Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 37, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 February 1905 — NATIONAL RULE OF RAILROADS. [ARTICLE]

NATIONAL RULE OF RAILROADS.

President Roosevelt in n Speech Urges Rail Rate Control. “In some stuli body ns the interstate commerce commission there must be lodged in effective shape the power to see that every shipper who uses the railroads and every man who owns or manages a railroad shall On the one hand be given justice and on the other Wind be required to do justice.” declared President Roosevelt the other night in his speech before the Union League Club of Philadelphia. The President pointed out what lie considers dangers to the country if the corporations are not controlled so as to. give all men an equal chance in business. Power to make rates, lie insisted, should be given to a national tribunal, and should all other means fail he would seek an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to bring about federal control of interstate commerce. Said the President: "There must he lodged in some tribunal the power over rates, and especially over rebates —whether secured by means of private ears or private tracks, in the form of damages or commissions or in any other manner—which will protect alike the railroad and the shipper and put the big shipper and the little shipper on an equal footing. “The great development of industrialism means that there must he ail increase in the supervision exercised by the government over business enterprises. “It was beyond question the intention of the founders of our government that interstate commerce in all .its branches and aspects should he under national control. If the courts decide that this intention was yqt. carried out ami made effective in tlm. Constitution as it now stands, then the Constitution will have to he amended.”