The Rock Island freight traffic manager also testified to the destruction of papers showing rebates or concessions.
“Commissioner Clements. Why are they destroyed?
“Mr. Johnson. Simply for the purpose of destroying any evidence there may be.
“Commissioner Clements. All the papers you know about or entries that you are familiar with are destroyed?
“Mr. Johnson. I understand they are all destroyed.
“Commissioner Clements. Have you any recent ones?
“Mr. Johnson. I do not think they are more than thirty days old.
“Commissioner Clements. You think that all up to within thirty days are destroyed?
“Mr. Johnson. That is the rule or custom.”[[362]]
The shippers who receive rebates, etc., adopt similar measures to keep their modest affairs from the public. In April, 1904, the newspapers reported that the Interstate Commerce Commission was going to Boston to investigate rebates and private car-line abuses. The office force of the Armour office at Boston was immediately set to work packing into barrels all letters and records that might show a combination or understanding among the houses or with the railroads, or other inconvenient matters, and all these dangerous documents were incontinently fed to the furnaces.