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The Commoner
6
0M9, No. io
The Dual Plan for the Ownership and
Operation of Railroads
Statement of William Jennings Bryan, before Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce,
House of Representatives, August 29, 1919 '
h
'
Mr. Bryan. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of
tho committee, in the first place I desire to ox
press my appreciation of the privilege you extend
to mo of presenting my views on this subject,
and I appreciate this opportunity all the more,
because public thought is turning to the subject
and the time is ripe for action.
It is difficult to get all the people to consider
any question far in advance of tho time of its
solution, but when tho time is ripe they consider
what is said, examine plans, and decide
If you will pardon an illustration, I was think
ing this morning of a story I heard some years
ago. .An atheist was trying to present his side
of tho religious controversy to' his own child, who
was attending Sunday school. Ho wrote on the
blackboard, "God is nowhere". Tho child looked
at the statement and read "God is now hero".
For yearB, when we have talked about govern
ment ownership, tho subject has seemed to bo
nowhere. Wo can now describe it as a subject
that is now here. It is because it is hero, and
bocauso tho people are reading and thinking
about it, that I appreciate this privilege of pre
senting here a plan that I have tried to present
for many years, but for which I have not found
a hearing because tho time was not ripe.
In tho second place, I recognize that my views
have no weight except as the reasons that sup
port them may have weight. You have had be
fore you persons who spoko for organization,
somo for security holders, some for stockholders,
some for railroad managers. And you have had
those who have spoken for labor organizations.
When men speak for othors, you weigh their
words in proportion to the importance of tho
organization for which they speak, or in propor
tion to the numbers for whom they speak. I
speak merely, as an individual, as a citizen, and
can claim no greater attention than you are will
ing to give to one who is interested in every
problem of government and who has had some
opportunity to consider this question and to
watch tho development of the forces that will
finally settle it.
FUNDAMENTAL PROPOSITIONS
In order that I may present exactly what I
want to say, I have written down and will read,
with comments, certain propositions which I re
gard as 'fundamental.
The first question to be asked and answered
is: Shall the-ailroads be owned and operated by
private corporations or by the public? Until this
question is answered we cannot intelligently con
sider plans, because all the plans presented In
volve one theory or the other, and according as
ono takes the side of private ownership or the
ido of government ownership, he will be inter
ested in the plans that embody that idea. The
first question to be decided, therefore, is that
fundamental question, whether the railroads
shall bo owned and operated by private corpora-'
tions or owned and operatod by tho gdvernment.
This question must, in my judgment, be an
swered in favor of public ownership and opera
tion of tho railroads. I am led to this conclusion
by1 tho fact that tho railroad is a monopoly at
, least, it partakcT of t'he monopoly to such an
extont that it must be considered and treated
as such.
I ocin with the proposition . that a private
monopoly is indefensible and intolerable. It is
inaerensiuie because it cannot bo defended, and
intolerable because a thing that cannot be de
fendod cannot bo tolerated in a republic where
the people are the source of power. Where com
petition is impossible and a monopoly therefore
noc-ssary, it must be a government monopoly
administered in behalf of all the peoplo and not
d private monopoly administered for the benefit
of a few of the people.
The principle involved is easily understood if
we will only apply to this question the common
sense rules of daily life.
I digress a moment to say that the baic .argu
ment in favor of popular government, the basic
argument in support of tho doctrine that the
people are capable of self-government, is that
all great questions are, in their last analysis,
simple questions and can be solved by tho ap
plication of the rules of daily life.
At Panama I was convinced that we had used
the wrong word in describing the canal. We had
spoken of it as a gr-t undertaking; it is really
nothing but a big undertaking, for there are no
new principles introduced in its building. The
Culebra Cut is 9 miles long and at its highest
point 350 feet deep, but when one, riding upon
a railroad, goes through a little hill and sees the
banks of the cut on either side he sees the same
principle. The Culebra Cut is simply the little t
railroad cut multiplied millions of times. The '
same is true of the Gatun Dam. It backs up the
water and makes a lake over 100 miles square;
but anyone who has' ever seen a little dam
thrown across a stream in a pasture, making a
popd for tho cattle, understands the principle.
The Gatun Dam is just this little dam in the
pasture, multiplied millions of times.
And so, as I see it, the question of private
monopoly is settled and settled conclusively by
the application of ono of the most common and
best-understood principles known among men.
We have good judges in this country. They
are selected because of their probity and char
acter and the confidence that the people have in
them. And yet, who would think of allowing a
judge to try his own case? There is not a civil
ized country in the world that will allow a judge
to try his own case. Why? Because we recognize
that the unconscious bias in the Individual in
"favor of himself makes him unfit to try a case
in which he has a pecuniary interest! We under
stand it so well that we will not allow a man to
be 1 in 12 on a jury if he has any interest in the
result of the trial.
Apply this everyday, common-sense principle
to the privato monopoly and what do you find?
You find that under the privato monopoly system
we allow a man not a judge selected because
of his character and probity, not a judge selected
because of the confidence the people have in him,
but just a man, a stockholder in a corporation
organized for no . other purpose than for tho
making of money; a man selected' by other
stockholders interested as he is; we allow that
man to act as judge and jury and decide every
day questions where his interests are on ono
side and the interests of the people on the other
side.
No one can defend a private monopoly, when
he understands it, unless he has so much stock
in it that the Income from the stock silences his
conscience.
OBJECTIONS TO PRIVATE MONOPOLY
I beg to submit three arguments against the
private-monopoly, arguments which I believo to
be unanswerable. First, the economic argument
A private monopoly destroys all the incentives
to progress. Under competition it is to the inter
est of the producer to furnish Jhe best article
at the lowest price, because in this way only
o-nth ZT U8lne88-1 T1Hg. Ms interests are
o the side of the .purchanor, at least, iden
tical with the interests of the purchaser But an
St SS diflffnt ,?ti'n is created when com
petition is eliminated; then the producer is
tempted to seek his own advantage only and do
higUtypS.lshIng thG poorest articl "dt
But even if it can be shown that under private
Th0, purchaser cUld secure the best "
be shown ethWe8t P?Ce-a thin thatanno
be shown the purchaser would not dare to
avail himself of the economic -advantage because
?Xm tWS P0litlcal "Stents which far out-
Sffip'SSiSrag9 which a private
lyUhatbtheSnrett0 the Se?nd obition, name
ly) that the private monopoly creates a crown f
men who, reaping where they have not sowTb
come conscious that; they are not giving an equt
vaient service for the money thev ii.
therefore, begin to distrust popu ar SS1 and
because tlrey are not willing that tK?1'
shall Vnake the laws necessary for tl Sir m
tection. We cannot afford to build Snff
country such a group, made un Americ I n
hostile to popular government by the , nJKi S
which they are allowed to enjoy Ees
Third. A stronger argument' still i8 n vfl
found in the fact that the victims o h n L
monopoly, increasing in number as mwKS
grow and flourish, become discouraged 1
driven to despair. They see a group of m
fluential because financially powerful aS1;
dominate the government and de y le law lh
t.hfiv Vinni lmf V.n i .., ' l,lt w while
- . A1Q cuu ul Liieir own vo pp whan
they pead for relief. It is in the heart of s
men that the seeds of anarchy can be s wn
Victor Hugo says that -the mob I the human
race in misery-. We cannot afford to allow SS
, to be made miserable by injustice
I have not attempted to present all of the ob
jections to private monopoly; there are many
others. If there is but one employer, the em
ployees are at his mercy, just as the consumers
are at the mercy of the producer when there Is
but one producer and just as the producers of
raw material are at the mercy of the purchaser
when .here is but one purchaser. I content my
self with presenting the three objections which
I regard as fundamental and of universal appli-
cation.
A
If tav private monopoly is indefensible and In
tolerable, and if a railroad must he considered
and treated as a private monopoly, then we may
proceed "to the next question, namely, how can
the transition from private ownership to govern
ment ownership be made with the least disturb
ance to business and with the least risk to all
concerned?
ONLY QUESTION OPEN FCR DISCUSSION
Believing as I do that a private monopoly Is
indefensible and intolerable, and believing as I
do that the railroad partakes so much of the
nature of a- private monopoly that it must be
considered and treated as such, I ask you to con
sider the only question open for discussion at
this time, namely, how can tho transition be
made most easily and with least risk or danger
to "all concerned?
Tho plan whichhas received most considers
. tion contemplates the federal ownership and
operation of all the lines of transportation. I
beg to propose as alternative what may bo de
scribed as a dual plan, which contemplates the
ownership and operation of a federal trunk-line
systemwsul.cient to reach into every state an
make each State independent by giving it an out
let'f or all it has to sell and an inlet for all u
has to purchase and the ownership and operat on
of all the other lines by tlie states in which tne
lines are situated. I beg your attention for a lew
moments as I compare these two plans.
You have had before you what is M" J
the Plumb plan, presented with the indorsement
- of the railroad brotherhoods and, I tn,nKr
of the Federation ttf Labor and s?e"Jj
organizations. The Plumb plan provides lori"
nationalization of all the railroads. I do noi w
to go into the details of it or to express .
opinion of it as a plan. I desire rather to i suow
an. alternative plan, only stopping to say ' w
agree entirely with the fundamental propo"'
upon which this nationalization plan is u
namely, that the government should ow
railroads. -
SOME PROVISIONS OF PLUMB PLAN
. I am not here to discuss the PXa of
I do not think it unfair that m the operau
tho railroads the 2,000,000 employee i rf
have one-third representation on tiie 6
management. When wo remember tnai
tolerated a condition under which raro con.
nates had three-thirds control and nev
Bidered either the patrons or the laborwb
LjW tiU .teis.injJd,&j
