Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 May 1887 — REGULATING THE RAILROADS [ARTICLE]

REGULATING THE RAILROADS

Judge Cooley,. Chairman of the Interstate Commerce Commission, has addressed the following letter to the other members of the commission for their approval: The Interstate Commerce Commission has had transmitted to it from the State Department, a communication from William 11. H. Washington, United States commercial agent at London, Ontario, in which that officer lays before the department the disastrous effects of the recent act to regulate commerce updn the trade of the United States with Cana la, and gives instances to prove their alarming nature. From the communication’s being sent to the commission 1 infer the department expects some notice to be taken of it, and, though the Commissioners are just now separated, I venture to express my own thoughts. Mr. Washington's fears of disastrous consequences are, lam well assured, excessive. They will not to any great extent be realized. Some inconveniences must necessarily arise from putting in force a law which attempts such considerable changes, but they will be greater at first than after the working of the law has become un lerstoo l, and greatest while parties are hesitating to act because of doubts of constructions. Probably no important act ever passed by Congress has elicited such a variety of opinions nnd with such radical differences as the one in question. The terms of the act are not as clear as they might have been; but it should also be said that the state of mind in which persons differently circumstanced have come to an examination of the law has not been conducive to harmonious views. A careful reading of Mr. Washington’s letter seems to show that the consequences which he attributes to the law flow from the construction railroad managers have put upon it, and which may or may not be correct In a recent visit of the Commissioners to the* Southwest it was made very apparent in the testimony taken that some persons were excited by fears of the destruction oi their business which had no other basis than views of the law which were so erroneous that it would seem they ought not to have been entertained by anyone. I cannot help thinking that equally unfounded views have had much to do with the disturbances of trade of which Mr. Washington speaks, and that as these are corrected the disturbances will become comparatively unimportant. 1 shall remain in that belief until further experience of the law snail shew its error. The Interstate Commission denies that it has discriminated against Northern roads, and says that if the Southern roads have been favored it is because the others have been backward in asking favors.