166 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



ored to devise some other means of improving railway credit as a substi- 

 tute for advanced rates. It occurred to me that an exhaustive investiga- 

 tion should be made upon the main proposition before any such conces- 

 sion was granted. 



It is not fair to take any month, or any period of three or four months, 

 as typical of the general tendency in any industry. From a broad, fair re- 

 view of conditions over a series of years, three facts can be set down as 

 conclusively established in regard to our railroads: 



First, the credit of railway companies is as good or better than that 

 of any other class of public service or industrial companies in the United 

 States. 



Second, railway securities are more attractive to actual investors, and 

 have increased in value more rapidly during the past decade than any 

 other class of securities on the market at the present time. 



Third, the earnings of our railroads above all operating expenses and 

 all taxes has been increasing steadily during the past twenty years, and 

 last year was the most prosperous year in the entire history of American 

 railroads. 



In the face of such a record as that, it takes lots of nerve to ask for 

 higher rates. But I suppose any of us are willing to get all we can. 



In support of those three propositions, I filed in the record before 

 the Interstate Commerce Commission over 580 typewritten pages 

 of figures. I am not going to read all those figures to you, but I 

 am going to tell you briefly the gist of some of the things that I 

 did establish. Most of these questions are matters of public policy. 

 For instance, I will give you two illustrations: 



It is claimed that the railroads are entitled to keep their prop- 

 erties up to date out of earnings. The supreme court of the United 

 States has held that they are entitled to build certain improve- 

 ments and betterments out of earnings. Now, where is the limit? 

 One railroal actually says that it should be entitled to pay six 

 per cent dividends on its capital stock, and should have an addi- 

 tional six per cent to put back into the property in the shape of 

 betterments and improvements and extensions; and it says that 

 rule should be allowed all over the United States, because the pub- 

 lic are demanding better facilities, double trackage, better and 

 larger cars, and better speed; they have to have the money to do 

 these things, and they ought to take it out of the earnings and 

 not make it a charge upon the people of future years and future 

 generations. Do you know what that little item would mean? 

 Figures sound terribly abstract and cold; we don't appreciate 

 their true significance. Six per cent upon the capital stock of all 

 the railroads in the United States, as asked for by President Rip- 

 ley, of the Santa Fe railroad, would mean over $400,000,000 a 



