192 GILBERT HOLLAND MONTAGUE 



restriction 29 cents per barrel. Although the Standard Oil 

 company had entered into the agreement only at the urgent 

 request of the producers, as the chief refiner it bore the burden 

 of the advance; and when the "shut down" was found to be 

 injuring the laborers employed in the drilling of wells, and 

 the producers' association set aside 1,000,000 barrels of oil for 

 their relief, the Standard added another million for the same 

 purpose. This philanthropy, in the end, proved not un- 

 profitable. The Standard benefited by the harmony it had 

 established; and the producers, by relieving the well drillers, 

 prevented them from working for producers outside the 

 agreement. 



As was expected, the results of this movement were only 

 temporary. In time the "shut down" was abandoned, but 

 not until it had gained a great though transient benefit, and 

 had given the impulse to the building of several pipe lines. 



The passing of the interstate commerce act, in 1887, 

 makes a natural division in the record of the railroad arrange- 

 ments made by the Standard. By the terms of that act, dis- 

 criminations were forbidden, and such contracts with shippers 

 as had been the rule since the late sixties were made illegal. 

 The interstate commerce act seems to have been observed by 

 the Standard Oil company. "Little testimony," says the 

 industrial commission of 1900, "was brought forward to prove 

 that it still actually receives lower rates for shipment over the 

 same tracks than its competitors." In the testimony before 

 the commission, on this latter point, the opinion was ex- 

 pressed by witnesses testifying in opposition to the Standard 

 Oil company that direct discriminations and rebates are still 

 received by the Standard; but the evidence adduced in proof 

 of this opinion was unsatisfactory, and was considered entirely 

 inconclusive by the commission. 



In other ways than by discriminations in actual rates the 

 Standard Oil company, after 1887, secured special advantages 

 in transportation. The shipments of oil from those localities 

 which it chose for distributing points were so large that the 

 freight rates for that locality were naturally most favorable to 

 this chief commodity of shipment. Competitive points, points 

 where several railroads compete, or where water transportation 



