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About The independent. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1902-1907 | View Entire Issue (March 21, 1907)
ft IS- I eV2u,nal HOME LIFE, AGRICULTURE AND Twentieth Year. A NATIONAL PROBIEM Georgia has just taken hold of the question of how to curb railroad gTeed and how to put its managers out of political control. Strange as It may 4 seem to some conditions in Georgia have been much the same as In Ne braska and Iowa and Kansas. Rates have been high and based on nothing , tangible except caprice, discriminations of the rankest sort between points in the state have existed; politics have been manipulated by passes and paid agents and money, and all the various familiar devices - employed to avoid paying, a Just. share of taxes. The recent speech of Governor Hoke Smith demonstrates that the people of the south are waking up to the dangers of railroad bossism just as we of the north have become enlightened. Gov ernor Smith says it is easy to place one's finger upon the root of the evil, so faF as the conduct of the transporta tion companies is concerned, . They have issued enormous quantities f watered stocks and watered bonds. They are straining their properties to pay dividends on these excessive bond and stock ' issue. The public is charged unreasonable rates that the money may be made to pay dividends on these, stocks and bonds, and net earnings whih should have been used to equip the properties have been paid out on excessive bond and stock issues. The long hours of work and the low pay to employes have not been required to make legitimate dividends on legiti mate stocks, but these burdens, also, have been placed in the interest of ex cessive bond and stock issue. Market values have been created for the ex cessive bond and stock issues by divi dends paid on them. The officers high up in authority have reaped their mil lions in profits, while the rights of the tinuing Governor Smith pointed out " some facts that careless observers have neglected to fully learn in order to un derstand this question. To quote his language: "Corporations owned and organized to bufld railroads differ entirely from ordinary private corporations, such as banks and manufacturing companies, public have been disregarded. Con They are siven special privileges and assume special duties. A company ownins a bank or manufactory can only acquire property by the consent of those with whom it trades. "A railroad company exercises tne ' state's power of eminent domain to take private property for its use even without the owner's consent ThUi power is exercised upon the theory that the publio will be benefited, and . rnilr. -Mi t-unpiMiy is allowed to use it because- a railroad company is corporation public in its niture with fixed public duties. "While the ft a to permits tho money of private individuals to be- used for th construction of a railroad, the ob ligation of the railroad to the publio r lion the lei cle.ir. The took h..M. r of a rnilroad cmipa'iy aro on tmd to a f:! return upon their mon.-y. l it no more. The public la rntUVd to a vi.lce !n t!i charges whMi ..r- u ! ly rt'tr.a.l Com j .ui fir v.rr.ln iu"--iu'M end t'r.ii;).!. Til"-.' wi '-'t l '' l, r, ,.nab!" ntvl frr from dt cri'i;l- Illt!'llrt, "A i silrotd n-mpin', by t ;iwn f H j. t.,- liutai.'. a-mumu th r.pm LINCOLN, NEBRASKA, sibility to furnish an adequate and safe service for the business of those dealing with it. A railroad . company owes it to the public to furnish ample means for transportation, over its lines for persons and freight, and to charge only reasonable rates for this service.". It is well to keep these things in mind when dealing with the railroads through legislation. The companies have no special claim to consideration; nothing except fair treatment with reasonable latitude for individual ini tiative. A DISCREDITED BURJBAl). Ananias could not be press aent for the most ambitious of circuses or re porter for the most perverted of news papers without first changing his name. That is because people, easily deceived as they appear sometimes to be, distrust anything In whose behalf they see men peddling lias. Such men as' from principle and "those other more -numerous men who from "interest" are contributing 10 tht support of the national press bureau operating to dis credit municipal owncraUp of public utilities, have .strangely overlooked this lesson. What, do they thfcik, will the people of Nebraska conclude con cerning the anti-municipal ownership movement, when they find M fo hard pressed for argument as to require the circulation, for foreign consumption only of course, of statements Tvhich all informed people know o bt falsa con cerning the. Lincoln municipal water supply? Everybody in Nebraska will now discredit tho stories the burean have been telling about the Springfield, 111., lighting ' business, and nobody at Springfield will take the slhrhtet stock in their statement? about the Lincoln water system. Their tales of crushing defeat for municipal ownership In London jarly this mouth are effective only until the pubhc learns that the Is sue in London was not chiefly munici pal ownership, but tht . the winning party made its cam paign largely on national is sues; that where municipal trading was an issue it was the management rather" than the policy that came into discussion. Thus in time everybody will learn to distrust their statements!.' Then how will they gain credit when they have truth to tell? FOUNDED OS A IIOCK. 'Jeremiahs have arisen in the train of the stock market slump with pre dictions of a general business collapse In" case of a crop shortage this year. This possibility is a thing to be kept In mind in deciding whether to incur new debts or pay old ones. But in connection with the crop situation it should not be overlooked that crop or no crop the country will not have to go hungry next year. On March first the finwri of the United States had still In their bins almost hJf of last yrar"i wheat crop. They still hold nearly as much corn as the country produced in some of the bad years of the last (Wad. Nebraska farmers had two weeks no lxteon mJUVon bushels of wheat, nearly a third of last year's crop, and out of a t-tal estimated crop of E4'J.000,0K bushels of corn they still hold lH.npft.OOO bushel, almost ex actly half, resides Indlcmttag that a short crop thta year wtll not create serious nerd, thta condition shows In wh it cm'ur ultuitlon for hearing a rltnek the firmer now stand. ll f ir th p.inlc of the irl iirt ! fArnvn wrr. iklii tU K'.vtrnmint for fun-U t ho! I their crop. The crops are now nnis held sndthe fares rs are furnishing the lundiT MARCH 21, 1907. BRYAN'S MANAGER Press correspondents at Cleveland recently took advantage of the pres ence of Mr, Bryan in that city to send out a report that his visit there was to secure the services of Mayor Tom Johnson as business manager for his "campaign for the presidency. Conceding that Bryan is a candidate for president, and that Tom Johnson Is old business himself, there Is reason to question this report. Mr.Bryan has never been at all in the habit of com mitting his campaigns to business managers. Whatever he has done in the way of campaigning has been al ways business managed emphatically by himself, and whatever of ill success has attended hi efforts has therefore been due to his own shortcomings in business management. During the campaigns in which Mr. Bryan has engaged his insistence on the management of his own cause has occasioned considerable disgust among leaders who wished, for reasons of their own, to be known as potential factors. Even Chairman Jones found that he was decidedly a figurehead in the battles in which he was supposed to be at least a first lieutenant. It is characteristic of Bryan that ho is not easily swerved from his own ch6sen pathway. Ha has a most capti vating way 6f listening with the most courteous attention to whatever advice any man may have to offer, and im mediately thereafter going off in pur suit of his own sweet will. Ordinarily a business manager is presumed to be the whole cheese in whatever under taking ha may be engaged. If he can not be "it." he is not at all to be con sidered a business manager, and can hardly be expected to cut much ice. He must be endowed with authority to provide the quid pro quo, or his ma chine will lack lubrication. It may be conceded that if Mr. Bryan were disposed to put his political pros pects into the keeping of any indi vidual other than himself, Tom, John son is just the kind of a man he would be apt to pick out for that trust. Just now government ownership is the Mr. Bryan's most vulnerable doctrine, and the capitalistic forces are relying much upon their ability to effect his discomfiture through it. Hchce if Mr. Bryan were really in search of a busi ness manager for his campaign, he would certainly go to one of the few men like Tom Johnson upon whose Inca pacity to sell him out to his enemies he could rely, for the enemies of Bryan are the enemies of Johnson also. They love each other for the enemies they have made. Perhaps Mr. Bryan's former cam paigns may hare taught him the wis dom of devolving upon other shoulders some of the responsibility of business management, but It is not in his na ture to submit himself to any one'a guidance, and the business manager who undertakes to run a campaign for him will never be overburdened with responsibilities. ( OMIsU AHOIXD. As the railroad president break cover one by ooe under legislative and prtkle ntlal fire the Mature of the llht thin ha downed upon thm Is dls cl'Mr.i. Mr, Morgan l ami u that th t't?(i,l.-nt "allay the publio bk My now thretQlAf to obstruct rail road lnvtmnt and construction." To this end U. IP. Yaakaco, etiairrtuua FULiriUb Subscription $1.00 of the board of directors of the Rock Island declares that "the railroad men are willing that the supervision of the railroads be centralized in the national government." B. L. Winchell, president of tho Rock Island, which by. the way is one of the notably over capitalized systems, adds that the Rock Island is preparing for a hard battle in the courts to contest the rights of legislatures to tamper with the rates of railroads, especially to reduce them. He regards such legis lation as "confiscatory and unconsti tutional." The railroad managers are making some progress. They now ad mit the right of the government to supervise them, something they would not do a year ago. With characteristic-modesty all they demand now is that this supervision do not in any way interfere with their management of the railroads, particularly In mak ing rates to cover dividends on Irri gated capital. WHEN STATES ARE EFFICIENT. A rift 'appears in the ranks of the lately"" capitalized states' rights army. On two successive days we have prominent railroad presidents contend ing, to quote the language of one of them, "that the only solution 05, the railroad problem Is to grant all the power to regulate the roads to the federal government" Mr. Stlckney's remark followed his statement that "The great unrest in the financial world Is not due to the policy of Prea ident Roosevelt, but is brought about by hostile legislation by the various state legislatures." Only lately, when .Senator Beveridge's federal child labor bill was thought to be In danger of passing, perferrid arguments against this Invasion of the rights of the states rainer" thick and fast from the ramparts behind which the same arguments, against the pure food law and the opposition to the new fed eral rate law had proceeded. The case is simple and shows how sensible these people are. The opponents of child labor restrictions see that universal and fully effective restriction Li im possible except by federal enactment. Therefore they are not for states rights on this question. Since state, legislatures began this winter to show a capacity for legislating in the pub lic interest on transportation ques tions t the railroads sudden)' discover that they favor a centralised gorem ment In Nebraska, where at present We feel secure in the enjoyment of Justice in transport alien management at the hand of car in law makers, the disposition win be altogether In favor of states rights on this polat In other words, an Intelligent public is learning a few thugs from the In-teutft-at managers of great corpora tions. It Is for stales' rights on mat ters where the public welfare Is bait subserved by state action and for centralisation on matters which can be handled to the publio advantage best by national action. A wren itmcTtsu octoi-is. Frnnk Rockefeller, brother of Rocke feller The Orml, announces himself "broke." ll has ben out of th Standard Olt company ulntv. iSiT, whirh nv.i account for his poor finan cial condition. Whether b may wish hlinsolf In again may depenj upin the outcome ef the great campaign now In prv rwi havtiwr tor Its otjoct ta drive