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Show FAILURE OF THE RAILROADS The railroads have only themselves them-selves to thank for the loss of private pri-vate ownership; this is the conclusion conclu-sion of Bradford Merrill, after careful care-ful study of the records, which he makes public in the article, "Railroads "Rail-roads Themselves Prove " in the February number of Hearst's Magazine. Maga-zine. Public ownership has become necessary because the public, has been systematically and for many years deceived and cheated out of its just dues. High finance sometimes seems too complicated to be readily understood, but Mr. Merrill brings out with a clearness which cannot be withstood the sensational story ot the rise of the New York Central lines to power, and the means which were taken to get ev. ry possible concession con-cession from the state, vhile seeing that the public nevsr got the benefit of their success. The story reads like a novel of Big Business, or, with a change of details, like the depredations depreda-tions of the robber barons of the middle ages who held the highways and exacted toll from every one who passed. How money was borrowed from the state and never repayed, how railroads which never existed off of paper were capitalized at large figures, how surplus profits were turned into this over-capitalization, and how, after all this, the railroads have put up a cry, of a need for increase in-crease in rates which would put a burden of $400,000,000 on the nation's na-tion's cost of living, is a startling revelation which the public has been sorely needing, and which clearly explains ex-plains the reason why the railroads have forfeited their right to the unquestioning un-questioning trust of the public to whom they acknowledge no obligations. obliga-tions. This question of Government ownership is one of the most important import-ant in our present domestic affairs, and it is one. which no one, after reading Mr. ' Merrill's article in Hearst's for February, can fall to understand. |