Omaha daily bee., 1919-11-16
JEFFER|S URGES
AMENDMENT TO
RAILROAD BILL
Fights Plan to Force All New
Railroads to Have Inter
state Commerce Commits
Sior Approval.

Washington, Nov. l5.-(Special
telegram - Congressman Jefferis,
who has shown a lively interest in
consideration of the railroad bill
now pending in the house, at late
hour Friday night spoke in favor
of an amendment to the bill offered
by Representative Mooney of Ohio,
providing that no railroad subject to
the act shall abandon all or any
portion of line of railroad Of the
operation thereof until there shall
have been obtained from the COM
mission a certificate that the pres
ent or future public convenience and
necessity permit of such abandon
ment."
The bill, as it came from the in
terstate and foreign commerce coni-
mittee, places limitation upon the
construction of new lines and the
extension of old lines unless there
has been obtained from the COM
mission, provided by the bill, "a GER
tificate to the effect that public con-
venicnce and necessity requires said
construction and operation.
Built t,y Initiative.
Mr.. Jeffcris, in supporting the
Mooney amendment i'll striking out
the restriction placed upon the
building of new roads and the ex-
tension and operation of old lines,
said that when the results that have
been accomplished through the I'M
tiative of the railroads i'll extending
their lines and opening up frontiers
to settlement and industry are re-
membereds he thought the house
ought to go slow in putting on the
brakes.
He suggested that if Daniel Web
ster had been OH the Interstate Com
merce commission some years ago.
wheih the distinguished New Eng
lander referred to the great west as
a desert. there would not have been
a railroad to cross the plains of this
great country But there were men
having forest ght to see the posi-
bilitiesl and the nerve to risk their
funds and their energy in building
the railroads of the western and
northwestern portions of this coun-
try" he continued.
Because of that fact we have
opened up the great grain producing
sections Of this country and the
great timber interests of this coun-
try, and it seems to me now that II
We adopt this provision as proposed
in the bill it will then be up to all OF
the railroads that are established to
use their influence, to use all OF the
power that they possess before the
Interstate Commerce commission, to
oppose the building Of any roads
in any section of this country.
Effect on Omaha Road.
Having in mind the desire of many
citizens of Omaha to con-
struct new rail line from South
Dakota to Omaha, a charter for
rev bridge across the Missouri river
between these two states, as the
first step in this direction, having
recently passed congress, the Omaha
said:
Il know that i'll our own section
of the state of Nebraska and i'll the
state of South Dakota to the north
of us there has been an effort, and
there is now purpose to build a
new railroad which will open up a
great territory and give access to a
number of people who are situated
long distance from railroads. And
yet if they come here before the
commerce commission l
know there would be at least two
railroads that are now getting that
business, but which are compelling
the people to haul produce for a
long distance in order to reach the
railroad, which will use all of their
influence to oppose the granting of
this permission.
1T seems to me that This congress
should legislate in favor of opti-
mism, in favor of opening new ter
ritory, rather than putting brake
on it and making it necessary for
who wants to organize a
new railroad to go to all this trouble
before they can use their own
money and enter into an enterprise
to open up new territory to give
service to the people who are now
4 long distance from the railroads.
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