EDITORIALS
THE PRESIDENT'S SPECIAL MESSAGES AND BILLS THE PRESIDENT has submitted to Congress his messages upon interstate commerce, federal corporation and the conservation of natural resources. The...
...Sweeping changes are effected by a single order in classification which the railroads make from time to time...
...He has since conducted an active propaganda to bring into the new organization the railroads of the country and their 1,600,000 employees, as well as other interests, such as railway supply companies, more or less dependent upon the railroads...
...The traffic department of a common carrier can set at naught the work of any railway commission by a shift in the classification of its freight schedules...
...Repudiating" Cannon THE announcement that Speaker Cannon will not be reelected to the Speakership, if indeed he is not forced to abdicate before the end of the present Congress, perhaps lacks news interest...
...It would be small gain to the people's cause to depose Cannon merely to make room for another dictator with the same arbitrary power...
...Nor is there any guaranty, on the face of things, that the employees are to benefit in any way directly from this propaganda...
...About $60,000, it is reported, have been spent in the work of the first year, most of which has been contributed by the railroads...
...What assurance is offered that the payment of higher wages is to become popular with railroad managers as a means of distributing fat profits and surpluses in the place of stock dividends andj.the other devices which have been heretofore the rule...
...Proceed with Care" T«HE "Eailroad Employees' and Investors' Union" has proceeded far enough in its activities to indicate its character and purposes...
...They tell what they saw on their trip in The Survey of January 1. Read the account and look at the pictures taken by the official photographer of the magazine, and ask yourself if that is the way to make American citizens...
...It is essential that the Republican party should shake itself free from, the dominance of a kind of politics we are happily beginning to outgrow...
...With Cannon and Cannonism should go the undemocratic rules of the House government, whch make Cannonism possible...
...Readers will then, it is believed, be in a position to judge fairly and intelligently as to the President's program of legislation and his policy of administration as a whole...
...He will find the rates the same...
...The Interstate Commerce Commission has recommended for years that it should have authority to prescribe what shall be a reasonable classification...
...SAID GIFFORD PINCHOT in a speech at the New York University Glub on December 27: "Special interests have made repeated attacks on the United States Forest Service, and these attacks have increased in violence just in proportion as the Service has offered effective opposition to predatory wealth...
...But remember: Office doesn't make the man...
...Would thi...
...Laugh on, Merry Men...
...It covers thirty-two pages, and some of the amendments which it proposes are excellent...
...The subjects are very important and the recommendations made in the special messages are to be definitely interpreted through the medium of administration bills drawn under Executive direction...
...It is not essential to the happiness and prosperity of the United States that the rules of the House of Representatives at Washington shall be changed...
...This will not give the shipper any opportunity to secure the advantage of a better rate...
...The judges of the Court of Commerce are to be selected by the chief justice of the Supreme Court from the circuit judges of the United States, each to serve five years, the term of one judge to expire each year...
...The man on the street comer has been able for some: time to foresee the end of Cannon's rule...
...No .small part of the public condemnation which the conduct of the railroad managers has invoked has been due to their treatment of their employees...
...Under the present law, while the Interstate Commerce Commission is empowered upon its own motion to make an investigation, it has no power to issue an order changing a rate, or remedying any abuse shown by such investigation to be wrong...
...It remains to be seen whether they will lend themselves to the furtherance of a scheme such as that embodied in this "Railroad Employees' and Investors' Union...
...The women who visited them were Miss Lilian D. Wald of the Nurses Settlement of New York City and Miss Frances Keller of the Inter-Municipal Research Bureaus, both members of the New York State Immigration Commission for 1908 and 1909, and Miss Mary Dreier, president of the New York Women's Trade Union League...
...To the credit of the railway employees it should be said that they are not being stampeded into this new "Union...
...Morrissey...
...The interest of the railway employees in this undertaking is not made definite further than that, by making the business of the railroads more profitable, higher wages to railroad employees may become possible...
...An arbitrary advance in freight rates on lumber from the far Northwest closed mills, threw thousands of men out of employment, inflicted serious loss and hardships...
...As the advocates of the "Union" did not care for this conditional endorsement, the whole resolution was rejected...
...Discussion of these provisions will be reserved for another issue of La Fol-lette's...
...Without troubling to comment or reflect upon Mr...
...The more important of these are the enforcement of the orders of the commission, cases brought to set aside, supercede, or enjoin such orders, mandamus proceedings mentioned in Section 20 and 23 of the interstate commerce act, and cases arising under the Elkins law...
...I anticipate that they will continue to do so...
...The Congressman whose constituency is against Cannonism will have to convince his people that his response to the public sentiment goes deeper than this, if he hopes for re-election...
...If that were all that were involved, the efficiency and honor of our national system of government would not come into the case...
...This is very important...
...The President's bill proposes that the existing law shall be so amended as to give the commission full power to determine and prescribe individual and joint classification of freight...
...If the Commission were unable to complete its investigation within sixty days, an unjust and arbitrary increase in rates would then go into effect and business affected by it suffer very great injury and demoralization...
...Is it not true that every gain which they have made along these lines they have made over the uncompromising opposition of the railroads and only by reason of the support of that very progressive public sentiment which this new "Union" seeks to align them against...
...The railroads have earned for themselves deserved public disapproval...
...So far more than half of the railroad mileage of the country is represented...
...These are some of the provisions in the President's bill which are highly meritorious...
...The employees, on the other hand, have enjoyed at all times to a gratifying degree the sympathy and respect of the public...
...These messages and bills taken together will be analyzed and discussed from time to time in La Pol-lette's...
...The railway employees of the country, if they could be organized as a political unit, would constitute a powerful factor in public affars...
...It will expedite hearings on appeal, will make it less expensive and more convenient for the government to present its cases and most important of all, will prevent the railroads from seeking out a friendly judge to set aside orders of the Interstate Commerce Commission...
...We doubt that such an undertaking can succeed even under the forceful leadership of a man so able and aggressive as Mr...
...The President's bill provides for the creation of a Court of Commerce consisting of five judges having exclusive jurisdiction over practically all matters relating to interstate commerce, which under existing law are subject to judicial proceeding...
...The Interstate Commerce Commission promptly recommended that it be given authority to suspend any advance in a rate until investigation should determine its reasonableness...
...not be a good time for the railway employees to reflect upon the histoty of their past efforts to secure just legislation for their benefit...
...But the public will not long allow its sympathies to be used against its own well-being...
...They have nothing in common with the short-sighted, narrow, and sordid policies which have characterized railway management...
...But though there is no difference in rates, there is often very great difference in the service over different routes, and the President's amendment will give the shipper the chance to secure whatever benefit there might be in better facilities and service of one route over another...
...So far as the purposes of this organization are made public, the primary object is to enlist the railroad employees of the country in the work of cultivating public opinion in opposition to the sentiment which is now recognized to prevail in favor of more strict government regulation of railroads...
...Laugh on, merry gentlemen, while you may...
...Some question may be raised as to whether it is necessary to make this increase in the number of circuit judges in order to provide at detail for the proposed commerce court, as the work in a number of the circuits is well known to be very light...
...But there are others, very important amendments proposed in the bill, which call for critical analysis more extended than space permits at this time...
...They are to join with the railroad magnates in fighting progressive legislation in the interest of the common good, because, if the enactment of such legislation can be prevented, the railroads will earn larger profits and may pay higher wages to their employees—perhaps...
...But it should be remembered, as Puck points out, that "Morse got his first big start through his partnership with Tammany—that vicious alliance between Privilege and Polities which flourishes the country over, from Town Hall to Senate Chamber...
...The President's bill would correct that omission in the act of 1906, and authorize the Commission to fix a rate after investigation upon its own motion as well as upon complaints...
...We have been thinking and wondering of late...
...The amendment authorizes the appointment of five additional circuit judges...
...What if the payment of higher wages is made "possible...
...Since the Forest Service called public attention to the rapid absorption of the water power sites and the threatening growth of a gigantic water power monopoly, the attacks upon it have increased with marked rapidity...
...I hat many members of Congress, who have heretofore sup...
...If the leaders of the railway employees who are sincerely encouraging this new "Union" have secured some new hold upon the railway managers which will enable them to compel a fairer distribution of railroad profits in increased wages, would it not be a good plan to take into their confidence their friends who wish them well...
...At the last annual convention of one of the great Brotherhoods, resolutions endorsing the movement were rejected...
...But let them not think that the public will be misled by mere renunciation of Dersonal fealtv to Cannon...
...At the outset it was definitely announced that the organization would take no part in the adjustment of matters between the employees and the railroads...
...Another of the amendments offered in the President's bill gives the Commission authority over a new rate and classification, and empowers it to suspend the operation of such rate for sixty days...
...The organization aims to build up a public sentiment against legislation which may have the effect of reducing railway earnings and profits...
...At the convention of another Brotherhood, an amendment to the resolution endorsing the "Union" was offered, making the endorsement conditional upon the Union's support of legislation demanded in the interest of railway employees...
...The President's bill also proposes that the shipper, when his shipment might pass over one of two or more through routes, may designate the route over which his property shall be transported...
...This organization was launched a " year ago last September at a meeting of the heads of the railway employees' organizations and the officials of some fourteen of the leading railroads of the country...
...The railroad employees of the country through this organization are to be induced to go into politics, not as public-spirited citizens but as the yeomanry _of the railroad interests...
...The foundation of rate-making may be said to rest on classification...
...In these camps thousands of newly arrived immigrants are employed...
...They need only to be fairly administered...
...The real news lies in the present reports of the procession of "conservatives" who are falling over each other to repudiate Speaker Cannon...
...The interests of the railway employees are in common with the interests of the public...
...We have seen great gangs of men taken away from all civilizing influences and huddled together in lumber or construction camps without the ordinary decencies of life and with nothing but drudgery, sleeping and eating to occupy their time...
...While the railroads reserve the right to continue as in the past to fight legislation for reasonable safety appliances, for railway employers' liability, for shortening the excessive hours of labor of railway employees, and other legislation in the interest of their employees and in behalf of the safety of their employees and the public, the employees are denied even the doubtful assistance of this new "Union...
...The President's bill to amend the interstate commerce act has been introduced in the House...
...Still greater opposition is promised in the near future," * * These same special interests are now cavorting with glee because Pinchot has been removed from public office...
...Now three thoughtful, intelligent and experienced women, trained to observe conditions and to estimate their human value, have made a trip to the great construction camps along the line of the barge canal in New York State and of the aqueduct in process of construction in New York City...
...Do they not owe it to themselves before making this new alliance, to be fairly certain at least of some direct benefit to themselves therefrom...
...He will have to convince them that he has undergone a fundamental change...
...But if the President's proposition is so amended as to provide that the circuit judges assigned to this court shall be selected by a majority of the members of the Supreme Court instead of the chief justice, we should say that the creation of this court has much to recommend it to public favor...
...Making American Citizens SLOWLY the idea is dawning on us as a people that men are more important than the products of the work they perform...
...Gradually the thought has come to us that after a great piece of work was over, after a bridge had been built or a railway laid, there would be left to us not only the material thing which had been constructed, but also the men who had been employed in its construction and according as these men had been used they would be better or worse citizens, keener or less keen to appreciate the ideals which we proudly claim as American...
...It should be borne in mind that the people are demanding the overthrow of a system and not merely of an exponent of misrepresentative government...
...P. H. Morrissey, then President of the Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen, gave up that position of honor, influence, and a good salary, to become the head of the new "Union...
...The matter is much broader than the individual career of a politician who has been well paid for his services over a long period of years...
...It is frankly the purpose of this new "Union," by inducing the employees to make common cause with the railroads, to secure for the latter the benefit of the public esteem which is enjoyed by the former...
...The railroads have seen to that, and our flabby interstate commerce act does not protect him in this particular...
...The President now reinforces this recommendation of the Commission but he limits the time within which the Commission shall have the right to suspend such advanced rate to sixty days...
...Congress treated this recommendation with its usual indifference...
...That he is against not only Cannon but Cannonism under whatever name,—against one-man domination of the House of Representatives in behalf of Special Interests...
...Was there ever a time when the railroad managers made common cause with them even for legislation to protect their lives from needless hazard...
...This was likewise urged upon the Senate when the bill of 1906 was pending before that body...
...For the railway men who attempt to do this will be to forfeit that public esteem which they have always enjoyed...
...It is reported that over 25,000 railroad employees have joined the new Union...
...The public good-will and respect which the railway employees enjoy they may for a brief time be able to utilize for the benefit of the railway managers...
...The propaganda is being most vigorously pushed for membership of both railroads and employees in those states of the Mississippi and Missouri River valleys where the public sentiment for progressive railway regulation is most pronounced...
...If those who stand for System-control of government imagine that they can silence this popular demand and continue their control of public affairs by making a scapegoat of Cannon, they do not know the public mind...
...Even should it meet with success in organization, it can be of only temporary advantage to the railway managers and it must do incalculable injury to the cause of railway employees...
...Cannon's personal character, he is attacked in his own party because he stands now, as he has always stood, for exactly that kind of politics...
...Will the higher wages be paid...
...Within the year ending November 30, 1909, the railroads of the country filed with the commission 184,303 changes in rates and rules governing transportation...
...And Pinchot out of office may prove as good a servant of the people as Pinchot in office...
...ported the Speaker, find it necessary in entering upon their several campaigns for reelection to renounce their allegiance to Cannon is at least gratifying evidence that they recognize the overwhelming popular disfavor of their erstwhile chief...
...This control has subordinated the public good to private interest...
...flMorse, the New York banker and Ice Trust magnate, has been sent to prison for his disastrous plunge into the whirlpool of high finance...
...What if railroad profits are increased...
...We have seen them, after weeks of this dispiriting life, come back to the cities and towns to plunge into dissipation, and we have asked ourselves if it was right, if it was expedient to use them in this way...
...He must convince them that his change is one of conviction and not a change dictated by mere expediency...
...But whatever may be said about Cannon's personal fitness, it should be remembered that the people have renounced Cannonism rather than Cannon...
...The writer brought this defect in the Hepburn bill to the attention of the Senate during the debate upon that measure in 1906...
...It is sordid, narrow, unpatriotic, and in its influence at least, always potentially corrupt...
...It would apear that any such limitation as that proposed by the President might largely nullify the value of the suggested amendment...
...We have suffered too much from a kind of politics which ignores honor, with the result that the business of the country is likely to be prejudiced by a belated and costly effort of the Republican party to show at the Congressional election in November that it has 'done something.* ** This denunciation of the Speaker and what he stands for is about as emphatic as any we have seen but it falls short of the mark...
...The Wall Street Journal, which is intellectually honest and which stands for a respectable and intelligent conservatism, carries in its leading editorial of January 12 the following repudiation of Cannonism...
Vol. 2 • January 1910 • No. 3
