Show HARRIMAN TELLS OF HIS I 1 FINANCIAL operations I 1 th the great FinAn financier cler refuses to tell interstate commerce commission what awat portion of alton stock he owns new york feb 23 25 E H harriman head mead of the union pacific sy system stern spent to day in recital of portions of the intimate history of the financial operations of himself and his associates before the interstate commerce commission which in ill behalf of ho united states government is investigating consolidations and tomb combinations lina of carriers relations between carriers and community of interest therein their rates facilities and practices special counsel for tho the government made particular attack upon the reorganizing and financing of the chicago and alton railroad by the harriman syndicate and their action with a challenge by counsel for the railroads of the right of the interstate commerce commission to inquire into the private transactions of an all indi vidual constituted the two chief events of the days proceedings mr harriman Harrl man declined to tell what proportion of the preferred stock of the alton sold to the union pacific belonged to him individually and the way was paved for taking the question into the federal courts the point raised involves a material question upon the inquisitorial power of the commission and is of serious importance to the whole of interstate corporation investigation there was an effort to show allow there had bad been an inflation of the stock securities and liabilities of the alton that the harriman syndicate had taken unfair profits by declaring a dividend of 30 per cent from the proceeds of the first sale of the bonds amounting to forty millions of dollars that the syndicate had sold itself the bonds at an unreasonably low figure only to resell them at enormous profit that the harriman syndicate had in the alton capitalized the losses of former stockholders in the road and the money which had been spent by the old manago management ment for betterments over a period of ten years and already charged to operating expenses that tha the books of the company h had been doctored and that for an In increase creaso of the stock mock and liabilities from frona forty millions to one hundren and sixteen millions wag was nothing to show except an expenditure of twenty million in Improve improvements mOnts on the prop erty mr Harrl Harri mans testimony was a denial ft of all the charges and aid he ma made ian an extended 1 explanation and defense of the transactions which he contended were fully justified by the conditions and circumstances of the time and had conducted entirely in the open Harrl Harri mans examination lasted fo for five hours and wis was unmarked by acrimony the witness declined to be led into an attempt to explain the details of the alton operations and constantly referred red his questioner to the records of the alton mr Harri mans testimony began |