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Show ' uu RAILROADS' GREAT LOSS Chairman Lee of Con-ference Con-ference Committee With Fireman Says Floods Will Reduce Surplus New York. April 5 The entire raH'oad system of Ohio and Indiana was practically put out of business for five days by the Hoods in the I middle w est To repair and replace the railway adected by this disaster will practical!) wipe out the surplus arri iu man) cases dividends will he threatened. The cuiso of course. Is t at all such damage mu6t be re-tileved re-tileved out of current earnings and c;nnot be charged to capital.' This posltlou of some of the eastern east-ern railroads was set forth today by Klishj Ia-c chairman of the conference confer-ence committee ot managers, m sum-m'ng sum-m'ng up hefore the arbitration board tha! It settling under the Erdman act the demands of .".4. Out) firemen for er wages and eitra help on large 6 locomotives. W. S. Carter for the I emen. concluded his summary shortly before Mr. Lee addressed the board The boards decision is to be announced an-nounced April 28, V S Carter, president of the B otherhood of Firemen, concluding his argument today, took up the two-riretnen two-riretnen rp'estlon and declared that t nt- mechanical stokers which the railroads maintain lighten the labors ol ihe firemen, did not do the work ! were guaranteed to do He said tbi ir use co-t the railroads more that! an extra fireman would nd for these gray-haired engineers," engi-neers," he continued, "to come here and say that thev worked harder as firemen in their day than do the firemen fire-men of the present is merely a con-ccll con-ccll The engines that they fired in those days would not make a good watch charm now" n |