OCR Text |
Show AN ABUSE. The California railway commission has administered a timely rebuke to the lawyers and others who are seeking to gorge their purses from tho vicissitudes of tho Western Pacific. Whenever a property worth millions is in straits a raid is made upon it by all who can get near enough to share in the plunder. One of the attornej's engaged in the proceedings which resulted in the sale of the road for $18,000,000 put in a bill of $1 72,000 to -cover his work on this particular case during sixteen months. The United States commissioner commis-sioner who read the notice of sale at the auction and who accepted the bid of the purchaser demanded $7000. . Perhaps Per-haps his task occupied an hour of his time, and $7000 an hour would make even a plumber gasp. He may have figured that as special master with discretionary dis-cretionary power to accept or refuse bids on a property worth $18,000,000 he was entitled to something for his horse sense and his special knowledge, but even reckoning by tho most liberal standards his work could not have been worth more than a few hundred dob lars. The California railway commission suggests as a remedy for this widespread evil that receivership and foreclosure proceedings be handled by the interstate commerce commission and by the various state railroad commissions. How this would improve the situation is not explained. ex-plained. Are tho state railroad commissions, com-missions, whose membership usually comprises men who know little or nothing noth-ing about the Ui'w and less about railroading, rail-roading, any better qualified than the courts to deal with such proceedings? Nevertheless, a remedy is needed and the California commission has performed a public service in calling attention to a long-standing abuse which seems to retain its power for evil throughout the years. |