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Show WOULD FORGE SALE OF CENTRAL PACIFIC GOVERNMENT FILES SUIT AT SALT LAKE TO END SOUTHERN PACIFIC' MONOPOLY. Action Taken Would Force Relinquishment Relin-quishment of Ninety-nine Year lease. Violation of Sherman Anti-Trust Law Charged. Salt Lake City. Suit was filed by the government on Wednesday in the federal court for the district of Utah to compel the Southern Pacific company com-pany to relinquish its control of the Central Pacific railroad, which it holds by virtue of a n'nety-niue-year lease of the property. The suit was filed by United States District Attorney William W. Ray, acting under the instructions of United Unit-ed States Attorney General J. C. Mc-Reynolds. Mc-Reynolds. Violations of the Sherman Sher-man anti-trust act and of the Pacific railways act of 1862 are charged in the petition for the dissolution of the raUroad interests. The allegations of the complaint are that the combination combina-tion of the interests of the two railroads rail-roads is in restraint of trade. The petition filed charges also that the Southern Pacific company is discriminating dis-criminating against the transcontinental transconti-nental line formed by the Union Pacific Pa-cific and the 'Central Pacific railroads in favor of the longer route via the Sunset lines, all controlled by the Southern Pacific company. In many ways the suit is one of the most important in the history of western railroads. Should the government's gov-ernment's contention prevail, the Southern Pacific will lose control of the Central Pacific from Ogden to San Francisco, and it is considered more than likely that the Union. Pacific, Pa-cific, at the suggestion of the department depart-ment of justice, will purchase the lines of the Central Pacific. At the very time that the suit was being filed in Salt L'ake delegations from California and Oregon were trying try-ing to urge upon the department of justice a delay for thirty days in order or-der that a further investigation might be made. The business men of California Cali-fornia and the other coast states strongly oppose any curtailment of the holdings of the Southern Pacific company. The Central Pacific road from Ogden Og-den to San Francisco with its connection connec-tion with the Union Pacific at Ogden, the petition alleged, forms a line to the east competitive with the Sunset Route of the Southern Pacific extending ex-tending from San Francisco south to southern California and thence east to New Orleans, where the connection connec-tion is made with steamship lines. |