Baltimore believed a railroad should be built to the West. The Baltimore and Ohio, first of all great railroads, shows by its name the purpose for which it was incorporated. Pennsylvania, however, undertook to connect the West by a system of combined railroads and canals.
From the first both cities looked to Pittsburgh as the logical terminus of their improvements. Then began a struggle of Philadelphia-Baltimore rivalry, which lasted for forty-three years, from 1828 to 1871.
In 1828 Pennsylvania had given a charter to the Baltimore and Ohio, by which it could construct its line through Southwestern Pennsylvania to Pittsburgh. The members of the Legislature at that time did not consider future competition, for the State works had not been built.
The charter was granted for fifteen years, and, in 1839, another act extended its provisions until 1847. This act, among other onerous conditions, was discriminating in favor of traffic to Philadelphia; it also contained a heavy State tax on freight, and the company could not accept it.
The Pennsylvania State works from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh were completed in 1834. When the charter of the Baltimore and Ohio expired in 1843, the road was completed only as far as Cumberland.
The company tried to obtain better terms from Pennsylvania. The residents of the western part of the State were all eager for an additional outlet to the coast, but the Philadelphia politicians were unwilling to yield any concession to their Baltimore rivals.
Several years later it was admitted that the State works would never provide adequate transportation facilities to the West, even though in excess of $10,000,000 had already been expended and the State seriously involved. Pennsylvanians were made to realize that railroads were superior to canals and that the commercial solution of Philadelphia lay in a central railroad to Pittsburgh.
The feeling in all three cities reached fever heat. The legislative hall was the battleground and all interests were well represented. The battle centered on the bill granting right of way through Pennsylvania to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.
Public meetings were held in Philadelphia and elsewhere. A State railroad convention was held at Harrisburg, January 14, 1846, where resolutions were adopted favoring the Central Railroad scheme and against the Baltimore and Ohio right of way grant.
The people of Pennsylvania believed since a railroad must be built it would be better for it to be run entirely through Pennsylvania and be a Pennsylvania institution. They also felt that if the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was given the franchise, it would be next to impossible to raise money to build the Pennsylvania Railroad.