Prevention of Trusts . 
75 - 
Now no railroad willingly pays these rebates. Says Judge 
Schoonmaker, of the Interstate Commerce Commission: “ The 
revenues of carriers are seriously impaired by the amount these 
payments add to the expenses of operation, and it is not un¬ 
common when rates are abnormally low that after the deduction 
of these payments not even the cost of carriage is left to the 
road, so that the traffic thus carried is sometimes detrimental to* 
the carrier. ” 14 
Thus it is seen that this practice is equally undesirable from 
whatever point it is viewed. But when recently the Western 
Traffic Association sought to reduce the rate of car mileage from 
f cents to 6 mills per mile, the Standard Oil and the Dressed 
Beef Combine were able, by playing one road off against another,, 
to compel the payment of the old rate, and thus defeat the 
efforts of the railroads to accomplish a very necessary reform. 15 * 
vention of Railroad Commissioners, held in Washington, March, 1895,. 
pp. 39-46 of report: “ The use by carriers of private cars of shippers in¬ 
stead of their own equipment has developed in the last few years to very 
large proportions. . . . The principal articles for which they are used 
are such staples as petroleum and cotton-seed oils, turpentine, live¬ 
stock, and dressed meats. . . . 
. . . “ By an investigation made in 1889 it appeared that on a single 
line of road between Chicago and an interior eastern point, a distance of 
470 miles, refrigerator cars owned by three shipping firms made in nine 
months, . . . 7,428,406 miles and earned for mileage $72,945.97, . . . 
or substantially at the rate of $100,000 a year. 
“ By another investigation, made in 1890, it appeared that private stock 
cars . . . used upon a line made up of two connecting roads between 
Chicago and New York, . . . had cost altogether $156,50u, and had 
earned for mileage in two years . . . $205,582.68; that the entire 
expense to be deducted during that period for car repairs and salaries 
for their management was $34,050.48 leaving net revenue to the amount 
of $171,532.20, being an excess of $15,032 above the whole cost of the cars. 
The cars were therefore paid for and a margin in two years, and there¬ 
after, under the same arrangement, and a corresponding use of the cars, 
an income of upwards of $100,000 a year was assured on an investment 
fully repaid, or in effect on no investment whatever.” 
14 Report of Third Annual Convention of Railroad Commissioners, 
pp. 44-45. 
15 Chicago Tribune, November 14th, 1894: “It appears from a com¬ 
munication sent to railroad managers by Chairman Midgeley that the 
