19S WISCONSIN STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
But on a well graded road with the best class of freight engines, 
thirty cars of wheat can be hauled. If we count 30 cars to a train 
each train would amount to $2,170. It will take no more hands 
for a train of thirty cars than for one of 20. The difference in 
fuel and the wear of the extra 10 cars would be small in compari¬ 
son to the extra amount received. 
Mr. Hurlbut of Illinois, introduced a bill in congress a few 
weeks ago, to incorporate a company to build a double track 
freight railway from Council Bluffs, Iowa, to New York, which 
limited the charges on bulk freights, for a distance less than from 
Chicago to New York, to one-half cent per ton per mile. This 
would be but little more than $4.50 per ton from Chicago to 
New York. 
It is but reasonable to suppose that Mr. Hurlbut knew that 
amount would be a fair compensation, or he would have laid him¬ 
self liable to the criticisms of railroad hirelings in congress. 
Should any better showing than this be asked to convince any 
reasonable man that freight railways are what we need to carry 
our crops to market ? The old fogies who still believe that we 
should depend upon lakes and canals that are firozen up nearly 
six months each year, to carry the vast products of the west and 
northwest to the Atlantic, remind me of some old wagoners that 
I was acquainted with when a boy in Pennsylvania, who thought 
they could haul freight from Philadelphia to Pittsburg in oppo¬ 
sition to the railroad and canal. They tried a few trips with 
their six horse teams, but soon discovered their mistake. So it 
will be with the antedeluvian sticklers for canals, when freight 
railways have been constructed between the Mississippi river and 
the Atlantic—it will only be a few years until the most obdurate 
old bourbon will be converted in favor of freight railways. 
The constitutionality of the power of congress to regulate com¬ 
merce between the states, is now acknowledged by the best legal 
talent in our country. The committee in congress on railroad 
transportation, with Mr. McCrerey, of Iowa, at its head, has made 
an exhaustive report and argument on this subject, and shows, be 
yond all reasonable doubt, the power by congress to regulate 
freight and fares on railways traversing more than one state. That 
it is not only right but just and expediant, for congress to so reg- 
