It may be difficult for railroad managers of the present school to adapt themselves to new conditions; it may be impossible for them to understand how any other practices than those which have long been established can succeed; yet in spite of them both the law and public sentiment have already undergone great changes, and still greater changes will follow. It may take years to accomplish this work; to bring about any great reform requires time and a deter, mined purpose on the part of its advocates. Yet I believe the era is not far off when railroads will be limited to their legitimate sphere as common carriers, when they will treat all persons and all places as impartially as does the Government in the mail service, when their chief factor in rate-making will be the cost of service, when they will respect the rights of the public and those of their stockholders, insuring perfect service to the former and fair profits upon the actual value of the lines operated to the latter.
The fact should, finally, not be overlooked that it is in the power of the General Government to prevent many railroad abuses, and especially excessive freight charges, by the improvement of our rivers and harbors. That our water-courses act as levelers of interstate rates is apparent from the fact that railroad rates invariably rise with the freezing of the water-ways and fall with the opening of river and lake navigation. By connecting, wherever feasible, our large Western rivers with the great lakes, the Government could greatly extend the reign of competition in transportation, and thereby keep freight rates within reasonable bounds. Lake transportation even now plays an important role. In 1892 it was not less than 20,000,000,000 ton miles during the season of eight months' duration, and it is almost equal to one-fourth of the total ton mileage of all the railroads in the country for the entire year. The average rate of lake transportation has been reduced to 1.3 mills per ton per mile, which is only about one-seventh of the average railroad freight rate in the United States.
Where the masses hold the sovereign power, there, if anywhere, the welfare of the people should be the supreme law. Violent political commotions never disturb the government whose policy is to secure the greatest good to the greatest number. Thorold Rogers justly remarks that the strength of communism lies in the misconduct of administrations, the sustentation of odious and unjust privileges and the support of what are called vested interests. Lord Coleridge, in a remarkable article published not long ago, recommended a revision of the laws relating to property and contract, in order to facilitate the inevitable transition from feudalism to democracy, and laid down the rule that the laws of property should be made for the benefit of all, and not for the benefit of a class.
During the middle ages, and even up to the beginning of the present century, nearly all the laws on the statute books looked towards the protection of the rights of the feudal lord. Provision was made for the expeditious collection of his dues and a severe punishment of his delinquent debtor. The peasant was forced to labor fifteen hours per day and three hundred and sixty-five days in the year to pay the baron's rentals and sustain life. The law permitted him to be flogged for failing to courtesy the feudal lord, and to be executed for injury to the lord's person, while to kill a peasant was no worse a misdemeanor than to kill his lordship's favorite dog or falcon. In short, all laws were made to protect and perpetuate the wealth and power of the few by impoverishing, humbling and enslaving the masses.
The age of feudalism has given way to an age of democratic liberty, but there is many a feudal feature left in our statutes and many a feudal doctrine is enunciated by our judges and learned expounders of modern jurisprudence. In his decision in the Iowa tariff case Judge Brewer said:
"I read also in the first section of the Bill of Rights of this State [Iowa] that 'all men are by nature free and equal and have certain inalienable rights, among which are those of enjoying and defending life and liberty, acquiring, possessing and protecting property and pursuing and obtaining safety and happiness,' and I know that while that remains as the supreme law of the State, no legislature can, directly or indirectly, lay its withering or destroying hand on a single dollar invested in the legitimate business of transportation."
Had Judge Brewer taken the pains to read on, he would have found in section 2 of the Bill of Rights the following:
"All political power is inherent in the people; government is instituted for the protection, security and benefit of the people."
It is strange that the learned Judge failed to see the difference between "men," the creatures of God, "by nature free and equal," and "possessing certain inalienable rights," and corporations, the creatures of man, having no rights except those which the State sees fit to give them. Had the learned Judge perused the whole of the document to which he refers, he would have found in article VIII, section 12, the following provision:
"The General Assembly shall have power to amend or repeal all laws for the organization or creation of corporations, or granting of special or exclusive privileges or immunities, by a vote of two-thirds of each branch of the General Assembly."