President Roosevelt's Railway Policy: I the Problem

THE present agitation for an extension of public control over the carriers of the country, according to the assertions of railroad men, has no justification in point of fact. It is alleged that there is no widespread popular feeling on the subject; that whatever there may be is an artificial product, the result of a persistent campaign for enlargement of the scope of their activities by politicians at Washington. This attempt to belittle the importance of the movement, both in and out of Congress, will deceive few people acquainted with the economic situation. Conditions are neither so entirely bad, nor so supremely idyllic, as interested parties on either side would have us believe. As always in such cases, glittering generalities entirely fail to make the situation clear. It is necessary to particularize, both as to the existing abuses and as to the remedies appropriate thereto.

Aside from the evils of secret rebates and personal discrimination, — for the cure of which the law is now entirely adequate if forcibly invoked, — complaints against existing conditions may be roughly classified under the following three heads: first, as to the absolute railroad rate charged for a given service, by and of itself; secondly, that the relative adjustment of freight rates is inequitable either as between different classes of commodities or different competing localities; and thirdly, that rights concerning the conditions of transportation are denied. Concrete illustration of these real or fancied evils may serve to enliven the discussion as to remedial action. The first class, namely, rates held to be absolutely unreasonable, in and of themselves, is of infrequent occurrence and relatively slight importance, if one is willing to concede that the general level of rates the country over is not unduly high at the present time. Unless and until the railways of the country attempt another general advance of charges all along the line, as they did in 1900, this phase of the matter will not occasion widespread unrest. Freight rates, as a whole, are not unreasonably remunerative, as compared with foreign countries. The service is the best in the world. The American people recognize these facts; although they might not so willingly acquiesce in another general advance, a point which railway managers should carefully note.

Yet while the general level of rates may not be unreasonably high, cases are always possible, in which particular charges in and of themselves occasion complaint. A notable instance is the contention of live-stock dealers that a switching charge of $2 per car on cattle at the Union Stock Yards at Chicago is an unreasonable exaction. This charge was arbitrarily imposed in 1894, as an addition to the regular freight rates long imposed from Western points. Shippers’ associations protested, and carried the case before the Interstate Commerce Commission. This tribunal, after full hearing, held the rate to be unreasonable, in view of the cost of service rendered, and suggested a rate of $1 per car as a proper terminal charge. Protracted litigation in the Federal courts, for enforcement of this decision, has thus far afforded no relief. The charge is still $2, and has been successfully collected without interruption for more than ten years. The quibble as to whether the terminal charge is really a part of the through rate or not, is of no practical importance, however large it may loom up legally. The fact is that $2 is exacted and must be paid.

Another instance of dispute over the reasonableness of charges in and of themselves has just derived prominence by a decision of the United States Circuit Court in Georgia upholding the Interstate Commerce Commission. It concerns the justice of an increase of two cents per hundred pounds on lumber from Georgia points to the Ohio River. From 1894 to 1903 these rates had been already raised by three or four cents to a level of thirteen or fourteen cents; so that prosperity had been already discounted by a rise of thirty or forty per cent. On top of this, and despite an enormous increase in the tonnage, came a further raise of two cents per hundred pounds in April, 1903. This was too much. To this exaction, involving not less than $132,000 per year additional freight rates, the lumbermen of Georgia objected. The Interstate Commerce Commission upheld their contention; and in July, 1905, more than two years afterward, the Circuit Court sustained the Commission. The slow, wearisome course of litigation will probably, however, drag along until a final award by the Supreme Court of the United States. Meantime, note you, the extra two cents must be paid, or the lumber cannot be shipped. A transportation tax, which the shippers, the Interstate Commerce Commission and a United States Circuit judge alike believe to be unfair, continues to be collected. Will such issues ever be decided promptly on economic rather than legal grounds; and if so, by what tribunal ? That is the open question.

Not absolute but relative freight rates constitute the most serious complaints against American railway practice. Such abuses may arise, either in respect of the relative adjustment as between commodities, or as between competing localities. That such relative freight rates constitute the main difficulty at present, is shown by the fact that of 353 cases decided by the Interstate Commerce Commission only 37, or less than 10 per cent, had to do with the unreasonableness of a rate in and of itself; while 135, or about four times as many, turned upon relative inequality as between commodities or places. See how it works in the intricate matter of classification; namely, the assignment of goods to different classes, according to value, bulk, weight, etc. The process of so grading commodities with reference to one another determines of course the freight rate. The following case is typical, as given by Gregory L. Cabot, a Boston manufacturer, in evidence before the Senate Committee on Interstate Commerce at its recent hearings in Washington: —

“From July 15, 1889, to January 1 of this year, the classification (of carbon black, basis of printers’ ink) continued to be once and a half first class in less than carload lots, third class in carload lots, approximately twice the freight required between 1887 and 1889. Meanwhile, the price had declined. . . . On the 1st of January, the classification was again raised to class 2, rule 25, an increase of about 10 per cent in carload lots. Numerous efforts have been made by myself and others to have this commodity classified where it belongs, as dry color, but the only result has been the reverse of what we desired: and the industry has been and is in a somewhat precarious condition, as we have contracted for millions of pounds of black at prices fixed at the point of delivery, and had no notice of the raise in freight rate until subsequent to its going into operation.”

Never mind whether this basic material of printers’ ink is more properly “dry color” or “carbon black.” That is not the question for us. We are concerned merely as to the tribunal most competent to decide this momentous matter. Shall cow peas pay freight as “vegetables, N. O. S., dried or evaporated,” or as “fertilizer,” being an active agent in soil regeneration? Are “iron-handled bristle shoe-blacking daubers” machinery or toilet appliances ? Are patent medicines distinguishable for purposes of transportation from other alcoholic beverages used as tonics? Is hay straw, or straw hay? Each of these is a real live case, raised in recent years. They may not appear to be vital questions to the world at large. Yet their decision may affect the welfare of great industries and populous communities.

The Spokane Chamber of Commerce, in these Senate Committee hearings, recites another illuminating instance of the exercise of arbitrary power in classification. “ The Pacific Coast Pipe Co. started to manufacture wired wooden pipe in the spring of 1900. . . . There was at that time but one factory of the kind on the North Pacific coast, located at Seattle.

. . . The Seattle factory, backed by the big lumber firms on the coast, finding a serious competitor in the Spokane field, got the railroads to put manufactured pipe under the lumber classification, thus reducing the rate from Seattle to Spokane from 46 to 20 cents per 100 pounds. . . . The Spokane factory at once filed a vigorous protest, with the result that the railroads put back the rate from Seattle to Spokane to 46 cents, but established a maximum rate of 50 cents for Seattle pipe, which of course shut off’ all territory east of Spokane from the Spokane factory. . . . The remnant of the Spokane factory. . . has been compelled to shut down, and the entire plant is being removed to Ballard.” Whether these facts are true exactly as stated or not, is not at issue in this brief article. Pacific coast rates are intricate in the extreme. We cite them as a fair instance of things which have been done, here or elsewhere, are being done, and will be done until a competent tribunal is established by the government of the United States. In the United Kingdom a Parliamentary Commission sat for months and prescribed a classification, which is in force on every railway, and for all possible commodities shipped by rail, from alligators “loose or in tanks” to zylonite K. D. Few will advocate so rigid a system for our own country, although the necessity of adequate governmental supervision and control is no less imperative.

Local discrimination, or inequality as between competing cities or markets, — a second phase of the complaint about relative freight rates, — constitutes the main gravamen of the difficulty to-day. Compared with it, all the other abuses above named pale into insignificance. Those probably affected a few individual complainants or possibly trade associations. But these local discrimination cases may involve the welfare of entire states or groups of states. A simple case is illustrated by our complaint of the Spokane wooden pipe makers, above cited. Who was to pipe the Northwest, Spokane, or Seattle ? And if to pipe or not to pipe, also to feed, warm, clothe, and furnish the population of that vast area. Spokane might consent to divide the field with her seaport rival; but to have goods — like the wire on this pipe perhaps — go through Spokane from the East on low “compelled” water rates to Seattle cheaper than Spokane can have it is mildly annoying at least. And then, on top of that, to have it manufactured into pipe in Seattle, come back through Spokane, and be laid down east of Spokane for less than that city must pay to sell in its own bailiwick, is unendurable. A similar issue has been up for some years as between St. Louis and San Francisco, in competition for the trade of the intermediate territory and the Pacific Coast. It is a vastly complicated matter to adjust such issues. To accomplish it successfully, demands not only impartiality, but the possession of power to compel the acquiescence of all parties concerned as well. For a long time the principal Western cities have been demanding an equality in freight rates into the South with New York, Boston, and Philadelphia; which would enable them to compete successfully for trade in that section. If Chicago, St. Louis, and Cincinnati are right in that contention, no permanent settlement can result until not only every railway but every coastwise steamship line is forced into harmony by governmental authority. For any single line by refusing to coöperate can hold up all the rest in their desire to deal justly. As long as empty coast liners are seeking a return freight by water from New York to Savannah, they will cut under any rate which the Western roads may be induced to give to Chicago. On land as well there are always “scab” railways. Every territory has had at some time its Erie, its Atlantic and Western, its New York and New England, or its Chicago and Great Western, to block the way to comprehensive reform.

The evil of local discrimination is generally due to failure to pay proper attention to the element of distance in transportation. The long and short haul clause in the original Act of 1887 was intended to secure this result; but its wise provisions have been entirely nullified by interpretation of the Federal Courts. For all practical purposes the railways may now do as they please ; and the consequent evils are very great, although happily localized in the main either in the Far West or in the Southern states. The disparity is often great. Recently cited, was a rate on rope from San Francisco to Kansas City in carloads for 60 cents per hundred pounds; while the rate from San Francisco to Hutchinson, Kansas, 220 miles west of Kansas City, was $1.01. The South has for a long time been a hotbed of popular discontent. An iniquitous scheme of rate-making prevails, which has been again and again condemned by the Interstate Commerce Commission. Certain cities not always on waterways are designated as “basing points.” To these, low through rates are granted ; while to all other places round about the freight rate is compounded by adding to the basing point rate the local tariff out. Thus on the line between New York and Montgomery, Alabama, rates from New York may progressively rise as the distance to New York becomes less. A figure recently quoted on canned goods from New York to Suwanee, thirty odd miles nearer New York than Atlanta, was 86 cents per hundred pounds; while Atlanta, miles from any waterway, got a rate of only 46 cents. Of course in so far as such low basing point rates are due to the stern necessities of water competition, they may be deplored, but must be endured. Others, however, are the mere creation of railroad favoritism. This is conceded even by so eminent an authority as Edward Baxter, Esq., of Nashville, in his brief for the railways in the celebrated Alabama Midland case before the Supreme Court of the United States. “There may be,” he says, “a few mere ‘railroad junctions’ in the South, which, owing to the ignorance or corruption of certain railroad officials, have been arbitrarily ‘called’ competitive points, and which ‘receive’ certain arbitrary ‘concessions’ in rates to which they are not justly entitled. There may be also a few strictly local stations in the South, which are not even ‘railroad junctions,’ where arbitrary and unfair ‘concessions’ in rates have been made by certain corrupt railroad officials, to enhance the value of property owned at such stations by said officials, or by their relatives or friends . . . [but they] are the offspring of ignorance or corruption and should not be recognized by the courts.” Now the fact is that the small towns all through this region have been clamoring in vain for years for the courts to make just such distinctions. And all that has resulted is that the Federal judges have held that wherever railroad or any other conceivable kind of competition, actual or potential, can be shown to exist, that the long and short haul clause does not apply. The evil can be cured. This is proved by the fact that several railways in the same territory have always adhered to the just principle of conceding to distance its proper importance in their tariffs. Thus at Birmingham the Alabama Southern, the K. C., M. and B., and the Southern Railway in part are said to concede the principle in force on all our Northern trunk lines; while the Louisville and Nashville and the Central of Georgia insist upon their right to charge what, when, and where they please, regardless of distance. And it is the Louisville and Nashville Railway, and not the Pennsylvania Company with its well-ordered scheme of charges, which is vociferously protesting against legislation, on the ground that it is not needed.

Our third variety of complaints involves no monetary issues at all, but merely conflict of rights. The Orange Routing Cases against the Southern Pacific Railroad touch the right of the shipper to name the particular railways over which their fruit shall reach Eastern markets. Rates are the same by whatever route; but the railways deny the right of the shipper not only to name, but even to know, the route taken by his goods in transit. The same issue came up some years ago, concerning the right of cotton shippers at Memphis to designate the particular connecting railroads which should haul their goods. The purpose of the carriers in seeking to control this matter is obvious and may be praiseworthy. Secret rebates cannot often be secured by shippers from the initial carriers; especially if, as in California, no railway competition exists: for the Atchison and the Southern Pacific have done away with that by pooling their fruit business. Secret rebates, if secured by shippers at all, must be wrung from the connecting lines, which bid for it at the great junction points, like Kansas City and Chicago. The initial road, by reserving the right to route the freight, is able most effectively to nullify all such preferential contracts. But on the other hand, this practice denies to the owner of the goods control, or even supervision over his own. Market conditions may easily change while the goods are in transit. It may be desirable to stop them off at Chicago, or divert them to New Orleans. And moreover, damages for delay on such perishable goods as fruit are refused by the terms of the contract. The routing road exercises power without assuming responsibility. On these grounds, and in consonance with the long-established principles of common law, the Interstate Commerce Commission held that the shippers’ rights were jeopardized. It was shown that freight was often diverted from one road to another in order to secure more valuable percentages of the through rate for the initial carrier. These cases have not yet proceeded to final adjudication; but the United States Circuit Court, in September, 1904, provisionally sustained the Commission. Meanwhile, be it observed, the railroads continue the practice, and popular discontent is the result.

After proving by concrete and living instances that abuses in railway operation really do exist, it may seem an unnecessary work of supererogation to prove that they can exist. Yet a favorite railway contention is that in the very nature of things injustice to the shipper cannot arise, or be long tolerated by the railways. For, so runs this threadbare argument, the welfare of both parties, railway and shipper, is indissolubly linked together. A policy which throttles trade or industry must react upon the volume of traffic and the development of the territory served. Every railway in the country fixes its freight rates by “charging what the traffic will bear.” To charge more than this, it is alleged, would immediately be detrimental to tonnage and revenue. There is force in this contention , and its validity explains the prevalence of fair rate adjustment by and large throughout the country. But unfortunately as in most human affairs, the principle sometimes fails to work according to the prospectus. At such times and places abuses are bound to arise. Most of them occur because of the fact that no two competitive centres or classes of freight are equally remunerative. Upbuilding of one town or industry often jeopardizes another. Such conditions are inevitable. Hence the policy of the railway manager involves a choice, not between two evils, but between a resultant good and a necessarily attendant evil. No sane traffic manager would naturally desire to transfer the milling of our American wheat to foreign manufacturers in Liverpool or elsewhere. Yet if his own particular railway revenues may be increased faster by the carriage of wheat in bulk relatively cheaper than flour in barrels, from the field to the seaboard, what can he do ? His President and his Executive Committee are following his gross earnings day by day. His large salary depends upon his record. Can he do otherwise than deplore the results, but continue to accept the revenue?

Railway policy often involves economic situations best described in the familiar lines of Lovelace,

The St. Louis roads this spring, when they reduced their freight rates into the South, did not do so because of any desire to work harm to the thriving town of Chicago. They merely loved St. Louis more! Or when, some years ago, the railways threatened to ruin a pulp paper mill to be established at Denver, by putting in lower rates from Wisconsin, they loved not Denver less but the long haul more. Observe again how it works out in a recent concrete case before the Interstate Commerce Commission. The planters in a certain Southern territory served by the Louisville and Nashville Railway ship out their cotton to the North by various routes. It may go by way of New Orleans, via Pensacola; up the main line along the Mississippi Valley; or be hauled eastward to Savannah and other Atlantic ports, and thence go by vessel to New England. Inasmuch as the through rate is the same by all routes, no monetary issue to the planter is involved. But not so to the railway; for by the first routes it secures a long haul, while by the last it not only is limited to short carriage of the goods, but is compelled to accept an even smaller fraction of the joint through rate. In this case the Louisville and Nashville Railway — which, as we have said, has more persistently denied the existence of abuses than any other road in the country — advanced the Savannah cotton rate arbitrarily from $2.75 to $3.30 a bale. This effectually dammed up the eastern outlet and jeopardized the interests of the port of Savannah to that degree. Doubtless the Louisville and Nashville was not oblivious to the welfare of that great seaport. It could not afford to be, for Savannah’s growth must indirectly accrue to its benefit. It did not love Savannah less, but it loved its own particular seaport, Pensacola, or the long haul via Louisville, more! Maybe it was better that traffic should go out this way; who knows! What the President demands for the people of the South is that an early decision in this case shall be made by some public, impartial, and competent tribunal; and not by one of the private parties directly interested in the dispute. In no other domain of commercial or industrial life is there such denial of equality of rights before the law. The President demands, and rightly, that such mediaeval conditions shall cease to exist.

Supposing we concede the principle of benevolent autocracy, — which we cannot for a moment, — namely, that railway managers are the natural guardians of the territory and interests committed to their charge; who is to nominate these custodians of the public welfare ? What is to insure any permanency in their policy ? Or who is to guarantee that such policy shall contemplate the permanent, rather than the merely temporary and immediate, interest of one party concerned ? Suppose — to continue our illustration drawn from real life — that a gang of Western speculators swoops down upon the Louisville and Nashvilleas it did in April, 1903. It stole the railway from those, we will assume, who as natural guardians of the territory had been developing and upbuilding it in a large way. What did these new speculators care about the permanent welfare of a large section of the South? Their control of the system was based on borrowed money. They bought the road merely to sell it again at a higher price. Their plan was to get business here and now, regardless of the future, increase dividends, and sell out before the public learned the truth. Is any community of interest traceable between the planter, the merchant, and a set of bandits like these! Such occurrences have dotted our railway history in the past, and are always likely to occur. The public demands nothing more than that the traffic policy of such a railroad should at all times be subject to some kind of administrative review.

Are present laws adequate to provide a remedy for these evils ? In theory and accordingto the letter of the law,in part, yes; in practice and especially for the evils of local discrimination and classification, emphatically no! Two years ago, at the instance of the railways, which were desirous of stopping large leakages of revenue due to rate cutting, Congress enacted the so-called Elkins law. This was distinctly a railway measure. Hence the ease and quiet of its passage. It roused none of the corporate watch-dogs of the Senate, ostensibly guardians of the public welfare. Nor was it a compromise. There was no need of compromise. Both railways and shippers were agreed in the wish to eliminate rebates. Section 3 of this law of 1903 recites “that whenever the Interstate Commerce Commission shall have reasonable ground for belief that any common carrier is engaged in the carriage of passenger or freight traffic between given points at less than the published rates on file, or is committing any discriminations forbidden by law” (our italics), it may petition any circuit judge for the issuance of an injunction summarily prohibiting the practice. Such a remedy would seem to be prompt, efficient, and adequate. It is the basis of the universal railway testimony that no further legislation on the subject is needed, but that the Interstate Commerce Commission should quit talking and get down to business.

The adequacy of this remedy hinges upon two vital points. First, what discriminations are really “forbidden by law,” and hence liable to prohibition by injunction; and secondly, the entire enforcement under this law, being immediately transferred from the Commission to the Courts, are judicial processes as competent as administrative ones for affording prompt and adequate relief?

That the Elkins law adds nothing to the original statute of 1887 is indisputable. It deals with means, not ends. It provides motive power, but not intelligent direction, for the wheels of justice. The law remains absolutely unchanged, in its definition of rights and wrongs. In so far as the law of 1887 prescribes that all rates shall be “reasonable,” the Elkins amendment would seem to offer a remedy, such as it is, against absolutely extortionate or unreasonably high charges. A circuit judge could summarily enjoin the railways about Chicago from exacting more than $1 extra for delivering live stock to the Union Stock Yards instead of $2, as they have so successfully done since 1894, in the face of protracted litigation. The imposition of a prohibitory rate against east-bound shipment of cotton via Savannah could likewise be enjoined as inherently unreasonable; and such increases as the two cents per hundred pounds on lumber from the South, cited above, could be prevented or at least retarded. These would all be complaints of rates, unreasonable by and of themselves. But is the same remedy open to those shippers who complain, not of absolute freight rates, but of their relative adjustment between different commodities, or competing localities ? There is the crux of the matter. Relative rate adjustments form the burden of the complaints. All parties are agreed as to that. What does the law provide respecting them ? Is it clear, positive, and just ? Or is it uncertain, halting, and insufficient ? Careful and disinterested examination of the evidence apparently shows that the state of the law is most unsatisfactory. All turns again upon that fateful third section of the Elkins law. The summary process of injunction can be invoked whenever a carrier “is committing any discriminations forbidden by law.” But all of our difficulties incident to unreasonable classification of commodities have never been adequately defined by law. The Act to Regulate Commerce of 1887 was strangely silent on this point. There are no discriminations “forbidden by law,” except as to those rates which are “unreasonable.” And who shall say that hay is straw, or straw hay ? Not the Interstate Commerce Commission certainly ? The Federal Courts have interdicted that, until the law makes express provision therefor. Unfortunately, also, as the law has been finally construed by the Supreme Court, no violation of the long and short haul principle constitutes such discrimination. The Alabama Midland decision established that point, and subsequent pronouncements have not materially altered it. An anomaly results. Transportation is in essence the elimination of distance ; yet distance as a factor in the determination of transportation charges has been practically disregarded. The original law of 1887 contained as a vital feature a long and short haul clause, providing that on the same line, similarly circumstanced, no more distant point should enjoy lower rates than any intermediate one. That was the law then. To-day, as remodeled by the Supreme Court, dissimilarity of circumstances, justifying neglect of this clause, arises whenever the railways can establish the existence of competition either by water, foreign carriers, trade conditions, or by other railways at the more distant point. All protection for the small or the local trade centre, as against the large towns and railroad centres, has vanished. The Elkins law has provided a lever, but the fulcrum has disappeared. Unless and until the long and short haul clause is reenacted and redefined according to the just intent of the Congress of 1887, many of the worst abuses of local discrimination, now irritating the people, will continue to flourish.

The second loophole in the remedy provided by the present Elkins law is obvious. The function of the Interstate Commerce Commission becomes merely that of initiation. It is shorn of all other powers. The circuit judge to whom appeal for an injunction is made, or a new Transportation Court, if especially created for the purpose, would supplant the present administrative commission, so far as any real power is concerned. And such courts would of necessity be restricted to passing upon the reasonableness of rates or practices, after the commission of the acts. The stable door might indeed be closed, but only after the horse had been stolen. Therein lies the defect of all judicial processes. Their inadequacy is well exemplified in the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company case of 1895. This corporation complained of excessive rates from Pueblo, Colorado, to San Francisco on iron and steel. The Interstate Commerce Commission ordered the rates on steel rails not to exceed 45 cents per 100 pounds, or 75 per cent of the Chicago-San Francisco rate on the same commodity, whatever that might be. The Southern Pacific, under pressure, complied with this order for about two years; and then in 1898 advanced the rate one third, to 60 cents per 100 pounds. Thereupon the Iron Company obtained an injunction from the United States Circuit Court prohibiting the violation of the Commission’s order. The case went to the Circuit Court of Appeals, which reversed this decree. Meantime, proceedings before a master had fixed the amount of damages under the rate increase at $35,300. The Court held that these damages, if due, could be recovered before a jury which should establish the unreasonableness of the rates in force. But while this was being done, what would become of the California business of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company ? The Pacific coast is one of its most important markets. The price of steel rails for competitors from Pittsburg or Europe, who ship by water, would remain quite undisturbed. It would be difficult to recover trade when once lost. No damages, based upon mere increased freight rates, actually paid, would begin to measure the possible loss. And moreover, even if this sum were recovered after prolonged litigation, the situation would not be remedied. Precisely the same rates which gave rise to the damages would still be in effect. An indefinite series of litigations might result, which would harass the company and perhaps drive it from the field altogether. The outcome of this Southern Pacific case sufficiently proves, even where the shipper is a powerful corporation, the futility of seeking redress through judicial proceedings. Again and again we are forced back to the same conclusion; that the only remedy for an unjust rate is not to continue an unfair one and pay damages, but as speedily as possible to substitute a reasonable charge. How much greater force has this conclusion for the small shipper, if the remedy fails even for an industrial combination powerful enough to extort secret rebates of $1000 a day from the Atchison Company, as proved in the now celebrated Morton case!

Extraordinary efforts are being put forth by the railways in the endeavor to persuade Congress and the American people that the only railway legislation needed at the present time concerns the prevention of rebates, the supervision of private car lines, and perhaps express companies, and the control of contracts between the side tracks of industrial combinations and the great railroad companies. These reforms are all good enough in their way. To effect them will be well worth while. But only the fringe of the really great transportation problems of the country will be touched, unless the forthcoming legislation is more comprehensive than this. And it surely will not be, in view of the determined opposition of the distinguished railway counsel constituting the Senate of the United States, unless the people carefully analyze the problem, and support the President in a demand for its solution in the right way.