People's Pilot, Volume 5, Number 49, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 June 1896 — MUST BE OWNERSHIP. [ARTICLE]

MUST BE OWNERSHIP.

HOW INTERSTATE COMMERCE LAW WORKS. Under Government Control tho Railroads Generally Do the Controlling— A Good Oao from tho Chicago Express. ... We hare what id called an “Inter State Commerce Commission” whose business it is, or is supposed to be, to see that railroad companies comply with the laws, do not form pools and other combinations, or otherwise band together to cheat shippers, esp&ikliy •mall shippers, it’s a nice thing—on paper. This Commission was provided foi by Congress, with the consent of the Srincipal railroad companies, if not at lelr suggestion, to pacify and conciliate the demand of the people for government ownership of railroads. This law was to be "government control” of railroads, you understand. This Inter-State Commerce Commission, so it was given out, was to be elothed with the authority to bring any railroad up standing for transgressing the laws regarding railroad traffic; that Is, the commission was to act as a spj on the railroad business, file information and institute legal proceedings against railroad companies, and then the injured public could have the blessed privilege of going to law in the United States courts, presided over by ex-railroad attorneys acting as judges, most of which judges received their appointments from either Harrison o> Cleveland, both ex-railroad attorneys It’s a beautiful scheme, this “govern ment control” through an "Inter-State Commerce Commission,” beautiful beautiful —for the railroad companies Let’s see how it works. ' There is a law prohibiting Tailroad companies from charging more foi hauling a quantity of freight a short distance than for hauling the same quantity of freight a long distance. The enforcement of this law devolves upon the Inter-State Commerce Commission. When prosecutions for violations oi this law were first made, it was found that to secure conviction it would be necessary that the books of the company showing shipments of freight be produced in court. This the railroad companies refused to do, oh the ground that they did no* propose to furnish eveidence tending to criminate themselves. * Now, there don’t seem to be any difficulty in making an ordinary business man or merchant produce his books in court in the progress of an ordinary lawsuit. Not only that, but instances have been known where officers of the law have broken into a man’s private desk and produced in court evidences tending to prove the guilt of the ownei under charge of violating the law. But to thus serve a great monopoly—whose influence makes laws, appoint? Judges, makes and unmakes president? —would be little short of sacrilege! SO an accommodating ex-railroad at torney, serving as administrator ol Justice for the people (!), decided it was unconstitutional to thus compel delivery of the books and papers of a rail road company to be used in court against said company, and another ex railroad attorney, serving as judge of the highest tribual of the land, sustain? his decision, and since then the prose cutions of railroad companies for vio lations of law have been little more than a farce. But these commissioners want tr make a show of earning their and the railroad monopoly and the old parties supporting them want to make it appear just before election that “government control” is not altogether a failure, so an accommodating ex-rail-road attorney, serving as judge in the supreme court, has handed down an opinion on the “long and short haul” clause of /the lav/, that at first glance seems to be more in favor of small shippers, particularly farmers. Commenting on this decision, Charles A. Pillsbury, manager of mills in Minneapolis that produce one-fif-teenth of the flour made in the United States, is reported as saying: “No matter what the decision of the courts may be, railroad companies have it in their power and it is to their interest to ignore the law relative to long and short haul. If they don’t dodge it one way they will another. “I can deliver a barrel of flour from my mills to Philadelphia or in France for fifty cents, and that is what I would have to pay to have it delivered at my residence only two miles away.” There is the whole policy of plutocracy in a nutshell. The Pullmans and the Pillsburys, the railroad monopoly and every other monopoly, “have it in their power and it is to their interest” to. run their business to suit themselves, and our laws are such that they can snap their fingers at their employes, or the government of the United States, or any other power on earth that may object. And though they may not express it in words, their acts virtually and insolently ask the question, “What are you mudsill people going to do about it?” In brie& we predict that this longsuffering and mnopoly-ridden people will pay the extortionate demands and submit to the tyranny of plutocratic railroad combines but little longer before they will arise in their might and wipe from our statute t>ooks every vestige of law authorizing the existence of a railroad corporations, and in its stead will write In bold letters which cannot be erased—- “ Government Ownership of Railroads!” Supreme Court Justices may con*

ttnae for a time to smirch their Judicial ermine through unjust decisions; railroad corporations may brag and bluster and mock at the law of their own making; the old parties may hedge and dodge the issue before election, and prate abont fanaticism and socialism after election; populist “leaders” may # seek to exclude the demand from the “great popular platform” they are going to get up if —but it’s bound to come, and that right speedily— Government Ownership of Railroads No truer statement is contained In that grand document, put forth at Omaha four years ago—which all true populists swear by and all monopolists and platform trimmers swear at —than this: “We believe that the time has come when the railroad corporations will either own the people or the people must own the railroads.” When this question is settled there will be but one result: Government Ownership of Railroads! And that is what the people are going to do about it.