MR. CRISP. Undoubtedly.

MR. BUTTERWORTH. Now, if competing rates do not pay any profit, but barely the cost of the transportation, must the railroads turn that business away? If not, if they are allowed to carry it, it certainly helps to pay expenses, and thereby, to some extent, takes the burden off the short haul. Just how the public is injured by that is what I ask the gentleman to explain.

Here is a little town, if you please, twenty miles from this city where the people have been accustomed to pay 6 cents a bushel for hauling all their coal. A railroad company builds a line passing that town and extending to some point beyond, where there is water competition. The railroad company says to the people at this intermediate point, What has it been your custom to pay for hauling your coal?" The answer is "6 cents a bushel." The company says, "We will haul it for 3 cents a bushel; but to the point beyond, at which there is competition, we must haul it for 2 cents a bushel, because our competitor will haul it for that price." Now, does it injure the people who previously have paid 6 cents a bushel to get their coal hauled at 3 cents? If it does, how does it injure them?

66

MR. CRISP. That, Mr. Speaker, is a plausible statement. It is however, based upon the inquiry, which I think an erroneous test, "What is the work worth to the shipper?" I maintain the question should be, 'What does it cost the transporter?" That is the difference between the proposition made by the gentlemen here and that insisted upon by this committee. You ask, "what are certain services worth to the shippers?" What is it worth to the man halting along the highway to meet a conveyance which will carry him out of the storm and darkness to a place of shelter? If you ask what it is worth to him, it may be worth all that he has. But is that the reasonable rule to apply in fixing the compensation of a corporation established for the public good and not solely for the private benefit of the corporators who have it in charge? MR. BUTTERWORTH. That is not the case I put by any means.

MR. CRISP. I understood the case put by the gentleman to be that of a railroad company, who say to the people in a certain locality, "You have been paying 6 cents a bushel for hauling, will you not agree to give us 3?" Does not that question look to what it is worth to the people who receive the service, and not to the cost to the transporter?

MR. BUTTERWORTH. No; for the company that builds the road takes into consideration when building it what competition there will be, what the local traffic will be, what the through traffic will be-it takes into consideration all the circumstances which go to fix the price. And I say, instead of the man at the intermediate point being injured, he saves 3 cents a bushel; and ultimately, according to the experience we have had in this country, he may save still more. He is not injured by the reason of the fact that the company runs their cars ten miles beyond, to a point, where, in order to compete, they must take a lower charge.

MR. SCOTT. The gentlemen from Georgia [MR. CRISP] before he resumes will allow me to make one suggestion. He referred in the case he put to the rate between New York and Atlanta as compared with the rate between New York and New Orleans. He said that the railroad companies were charging 75 cents a hundred from New Orleans to New York, and a dollar a hundred to Atlanta, which was not half the distance.

MR. CRISP. A little more than half.

MR. SCOTT. A little more than half. Now the gentleman must remember that the competitor with the railroad from New Orleans to New York is the Atlantic Ocean. Steamships plying between New York and New Orleans fix, to a certain extent, the rates between those two cities. By the competition of the railroads from New Orleans to New York, these ocean rates are kept down. Your bill proposes to drive these railroads out of that competitive business; and such a policy must result in placing the entire control of the business between New Orleans and New York in the hands of the steamships, while the only satisfaction the people of Atlanta get is that possibly the people of New Orleans are compelled to pay eventually a dollar a hundred for transportation from New Orleans to New York, whereas if they were allowed the competition of the railroads that business might be done for 75 cents a hundred. Misery loves company."

66

MR. CRISP. Mr. Speaker, I confess I can not see, as suggested by my friend from Pennsylvania [MR. SCOTT] and my friend from Ohio [MR. BUTTERWORTH], that the effect of this proposition will be to increase the through rates unless the present through-rate system is based upon a rule which requires the local shippers to sustain the loss incurred on the through rates. If the charge from New York to New Orleans of 76 cents pays a small profit to the railroad company, I ask again, what kind of a profit must be paid for a haul which is half the distance, when the charge is 33 per cent. more? We do not seek, as I was going on to say, to establish any pro rata arrangement of so much a mile. We agree by this bill that the companies may charge, if it is reasonable to do so, as much for the short haul as for the long haul, and no more.

MR. ZACH. TAYLOR. Is not the proposition of the bill designed to meet cases of this kind: Between Covington and Memphis, a distance of 37 miles, the charge for transportation of cotton is $1.15 a bale, but from Memphis to New York the charge is only 90 cents, and it passes over the same line?

MR. CRISP. Mr. Speaker, if it were not going over a subject already exhausted, I could occupy an hour in bringing to the attention of the House actual cases which have arisen in the transaction of business by interstate carriers which would absolutely shock the sense of justice of any man who feels that the public has a right to demand absolute equality in transportation rates.

MR. BUTTERWORTH. But do not the other sections of the bill correct that, leaving no necessity for an arbitrary law fixing a rate without reference to circumstances?

MR. CRISP. If my friend will pardon me, I must go on. I will say to him, however, that the other sections of the bill have a tendency to do that, but in view of the fact that some court, some jury, somebody charged with the execution of this law might think it the intention or design that more should be charged for the shorter than the longer haul, we, by a provision inserted in the bill, give the decision of the legislative branch of the Government, that in no case, except it be a special one, can such a rate be reasonable or just. That is the purpose of the provision referred to.

MR. O'NEILL, of Pennsylvania. I do not wish to interrupt the gen

tleman; but in reference to this question, whether these charges for freight pay or do not pay the railroad companies for hauling, I want to ask him the simple question, whether the 'people of this country are complaining that within the last ten or fifteen years freights have been reduced from 24 cents per ton per mile to less than 1 cent to seven-eighths of 1 cent?

MR. CRISP. My good friend from Pennsylvania will pardon me for not replying fully, as I have already occupied so much time. I will say, however, that this is not the first time I have heard the claim set up that the railroad companies are entitled to great credit for having during the last twenty years reduced their rates.

We are told by gentlemen representing the railroads that this reduction of rates is a mere matter of grace to the people, who should rise up in thankfulness therefor; and figures are presented to show how much greater the incomes of the roads would have been if they had maintained the rates of twenty years ago. To be truly grateful we must believe that all the advances and progress made in machinery and cars used for the transportation of freight are to be used for the benefit of the railroads and not for the public. Such a proposition denies to the public the saving derived from the use of the discoveries in steam appliances. It denies to the public the advantage of the reduction in the price of steel. It denies to the public the benefit of the reduction in the price of everything that is necessary to sustain life. It denies to the public and claims for the railroads all the benefits arising from a general reduction in the value of all property and is entirely indefensible.

I do not wish to be understood as underrating these corporations as a means to advance civilization and promote the general welfare; but I do mean to enter a protest against the claim that under any sort of rule they would have a right to maintain charges of twenty years ago, when everything else has diminished in value, and to mildly suggest that perhaps these have not been altogether so generous in reductions as their advocates would have us believe. Has the reduction of local rates on any line of railroad in the United States been as great during the past twenty years as the reduction in the price of clothing, as the reduction in the price of sugar, as the reduction in the price of shoes, as the reduction in the price of cotton, as the reduction in the price of almost every article which humanity uses? I grant you at the great competing centers reductions have been made; but I submit that an inspection of the tariff of corporations will show that there has been, no commensurate reduction at intermediate points.

For what purpose do the people of Pennsylvania grant to a railroad the right to build on the territory of the State? What is the object of the grant? Is it because somebody not living in Pennsylvania may be benefited by the railroad? Is not the paramount object the benefit of the people who own the soil? Is not that the primary object? Are those people living along the line of this great road - those people dependent on that means of transportation are they to be charged with burdensome rates in order that the railroad may transport or obtain freight at a point some distance from it?

I say the true policy of a railroad is to build up shippers along its line. At last on them it must depend for its life. The contrary policy

must result in breaking down those upon whom the road must depend for support. It depreciates the value of property along the line. It diminishes population and defeats, in every way, the object and purpose of the public in authorizing the construction of the road.

MR. MCKINLEY. I would be glad if the gentleman from Georgia would give the House an example which would realize an exception to relieve the carrier from the operation of this act if he can give us an example in practical business which would justify the commission in making the exception that is provided for in the last clause of section four.

MR. CRISP. Mr. Speaker, I should not like to undertake to do that, but I will say very frankly, speaking my own views, the other House conferees not being present can not speak for themselves, nor can I speak for them. I was of the opinion the general rule ought to be that in no case should a greater charge be made for a shorter distance than was made for the longer one when the shorter is included in the longer. That is my own opinion about it, but in deference to the sentiment, which existed in some breasts that there might be a hardship in an ironbound rule, believing as I do the commission organized under this act would be slow to relax the general rule, believing that in nearly every case, if not every one, it would be found the enforcement of the rule would work no hardship, I agreed to this provision. I had another reason for agreeing to it, one that always has weight with the practical legislator. I had to do it to get an agreement between the conferees of the two Houses.

MR. MCKINLEY. What particular case?

MR. CRISP. None were cited. I understand it to be like this: Here is a universal rule which we propose to establish. There may possibly be a case, though I confess I can not see it, when the enforcement of this rule would work a hardship to a transportation company, and out of abundance of caution, to do no injustice, whenever the complainant can establish that in a specific case the operation of the general rule would be unjust in that particular case, the commission may relieve him from the operation of the rule.

MR. HEPBURN. Does the word "cases," in the fourteenth line of the fourth section, in your judgment, refer to shipments or to roads? I refer to the use of the word in connection with the proviso: Provided, however, That upon application to the commission appointed under the provisions of this act, such common carrier may, in special cases, after investigation by the commission, be authorized to charge less for longer than for shorter distances for the transportation of passengers or property.

MR. CRISP. In my judgment it applies to shipments.

MR. HEPBURN. If I believed that I would not vote for your bill. MR. CRISP. I should be sorry to lose the support of my friend from Iowa. I do not want to be misunderstood in the answer I have given. I think that it applies to shipments in this sense, that all like cases on that railroad should be operated under the same rule.

MR. HEPBURN. Would it divert the gentleman from his argument to permit me to give an illustration of the point I mean, and then ask his opinion in connection with it?

MR. CRISP. I would be glad if the gentleman would wait a mo

ment, as I prefer to get through as soon as possible with my remarks, and think I may perhaps answer the point to which he refers in the course of the discussion.

There are only one or two other points, Mr. Speaker, to which I wish to call the attention of the House. That exception, or authority to suspend the rules, was granted by the committee and put in upon the idea that there might be conceivable cases where injury or injustice would result, and hence we would give power to the commission to relieve them.

The next section that has excited comment is that which prohibits the pooling of rates. It takes it for granted that every member present knows what is meant by the words "pooling rates." The railroad companies, or their representatives, or rather the leading representative of the system of pooling, object to that term as offensive, and say that a very great amount of misconception exists in the public mind on the subject of pooling, largely resulting from the unfortunate use of that term; and suggests in lieu of it that it is a system for the "maintenance of rates and traffic unity.' That is what he calls the system which we seek to prohibit in this bill.

Pooling, Mr. Speaker, is a device - and of course I do not use that word in any offensive sense-on the part of independent monopolies to build up and maintain one great monopoly. It is a device to defeat competition; and when they talk of the "maintenance of rates and traffic unity," they mean that those companies that were built by the public to give the people the benefit of competition, shall be united with each other by this new device, so as to make them practically, for rate purposes, one line.

We have heard much of the importance to the general public of stability of rates, and I agree that it is important. We hear much said in defense of this system, and the allegation is made that it is merely a system to preserve and maintain regularity of rates and prevent railroad wars. A significant fact in this connection is that in no case on record, I undertake to say, can you find where two railroad companies have pooled their local rates. Wherever the railroad is omnipotent, so far as the shipments are concerned, wherever they can put upon the shipper a ny rate suggested by their cupidity or avarice, or suggested, if you p lease, by the other rule so lauded by these gentlemen as to what the freight will bear, in every such case you find each road standing by itself and making no pool.

Therefore I aver the object of pooling is to destroy competition. You may present it in any light you choose, call it by any name you please, that is its object, and it never was discovered until the competing lines, which had been built for the public interest, were requiring these corporations to transport for the public at such reduced rates that they were not making what they thought they ought to make. I maintain, sir, that the railroad business, or the business of transportation, is no exception in one respect from any other business, and that is that it is to the interest of the public to have competition.

While it is true that under the railway system as it exists to-day it seems that railroads will not quietly submit to competition, yet I suggest that is the fault of the railway companies and not of the public.