130 HISTORY OF THE GRANGE MOVEMENT; OR, 



we have not submitted to their arbitrary demands, but 

 have decided to hold out, and let our courts settle the 

 question, they have taken the course as it seems to 

 us out of sheer malice, to injure us of notifying all 

 their Western connections to refuse all property con- 

 signed us unless freight was prepaid. This is not 

 through fear that they shall lose by us on freight their 

 due, as they have commenced suit against us for 

 amount of their bills, and we have given them a bond 

 to cover the same, so they are secure on that score; but 

 it is done simply so to annoy us as to make us surren- 

 der unconditionally to them. We propose to see, how- 

 ever, if we have any rights at all in the matter, or 

 whether the railroad corporations are the supreme law 

 in themselves, and everything must yield to them. 

 The B. & A. R. R. Co. have even gone so far as to 

 refuse to receive at Albany grain for which we hold 

 through bills of lading, contracting to deliver such at 

 East Boston; and through their influence flour and 

 bran in transit to us, and for which we also hold 

 through bills of lading, contracting to deliver such at 

 East Boston, have been stopped at Toledo and Cleve- 

 land. We are also daily in receipt of advices from 

 our friends, that cars for shipments intended for us are 

 being refused by them at all points throughout the 

 West. 



" SCUDDER, BARTLETT & Co." 



The instances given are enough to sustain our 

 position that the railroads recognize no such thing as 

 individual rights. Neither do they recognize nor 

 respect the rights of the public as represented by the 

 State. They are humble enough, plausible enough 



