The silver state. [volume] (Winnemucca, Nev.) 1909-1925, 1919-10-25
TELLS HOUSE
UNPLEASANT TRUTH

iHineu and duty-bOund little speech
to the house on Wednesday, October
8, a copy of which has just come to
hand. 1t was as follows:
Mr.. Evans of Nevada. MFR Speak
er, an effort is being made to obtain
a law restraining any railroad from
charging for a shorter haul
than for a longer haul, the shorter
haul being included in the longer.
over the same line and in the same
direction. This statement is too sim
pie to be understood, but 1t means
that Congress is asked to enact a law
that will prevent a railroad from
charging. say, fifty-five cents per hun
dred for hauling cement from Kan
sas to Boise, Idaho, when the rate
over the same line to the Coast, 500
miles farther, is but forty cents per
hundred.
Sixteen thousand ions of cement
used in the Arrow Rock dam, in Idaho,
was hauled from Kansas, and it cost
this government $4,000 more to haul
the cement to Idaho than 1t would
have cost t o haul it 500 miles farther
to the Coast. A law is needed be-
cause the railroads wish to have the
right, under the rulings of the inter-
state commerce commission. to do
just such things.
The railroads say that they must
meet water competition" with an
equivalent rate to Coast cities in
order to get freight that otherwise
would be carried by water. The whole
trouble is that it discriminates to
destroy water traffic. These exam
pies of discrimination between Sec
tons and states can be shown to
have occurred numberless times.
1t is impossible to state what this
has cost Nevada, but more than $780,
600 per year for fifty years, and it
still continues, costing our producers
more to ship wool to the greatest
wool market, Boston, than from points
500 miles farther west.
A tariff on magnesite, tungsten and
other minerals would not be needed
in Il State only for this enormous
drain of money which, if it could
have been saved and expended upon
our struggling industries, would have
doubled and again doubled our de-
creasing population.
The iniquity and injustice Of this
practice against a whole State must
stop. Nevada demands an even break.
All the protection this whole country
needs is for our government to pro-
tect its citizens. their lives and prop
erty, everywhere on earth. We hear
much of the freedom of the sea; and
while England dominated the great
oceans any man could sail his tub to
any port.
England, upon small islands with
out great natural resources, but with
an indomitable spirit, excelled with
free trade. The question of ships,
railroads, and transportation, is par
ticularly a national problem. and one
not to be compromised upon any such
narrow basis as benefits to single in
dividuals, single industries, single
states, or even single sections of the
United States; but a problem to be
settled with justice on the basis of
national welfare.
1t is not a problem of rates between
cities, but is much more. 1t is not
a problem Of railroad transportation
alone, but of transportation in gen.
eral, whether over highway, railroad,
or steamship line; and the house
committee is approaching the subject
with hearings designed to bring out
all the facts and to show just what
step should be taken to insure JUS
tice both to the transportation indus
try and to the Nation which it serves.
This solution would seem to grant
to each transportation industry-rail-
road and steamship line-a fair field
in which to develop; a field n which
the railroad and steamship lines could
compete in healthy rivalry. ultimately
specializing on that profitable work
for which each had proven itself the
better fitted.
We may encourage shipping and all
other national interests by less of
governmental paternalism and exac-
tons. Give states equal opportuni-
ties. The time has come to stop the
ever-increasing growth of bureaus
and Capitalization of too much power
at Washington over states which
could more efficiently and economic
ally act for themselves.