QOV. PALMER ON RAILWAY MONOPOLIES. 283 



now, it may be so ; I can not tell neither can you tell what our 

 courts will hold to ; but I predict that the time is coming, and I 

 want you to be patient it won t come this afternoon, it won t come 

 next week, it won t come this year, it won t, perhaps, in five years, 

 it may not come, perhaps, until after a struggle of a quarter of a 

 century, but the time is coming, if you are as determined and per 

 sistent in your efforts as you are enthusiastic to-day, and have been, 

 when public opinion will mould the character of our courts, and com 

 pel them to reverse that decision in the Dartmouth College case. I 

 say that the time is coming when our courts will not hold that these 

 charters are a contract between the people of the State and the cor 

 porations, but, they will hold that they are, as in my opinion, but mere 

 grants of power which enable them to contract in getting the road 

 bed, enable them to contract in furnishing means of transportation, 

 enable them to contract with you in carrying your freight and your 

 person ; and that the amount of power can and must be controlled 

 by the legislature giving that power. I say the time is coming when 

 our courts will hold that the creature is not greater than the Creator ; 

 that the corporations created by law are not greater than the legisla 

 ture that created them ; that these corporations, called in one sense 

 persons, are not more sacred in their vested rights than are the 

 vested rights of you or me, of the rights given me by the great God 

 himself.&quot; 



Gov. Beveridge then explained the difficulties with which 

 legislation on the subject of regulating railroads was beset, 

 stating that many persons who imagine they could settle 

 the whole question in half a day would find, on consideration, 

 that it was a most difficult question. 



GOV. PALMER ON RAILWAY MONOPOLIES. 



Ex-Governor Palmer followed in a strong speech. He 

 said: 



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&quot; The germ of this whole subject of vested rights is the Dartmouth 

 College case. The State never made a being more lofty than the 

 being that God makes, and no corporation can have rights superior 



