- r . WHVUIHlUWipPioWP'lif WPPHWWWPWIMWIIIWMW!
'iy "T?
- Vtl
.
The Commoner.
JUNE 20, 1913
3
of the squire and the gentleman. For a cen
tury Great Britain has sent her strongest and
most forceful sons. 'Send forth the best yo
breed and the nation breeds from the second
best.
"And in this loss of fair and strong, the un
returning brave, wo may find an answer to somo
of England's most desperate problems.
"Where is the country squire of English life
and English history. Whore are his roBy
cheekcd and strong-limbed daughters? Where,
indeed, is the typical John Bull of the time
honored cartoon? Why is it that three or four
somo say eleven millions of Englishmen aro
unable to earn a decent living, or any living
tit all, in England today? Why is it that these
same unemployed aro found unomployable in
Canada, in Australia, or wherever they may go7
Why is it that the tendency in all average physi
cal standards is downward, while the standards
of the best aro growing always higher? Tho
answer lies in tho reversed selection of war.
"Its effects aro found in England and every
where else where strength and courage have
been rewarded by glory and extinction. Eng
land has exchanged her country squires for tho
memorial tablet. More than for all who have
fallen in battle, or were wasted in the camps,
England should mourn 'the fair women and
bravo men' that should have been descendants
of her strong and manly men. If we may per
sonify the spirit of tho nation, England should
most grieve, not over her unroturning brave,
but over those who might have been but never
were.
"For 150 years the wars of Britain the world
over have called to Scotland: 'Send us the best '
ye breed.' The best were sent. From moors
and glens they went, from the shires and from
the islands. Generation after generation they
went, all the upstanding and fit, from the cot
tage and from the college, sons of tho manso
and sons of the glen the best they bred.
"Tell me have the fittest survived? Go
through their cities and over their moors and
down in their glens. Tho glens that bred tho
men of the Forty-second and the Seventy
eighth and tho Eighty-fourth and the Ninety
third have none left of that breed to give. In
vain the recruiting sergeant goes through
Strathspey and Strathglass and Glengary and
Glen Tilt and Glenelg and Glenorchy and Strath
conon and Strathfarrar and Glencoo, and tho
glens of the west and the Islands.
" 'The best ye breed,' is war's insatiable call.
Send your best, your fittest, your most courage
ous, your youths of patriotism and your men
of loyal worth, send them all and breed your
next generation from war's unfit remainder. Do
that, as Scotland has done it, and what says
your biology? Like father like son. Like seed
like harvest. You can not breed a Clydesdale
from a cayuse, neither can the weakling rem
nant of a war nation breed a new nation of
heroes for a new generation's wars.
"By the law of probability as developed by
Quetelet, it is claimed that there will appear in
each generation the same number of potential
poets, artists, investigators, patriots, athletes
and superior men of each "degree. This law,
however, involves the theory of continuity of
paternity, that In each generation a practically
equal percentage of men of superior mentality
will survive to take the responsibilities of
parenthood. Otherwise this law becomes sub
ject to tho action of another law, that of re
versed selection, or the biological law of
'diminishing returns.'
"Breeding from an inferior stock brings race
degeneration, and such breeding is tho solo
agency of such degeneration; as selection,
natural or artificial, along ono line or anther
is the sole agency for race progress. And all
laws of probabilities and averages are subject
to a' still higher law, tho primal law of biology,
which no cross-current of life can check or
modify. Like tho .seed is the harveBt. When
conditions change, go change tho products of
heredity.
"What shall we say of our own country, with
her years of peace, and her two great civil
"wars, the straggle of children with their
parents, of brothers with brothers? It may be
that war is sometimes Justified. It Is sometimes
inevitable, whether necessary or not It has
Happened once In our history, that 'every drop
of blood drawn by the lash must be drawn
again by the sword.'
. "It c"ost as 60,O.QO lives of young men to
get rid of slavery. I saw not long ago In Mary
land dne hundred and fifty acres of these young
men. There are some 18,000 acres filled with
them on the flolds of the south. And this num
ber, almost a million, north and south, was tho
beBt that the nation could bring. North and
south alike, tho men wero in dead earnest, each
believing that his view of stato rights and of
national authority was founded on a solid rock
of righteousness and fair play. North and
south, the nation was impoverished by tho loss.
Tho gaps they left aro filled to all appoaranco.
There aro relatively fow of us loft today in
whoso hearts' tho scars of forty years ago are
still unhealed. But a now generation has
grown up of men and women born since tho war.
They have taken tho 'nation's problems into
their hands, but theirs aro hands not so strong
or so clean as though the men that are stood
shoulder tq shoulder with tho men that might
havo been. Tho men thatdied had bettor stuff
in thorn than tho father of tho average mom
of today.
"Those states which lost most of their strong'
young blood, as Virginia, Louisiana, tho Caro
linas, will not gain tho ground they lost, not
for centuries, perhaps nevor.
"Dr. Vonablo, prooidont of tho University of
North Carolina, told mo not long ago, that onc
lmlf tho alumni of that collogo up to 1865 woro
in tho civil war. One-third of these woro slain,
Wo can never measure our actual loss nor do
tormlno how far tho men that aro fall Bhort
of tho men that might havo been.
"The samo motivo, tho samo lesson, lasts
through all agos, and It finds koon expression
in tho words of tho wisest men of our early
national history, Benjamin Franklin, 'Wars are
not paid for in war timo: the bill comes later "
Powers of States Conceded by Higher Court
Following Is an Associated Press dispatch:
Washington, D. C, Junp 9. The power of tho
states to fix reasonable intrastate rates on inter
state railroads until such time as congress shall
choose to regulate tho rates was upheld today
by tho supremo court of tho United States in
tho Minnesota freight and passenger rato cases.
At tho same time tho court laid down far
reaching principles governing tho valuation of
railroad property for rato making purposes,
and, according to these, held that the state of
Minnesota would confiscate tho property of tho
Minneapolis and St. Louis Railroad company by
its maximum freight and 2-cont passbnger law.
It enjoined tho stato from enforcing these laws
as to this road for the present. In the cases of
tho Northern Pacific and Great Northern, how
ever, tho court held that these roads had failed
to show that tho rates wero "unreasonable" or
"confiscatory" and consequently reversed tho
United States district court of Minnesota' which
had enjoined their enforcement as both confis
catory and a burden on interstate commerce.
The decision, regarded as ono of tho most
important ever announced by tho court, had
been under consideration for fourteen months.
Railroad commissions from eight states and tho
governors of all tho states filed briefs in sup
port of the state In tho cases, recognizing that
the principles involved affected them all.
Rate cases from Missouri, Arkansas, Oregon,
Kentucky, Nebraska and West Virginia wero
not decided today, but tho points announced in
tho Minnesota cases aro regarded as governing
thom generally. These cases probably will bo
disposed of tomorrow, when tho court will hold
another session, as it will also do Monday, Juno
16, tho final day of adjournment for tho term.
Tho criticism of the apportionment of valuo
between interstate and intrastate business on a
gross revenue basis and tho apportionment of
expenses by regarding intrastate freight busi
ness as two and a half times as expensive as
interstate business was regarded hero as favor
able to tho state of Missouri In Its fight to up
hold tho validity of tho maximum freight and
2-cent passenger rate law enacted by it.
The states 'of Oregon and Kentucky woro re
garded as almost certain to win their rate cases,
involving tho validity of stato freight rates, be
cause in each instance practically the only
objection to tho laws was their reputed Inter
ference with interstate commerce.
The decision was announced by Justice
Hughes. Justice Hughes considered the attack
upon the state rato in two parts, tho one that
they placed an unlawful' burden on interstate
. commerce and the other that they were so low
as to confiscate property of tho railroads.
In considering the Interstate commerce phase
he took it for granted that tho state had the
power to regulate rates between points within
the stato of Minnesota on railroads not cross
ing tho state lines and go far from the boun
daries as not to compete with the cities of other
states or otherwise affect Interstate commerce.
Ho next reached tho conclusion that Intrastate
rates, whether on purely Intrastate railroads
or on interstate railroads, had not been re
garded by the courts as being a direct regula
tion of Interstate commerce.
The most intricate argument on this phase of
the controversy Was made by the justice in con
sidering whether state rates on Interstate car
riers could have such an indirect bearing on
interstate commerce as to exclude the states
from Imposing them. He reached the conclu
sion that this was a well known field the
states could exercise their authority until con
gress had seen fit to regulate this field exclu
sively. Finally lie arrived at the conclusion
that congress In nil Us rato making legislation
had expressly .provided that tho regulation
should not oxtend to transportation wholly
within tho state.
Among tho laws which tho states may pans
indirectly affecting intorBtato commerco were
mentioned stato inspection laws, stato em
ployers' liability laws and quarantines regula
tions. He said that stato rato making was to
bo classified with these.
"It has never boon doubtod," said ho, "that
tho stato could, If It saw fit, build Its own high
ways, canals and railroads. It could build rail
roads traversing tho ontlro stato and thug join
its border cities and commercial centers by now
highways of intercourse to bo always available
upon reasonablo terms. Such provisions for
local traffic might indood alter relative advan
tages in competition, and by virtue of cconomio
forces those engaged In Interstate trado and
transportation might find it necessary to make
readjustments extending from markot to market
through a wldo sphero of influence, but such
action of tho stato would not for that reason
bo regarded as creating a direct restraint upon
interstate commerce and thus transcending the
state power.
"Similarly tho authority of tho stato to pre
scribe what shall bo reasonablo charges of com
mon carriers for intrastate transportation un
less it bo limited by tho exertion of tho con
stitutional powor of congress is statewide
"To say that this powor exists, but that it
may be exercised only in prescribing rates that
are on an equal or higher basis than those
that aro fixed by tho carrier for interstate
transportation Is to maintain tho powor in name
while denying it in fact. It is to assert that
tho exerciso of tho legislative Judgment in de
termining what shall bo tho carrier's charge for
tho intrastate service Is itself subject to the
carrier's will. But this statewide authority con
trols tho carrier and Is not controlled by it; and
tho idea that tho power of tho tato to fix
reasonablo rates for its internal traffic is limited
by tho mere action of tho carrier in laying an
interstate rate to places across tho state's bor
der is foreign to our Jurisprudence.
"If this authority of the stato bo restricted
it must bo by virtue of tho paramount powor of
congress over interstate commorco and Its in
struments: and in view of tho nature of the
subject a limitation may not bo implied because
of a dormant federal poner; that Is, ono which
has not been exerted but can only bo found 1m
the actual exerciso of federal control in such
measures as to exclude this action by tho state
which otherwise would clearly bo within Its
province."
In taking up the confiscatory phase of the
controversy Justice Hughes first considered
whether the rates wero confiscatory as applied
to tho Northern Pacific. Ho said this would
turn upon what was the "fair valuo" of the
railroad property. He tested the lower court's
theory of arriving at a fair value by finding
"the reproduction cost now" by ascertaining
how this theory worked on the value of the
railroad lands. He declared that the lower
court was in error in .adding 30 per cent to
normal valuo of the land In gome instances ani
200 per cent at the big terminals. In arriving
at what the court considered the "cost of re
producing its property."
"It Is manifest that an attempt to estimate
what would be tho actual cost of acquiring the
right of way. If the railroads were not there,
is to indulge in mere speculation.
"The cost of reproduction method is of ser
vice in ascertaining the present valuo of the
plan, when it Uk reasonably applied and whe
SL WmtiJtp.i
. jt! A
fijXr Ljrs
alt.irttt Ol, vft V