Pierre weekly free press. (Pierre, S.D.) 1889-19??, 1918-01-03
K THE RAILROADS

Americas railroad problem will no
doubt prove the right one. The
president does not rush blindly into
any matter, but proceeds cautiously
and reaches a decision only after
he has exhausted all means of
learning every angle of the situa-
ton at hand.
In selecting Secretary McAdoo
for director of the railroads the
president has displayed his usual
perspicacity and judgment. Mr..
McAdoo, though he is known to
most Americans, perhaps, as secre-
tary of the treasury, has achieved
a measure of prominence before
that as the builder Of the Hudson
river tunnel, which annually &C
commodities $4,000, 900 people who
wish to go from II part of New
York to another. The tunnel was
built, you will recall, after the most
prominent engineers in America
had declared it impossible. In
this work, as in other ventures in
to the railroad field MIR. McAdoo
acquired more experience with rail-
roads than any other public man of
the present possesses, and yet at
the same time is not bound by ira
dition nor blinded by custom as
might have been some man chosen
directly from the railroad field.
Government control of railways,
coming at the height of public clam
or or government ownership, will
probably prove fortunate in more
ways than one. To begin with it
will practically give us government
ownership and all that it entails
without the tremendous expense
involved. We will be able to take
government ownership on trial and
if we don't like it can reject it with
out the humiliation of asking for
our money back.
One of the first things the gov
eminent will do, under its control,
will be to eliminate the super-ser-
vice passenger trains that all the
roads have been forced to operate
because of competition. We, who
have become used to sybaritic lux
ury while travelling, will have to
give up our parlor cars, while on
shorter journeys, when we patron
ize the chair car, we will be forced
to occupy a single seat, one-half a
bench, and will not be permitted to
hog four seats for baggage, wraps
aud feet. This will be because the
government will run fewer trains
and viii load them to capacity, be-
ing no longer under the burden of
competition and its need to give ex-
traordinary comfort.
An excellent feature of this gov
eminent control is promised in the
increased pay that will be given
the. small cogs i'll the great railway
machine-the Pullman porters. for
instance, who, after being emanci-
pated by Abraham r held in
greater bondage by Robert in the
way of starvation wages that must
ampliied by the generosity of pat
rons upon the Pullman cars. The
verumen cannot consistently con-
tinue to pay these men $50 a month
while our legislatures are passing
minimum wage laws.
So many other changes in ac-
cepted railroad customs and serv-
ice suggest themselves to the mind
that it would require more space
than is available to speculate upon
them. Ali that can be done is to
warn the public that changes are
bound to come and suggest that,
as these changes come, they be
compared to "the good old days"
of private ownership and control
and the comparison be recalled
when the government ownership
proponements again become active.