610 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIII. No. 590. 



interstate commerce commission. This 

 commission is a federal agency of high 

 authority and the law under which it ex- 

 ists is a broad and comprehensive statute 

 which has strongly influenced the economic 

 life of America since its enactment in 1887. 

 It forbids every unreasonable inter-state 

 railway rate and every undue discrimina- 

 tion among rates, and the commission has 

 the right to condemn any unlawful rate 

 or practise. Much of the work of the 

 commission is accomplished through its 

 agencies for publicity and by conciliation; 

 at least eighty per cent, of the complaints 

 it receives are settled by its informal and 

 mediatoiy action; seventy per cent, of its 

 formal orders are voluntarily obeyed. In 

 nearly nineteen years only forty-seven 

 eases of disobedience to its orders have 

 been presented to the courts, and of the 

 thirty-five final decisions rendered all but 

 four have been that the order disobeyed 

 was unlawful. In four cases the orders 

 have been enforced by the courts, thus 

 proving that the power exists when the 

 commission acts lawfully. In addition the 

 Elkins law has proved a prompt and 

 effective remedy for unjust discrimination. 



So much for existing law. Many pro- 

 posals for new legislation are now before 

 the congress and the people. This paper 

 has been prepared especially to point out 

 certain broad principles in connection with 

 them. The measures proposed fall plainly 

 into two classes. There are proposals 

 which contemplate: {A) A single act of 

 legislation leaving the enforcement of the 

 law to the ordinary executive and judicial 

 machinery supplemented, as at present, by 

 the interstate commerce commission, and, 

 (B) successive acts of legislation, each 

 specially adapted to the conditions peculiar 

 to a particular case. 



The conclusion reached from a study of 

 existing methods and conditions is that, 

 with our laws as they are, there is no 



genuine instance of injustice in interstate 

 railway rates which can not be remedied 

 under the present law, and that the exist- 

 ing remedies can be applied as promptly as 

 those which government provides or can 

 provide for wrong of any sort when the 

 interests concerned are of great magnitude. 

 To adopt the other theory would be to rely 

 on law-made rates instead of rates deter- 

 mined by the market. 



Methods of Developing Traffic, Industry 

 and Immigration iy a Modern Railway: 

 J. F. Merry, General Immigration 

 Agent, Illinois Central Railroad. 

 The fact that more than 98 per cent, of 

 the $1,975,174,091 collected and disbursed 

 by the railroads of the United States in 

 1904 was from traffic, and less than 2 per 

 cent, from all other sources, presents a 

 good and sufficient reason why the rail- 

 road companies of this country should em- 

 ploy only the best methods of extending 

 this almost exclusive source of revenue. 

 There are many ways by which traffic may 

 be increased, but the following methods 

 have been, and are still, in use by all 

 modern i-ailroads: 



1. A study of the agricultural resources 

 and possibilities of the country on and ad- 

 jacent to its lines and the encouragement 

 of every legitimate effort to develop them. 



2. A careful study of the industrial con- 

 ditions that obtain in all the territory 

 through Avhich its lines run and the taking 

 of such steps as will permanently locate 

 factories at as many points as practicable 

 for the manufacture of raw material, and 

 the employment of labor and capital. 



3. Providing modern equipments and 

 quick service for the handling of merchan- 

 dise and the products of the farm and 

 factory. 



Methods of development by the Illinois 

 Central began with turning its 3,700 acres 

 per mile of road into freight-producing 



