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asking relief from the railroads. They have power to control matters 

 in their own interest, and they will do so. 



Mr. Berwick: If forty-two countries can own their own railways, this 

 country can do that same thing. If we cannot do it, let us change our 

 government and get a government that can do it. 



Mr. Hutchings: This proposition of the State building railroads is a 

 pretty big one. I had hoped to see a proposition made providing for the 

 opening of the great natural arteries, the rivers of the State. These 

 rivers are far better than any railroad that can be built. We have per- 

 mitted those rivers to be destroyed, and not one word has been uttered in 

 opposition to it. Here is the Sacramento River running from one end of 

 the valley to the other, a far better competing line against the railroad 

 than any road that can be built. There are the branches of the Sacra- 

 mento; the Feather River, which has been navigable to Marysville and 

 Oroville. As things are going it will not be long before these rivers 

 become innavigable from one end to the other. And I think the atten- 

 tion of our fruit growers ought to be turned to them as a means of com- 

 petition against the railways. 



Mr. Motheral: The proposition that we shall take care of our rivers 

 is all right, and we are willing to help to do so for the benefit of those in 

 the northern part of the State. But the gentleman is advocating a selfish 

 policy, for those rivers lie in the northern part of the State, and their 

 improvement will not benefit the farmers in the big valleys in the south- 

 ern part. 



Mr. Buck: In advocating the building of a State railroad the gentle- 

 men have overlooked the fact that competition in our valleys would give 

 relief to but very small sections of the State, whereas the cost of building 

 such a road, if applied to the building of a competing road across the 

 mountains that would connect with Eastern roads, would give an outlet 

 for the whole State, and connect all our producers with the markets of the 

 East. 



Mr. Motheral : Are you not very wide of the facts ? You must remem- 

 ber that to build a road across the mountains requires a much greater 

 expense than to build it through our valleys. 



Mr. Sprague : The purpose of this resolution is not to fix a method by 

 which the people of California must proceed, but it is simply that we 

 may take the initiative, looking toward some relief from this source. 



Mr. Fowler: The gentleman who addressed this convention the 

 other day, and who said he represented the Southern Pacific Railroad, 

 said that we could have as low freight rates as they- do in India if we 

 had labor at 20 cents a day, as they have there. 'That was not a fair 

 comparison, and the gentleman himself knew it was not. Because a 

 comparison made on the basis of 20 cents a day labor should be made 

 between Government ownership and private ownership, run there. In 

 every country where there is Government ownership of roads, and where 

 there can be instituted a comparison with private ownership in the 

 same country, the result is invariably in favor of Government owner- 

 ship. I have some facts and figures which I have obtained from 

 authoritative sources. I will give them to you and leave the thought with 

 you. You may supply the deductions. One point made is that Govern- 

 ment ownership does not amount to much in those countries where it is 

 tried, and that it is tried in only small districts. As an offset to that 

 statement we have heard on the floor to-day with regard to the great 



