606 THE IMPENDING REVOLUTION. 



substantially similar circumstances over the same line in the 

 same direction. What does that mean? You know the 

 Knights of Labor believe in having laws so plain that the 

 people can understand them when the children read them. 

 I defy all the lawyers in Lima to tell me; there is no one 

 under the sun that can tell what it means. 'Shall not 

 charge more for a short haul than a long one under sub- 

 stantially similar circumstances and conditions over the 

 same line running in the same direction. ' Why, it was 

 drawn so nobody could understand it. 



"Just imagine the Great Law-Giver, when he gave 

 the ten commandments : Thou shalt not kill ; Thou shalt 

 not steal, under substantially similar circumstances and 

 conditions over the same line in the same direction. (Loud 

 and tumultuous applause.) No, that was put in that law 

 for the purpose of deceiving the people. The people 

 clamored for a law regulating inter-state commerce, claim- 

 ing that commerce was put into the hands of these great 

 corporations and controlled by them. And they answered 

 you by giving you a law which was declared, in the face 

 of its promoters in the House, to mean simply to leave the 

 question to the railroads to decide what was the similar 

 circumstances and conditions. They passed it, and last 

 week the five commissioners decided it to mean exactly 

 what we told them it meant that the railroads must 

 determine what was substantially similar circumstances and 

 conditions, and then, if the people didn't like it they 

 could go where? The law tells them where, and only 

 where. Hither in the federal court, away off from their 

 homes, or before the five commissioners at Washington 

 City." 



Section eight of Article first of our Constitution says: 

 Congress shall have power "to regulate commerce with 

 foreign nations, and among the several States, and with 

 the Indian tribes." 





