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Show RAILROAD DISCRIMINATION. The platform of the Nebraska Democracy Democ-racy contains this plank : We believe the Railroad Commission created cre-ated by the last Legislature of this State is an institution simply to provide more places for Republican office-holders, and is inadequate inad-equate to correct the evils complained of; we therefore demand such legislation as will prevent discrimination against individuals, and shall so regulate the tariff on the railroads rail-roads in this State as will be just to the roads and also to the people. What the Railroad Commission in Nebraska Ne-braska is we are unable to say, but as this plank says it "is inadequate to correct cor-rect the evils complained of." The portion of this plank which most interests us is the matter of discrimination against individuals. What that is in this Territory we all know. Not only have individuals been discriminated against, but the Territory itself has been discriminated discrim-inated against. The smelting interests of Salt Lake City have been sacrificed to build up Omaha,and Denver, and Chicago, and other places. So long as Idaho and Montana have not proper facilities for smelting the products of their mines, Salt Lake City becomes naturally the smelting smelt-ing centre to which the ores of these Territories Ter-ritories would be shipped if it were not for discrimination. The facilities are all here, and the city -itself is the centre of a vast mining country ; and the shorter distance between our city and the shipping points of Idaho I and Montana, as compared with the distance dis-tance between those shipping points and Omaha or Denver, makes Salt Lake City the proper receptive point for the mining products of our northern neighbors. But Salt Lake City is forbidden to enjoy the advantages which nature has so abundantly abund-antly bestowed upon her. All this refers to commerce with towns outside of Utah's boundaries and to railroads which are foreign corporations. Still, railroads which have received their franchises from Congress Con-gress 6hould not be permitted to kill an industry or Btamp out- a town through discrimination; and such discrimination should be forbidden by the local Legislatures of the Territories so far as internal commerce is concerned, although al-though it is probable that if the evil of dis-irimination dis-irimination continues to grow, Congress wiil be importuned to exercise its consit-tutional consit-tutional power to regulate inter-State commerce, and forbid discrimination. Our local railroads have not been entirely free from the curse of discrimation, but the discrimination has chiefly been against individuals, and not against localities. ' These thinsrs are wron?. and should bp ' righted. Railroads are .given great powers not that men may make money alone, but because they are a public necessity and quasi-public in their nature. We do not believe that the fixing of the freight and passenger tariff of railroads by Legislatures Legis-latures or Railroad Commissioners is a wise thing, but the cutting of rates one day and the sending of them up another day should be forbidden, unless such cuts and raises shall be announced for so many weeks in advance, and such cuts and raises shall be maintained for a certain length of time. What, at times, seems a discrimination is, not, as where the rates on a very long haul, which requires no shifting of freight or switching of cars, are somewhat lower than the rates for short hauls, which require re-quire frequent stops and much handling of freight. Neither is it discrimination to give better rates on car load lots' than on small shipments of two or three hundred pounds. The railroad legislation of Utah needs considerable overhauling, and the people will look to the Legislature this winter to enact such needed legislation. " |