Year: 1875

the refusal of the Baltimore and Ohio road to
be bound BY the Saratoga compact and has
been kept up with increasing vigor since the
beginning Of the year, is as great an evil TO
the community as it is to the roads In
| pointing out some of it's injurious effects we
will first notice one which interests the State
Of New York The ruinous underbidding of
the railroads against one another has de-
stroyed all possibility of q surplus revenue
from our public works, and made it doubt
ful whether they will this year yield
/ income enough to defray the expenses of
management and ordinary repairs. In the
early part of January, when Governor Tilden
sent in his annual Message, he opposed any
further reduction of canal tolls He main
tanned, on what then seemed to be solid
grounds, that the canals should be made to
produce a revenue large enough to relieve the
State from taxation on their account and to
leave surplus for deepening their bed and
permitting boats to sink deeply enough TO
take larger cargoes and carry machinery for
propelling them by steam. This recommen-
dation was made on the assumption that the
railroad war, which was then just beginning,


could not extend beyond the opening of navi-
CATION in the spring But it was
kept up with spirit during the long
session, and before the Legislature
adjourned Governor Tilden withdrew
his opposition to reduction Of tolls. Even
with the reduced toll sheet the business of
the canals is likely to be small if the railroad
war should continue through the season. This
ruinous war is not only heavy and destruc-
tive blow to the New York canal interest, but
to the prosperity Of lake navigation Our
lake tonnage exceeds ell the American tonnage
employed in foreign commerce, and is quite
as valuable as school for training seamen
for the navy, which is one of the most i'm
portant considerations connected with the
national defence But the railroads are car
rying freight at prices with which the lake
vessels cannot compete, and many of them are
laid up, because their owners will not incur
the risk of engaging crews for the season
without any reasonable prospect of business.


This deplorable condition of the lake navi-
CATION interest and the canal interest which
own thousands of vessels and boats, and give
employment in prosperous seasons to many
thousand men, would not be thing to be
mourned over if the cheap railroad freights
with which they cannot compete had any
reasonable chance of permanence. In that
case the general public would profit by the
destruction of particular interests as SO often
happens by the invention of machinery which
throws large classes of laborers out of en-
ployment If it were demonstrated fact that
railroad transportation is hereafter to be per-
manently cheaper than transportation by
water the country at large should feel no re-
gret at seeing the lake vessels laid up to rot,
and the great Erie Canal on which so much
money has been expended, converted
into an Improbable ditch. But this
is not the state of the case. The present
rates Of transportation cannot continue with
out bringing ruin on the railroads and ami
hilating the vast amount of capital which has
been invested in them. The Erie road has
already succumbed to this destructive compe-
tit1on, as q man whose constitution is ex-
hausted by excesses falls the first victim to an
epidemic. But stronger and more healthy
roads than the Erie suffer, though they may
not succumb. OF course none of them could
stand if they continuec to do business at rates
they cannot afford but after a while they
will conclude that they have punished each
other enough, when they will combine to put
up freights and try to fix them high enough
to recover what they have lost in the quarrel
And they will succeed more easily in this
in consequence Of the prostraton they
are inficting on the lake interest and on the
canal interest. While the present state Of
things continues new canal boats and lake
vessels are not built, the old ones are not re-
paired, the hands employed on them get scat
tered and 60 into other employments, and,
meanwhile, it is in the power Of the railroads
TO substitute combination for competition
without previous notice, and extort high prices
without any immediate fear Of cheaper trans
portation by water. As soon as the new grain
crop begins to come forward and freights
begin to crowd railroad rates are certain
to 60 up, and the crippled condition Of lake
and canal facilities will remove the most effec-
tive ordinary check to railroad extortion. The
railroad war il, therefore, in spite Of transient
cheap freights when little business is to be
done, general evil to the business commu-
nifty as well as q calamity to the stockholders
of the roads. 1t discourages investments in
railroad property BY fluctuations Of value
and uncertainty OF dividends, which is of
itself great evil, considering the importance
of railroads to the comfort and convenience
Of modern life. 1t forebodes o coalition
after the war is over to reimburse the losses
entailed BY the contest Commerce viii be
obstructed and the community Aeeced a. soon
as business presses to ten times the amount
that is saved BY the temporary low prices Of
trans sportation during this period Of fnan-
-cial suspense. It tends, moreover, in its ul-
innate results, to revive the intense hos
tility 70 the railroad interest which prevailed