New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1918-11-24
Private Control
Of Rails Within
6 Months, Is Asked
Unihcation for Longer Pc
riod May Render Roads
Undesirable
Will Fight in Congress
Security Holders Association
to Sift Attacks on Federal
Management

The battle to have the control of the
railroads returned promptly to the Sc
curity holders who own them is to be
waged on the floor of Congress under
the generalship of Elihu Root, and the
fight will begin soon. The strategy of
private management is to be mapped
out this week at meeting in this city
of the subcommittee of eight members
of the National Association of Owners
of Railroad Securities.
The members of this committee are
s. Davies Warfeld, chairman, of the
Seaboard Airline Railway; Darwin P.
Life Insurance Company; Myron T.
Herrck, of the Society of Savings, and
who was Ambassador to France during
the early days of the war; F. H. Ecker,
treasurer of the Metropolitan Life In
surance Company; Forrest Dryden,
president of the Prudential Life In
surance Company; Gordon Abbott,
chairman of the board of the Old
Colony Trust Company of Boston;
CIHeSI L. w OOOIuu, pIcSlQcuC Oh Viz
Trust Company of Georgia, of Atlanta,
Ca, and A. H. Jackson, vice president
of the Girard Trust Company of Phila-
delphia.
Want Roads Soon
The objective of the drive is not
merely to get the railroads back to
private control, for the existing law
provides for their reversior to their
/ e., IF
iwenty-one months after the present
emergency" but to get them back soon.
This distinction was stressed by one of
the leaders of the association who said
that unless the operation of the rail
roads is returned to the security hold
ers within six months the railroad Sc
curty holders will not want their prop
critics returned"
If the effort to get Congressional aid
fails, it was limited that under the
leadership of Elihu Root, who heads
the group Of lawyers who are sitting
and compiling a mass of criticism COM
ing from railroad executives, shippers
and security holders and all directed
against the work of the United States
Railroad Administration, the associa-
ton might possibly take steps to con-
test the constitutionality of the govern
r.ent's right to take over the railroads.
Now that the war is all but technically
over it is argued that action of this
character would not be incompatible
with patriotism
The offences charged against the gov
eminent handling Of the railroads in
clude data concerning the arbitrary
closing of railroad terminals as a part
of the process of unihcaton. These
terminals, in some cases, it is said,
re nf No 1r.no RI
owning them that were of almost in
calculable value; properties that had
been won after years and years of hard
competition with rival roads.
Unscrambling Is Difficult
representative of the security
holders who is playing an important
role in the fight to restore control of
the railroads to the owners said YES
terday:
"The railroads are being so scram-
bled together that it will be almost
impossible for them to be turned back
to their owners. This is being done
| high handedly and deliberately.
1T has been the policy of the rail-
road administration to seek to weld
all the railroads of the country into
one transcontinental system without
regard to those who would be affected,
whether security holders or shippers.
Short cuts have been made. For
example, two roads, rivals, had tracks
running to large plant The United
States railroad administration cut the
physical connection of one of these
roads by actually tearing up several
miles of its track, leaving the rival
road in undisputed possession of the
shipping business of the plant in
question.
! Our complaints are not 80 much
concerned with improper expenditures
as they are with the arbitrary Topping
Off of adjuncts to various railroads
! as corporate entities Then, too. the
roads have been ordered to spend
money for purposes which served onlv
the government in the prosecution Of
the war and which properly should be
paid for by the government. From all
THESE things there has been no appeal"
A Cause of Complaint
Some months ago, it was pointed ont.
the railroad administration announced
that 1T had ordered 100000 freight cars
which would be paid for from govern
ment funds. Later, however, railroad Of
metals began to learn the Federal all
thhorities had decided that the indi-
vldual companies would have to paw
LOT lhelI particular allotments. In this
connection The Railway Age" saws:
director General McAdoo has or
dered the railroad corporations to nav
for. the cars and locomotives already
ordered, in spite of their protests.
While he declined to change his posi-
ton in this matter at their request he
is said to have some doubts as to
whether he can make his decision stick
without lawsuit The railroad cor
porations have still greater objections,
now that the war is supposed to be-
over, to paying war prices for equip
ment over which they will have no
control for some time, from which they
Will earn no revenue and which thew
probably could purchase at much lower
prices later on or when their proper
ties are restored to them"
Samuel Untermyer, general counsel
for the organization of security own
ers, was asked yesterday if there was
any possibility of a working alliance
between the railroad security holders
and the Postal Telegraph CONNIE rcial
Cables, which is planning to fight in
the courts the. seizure by Postmaster
General Burleson of the cable lines of