The Washington times., 1921-04-29
RAIL CR|S|SAT
CLIMAX July |
-HAPGOOD
-HAPGOOD
Acute Stage Certain When In
terest on Roads Bonds Be-
comes Due, Says Writer.
BY NORMAN HAPGOOD.


The railroad crisis develops in va
rious ways. 1t is expected to reach
it's climax about the first of July,
when interest comes due on a large
part of the bonds. A Senator who
is particularly interested in this
question said to me the other day:
"The people up on the Hill (mean-
ing Senators and Representatives,
say very little about it.. They don't
like to talk about it,"
wOOLLEY's ARGUMENT.
Robert w. woolley, until January a
member of the Interstate Commerce
Commission, has an article on the
railroads in today's issue of the Yale
News.
He first points out that since the
development of our productive capa-
city during the war ii is probably con-
servative to say il is necessary TO
dispose regularly of so per cent of
the products of our fields, our mines
and our mills to foreign countries IL
we are to develop our normal indus
trial pace once more"
But while the restoration OF foreign
trade would do much to steady the
railroad situation. the transporta-
ton problem is bigger than that.
For instance. until we establish reg
ularity OF coal production. with at
tendant continuity of employment fer
mine labor and steady use of cars,
the railroad question is going to be
increasingly vexatious. Industrial
peace and protection against profiteering
in the most widely used and most nee
essary of all commodities are Of first
Importance
EsCH ACT FAILURE.
Mr.. Woolley then speaks OF the ad-
mitted failure of the Esch-Cummins
act. Next he points out the increas-
ing effect OF water competition. Prod
ucts now go from the Pittsburgh dis
trict to Atlantic ports in half the time
and at about two-thirds the cost of
rail shipment.
Recently a steamboat heavily laden
with manufactured products left Gin
cinnati, via the ohio and Mississippi
rivers for New Orleans. where the
cargo was transferred to an ocean
going vessel bound for Pacific coast
ports.
A steamship equipped with a re-
frigerating plant lands at Baltimore
with fruits and other perishables from
southern California in only little
over two weeks. with the cargo said
to be in better condition than IL
shipped by express.
The writer adds:
Think what a tremendous further
boost ocean transportation in com
petition with transcontinental rail-
roads will receive II free tolls for
American coastwise vessels, to which
President Hardine's administration is
pledged, becomes fact"
atm dxip
received from one of the country's
leading experts a letter In which he
says:
you cannot eliminate waste and
honest graft as long as you have more
or less overpaid and utterly incom-
petent executives representing, or
thought to represent. interests ad-
verse to the railroads. 1t 10 OF no
use for the executives to talk about.
the wickedness OF time and half
for overtime when most of them are
paid from two to ten times what they
are worth for all their time. I have
lost all condolences In the competency
OF present railroad management /
want a chance and a radical one"
EFFORT TO SHOW EARNINGS.
The following is from another
letter. also from an expert OF national
standing:
80 far as the railroad executives
now have any plan at all, It is ap-
parently to stop all work on main
tenance, discharge wholesale every
employe they can dispense with and
thus try to show some apparent
earnings They will not be real
earnings.
81 am told that hundreds, perhaps
thousands, of engines and cars that
ought to be in the shops are being
stacked on side tracks, insdeauately
protected from weather deterioration.
OF course, ~ we have an increase OF
business this summer, there will be n
shrek OF lack Of equipment and an
other charge OF mismansgement under
Federal control"
An investigation into the railroad
situation Is about to be opened by
Congress These facts are respectful
" submitted