayleabl
 waters and rates between those rtem
 ini were from the beginning depresse,
 because of this water competition When, subsequently,, railways were ex tended to the interior, distributin, points were thereby created. @her there arose competition of two or nor markets. or of two or more carriers resulting in depressions in rates, eve
 when there was no direct water com petition.
 These conditions undoubtedly con tributed to the commercial and indus trial development of the interior souti and, while they resulted in more ire