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THE
Weekly Jeffersonian
A Newspaper Devoted to the Advocacy of the Jeffersonian
Theory of Government.
PUBLISHED BY
THOS. E. WATSON and J. D. WATSON
Editors and Proprietors
Temple Court Building, Atlanta, Ga.
SUBSCRIPTION PRICE - $r oo PER YEAR.
Advertising Rates Furnished on Application.
Enttrtii at Ptitifficr, Atlanta, Ga., January 11, IQO7, at second clan mail matter
ATLANTA, GA., THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 1907
No Dibine Right in Business.
It is soberly claimed by people who ought
to have better sense, that money invested in
railroad property is entitled to a profit.
Plausible assertions carry, sometimes, the
force of argument, and we, therefore, find
many thoughtless editors, and other public
men, weakly admitting that money invested
in railroad property has a right to a profit.
Will you, my dear reader, please chew on
this proposition a little bit before, you gulp it
down ?
From what source docs money invested in
railroad property derive its title to a profit ?
From what high and holy fount comes this
peculiar claim in behalf of railroad capital?
Shall we establish an Order of Nobility in
the commercial world?
Shall one special kind of investment rule
by Right Divine?
Consider, for a moment! Five citizens en
ter the business world to invest their money.
These citizens are equals before the law. Their
money is just common money —coin current
of the realm.
Mr. A. invests in a Book store.
Mr. B. in a Barber shop.
Mr. C. in a newspaper.
Mr. D. in a dry goods, or grocerv store.
Does cither one of the citizens claim any
special rights over the others? No. Each of
them knows that he must hustle for custom,
attend to his knitting, economize on expenses,
manage prudently, and thus make a profit.
Neither of them claims that he is entitled
to a profit. Each of them hopes to earn it:
believes he can earn it. and, therefore, risks
his money. But while this is so, each of these
citizens realizes that his own mistakes, the
changes in business conditions, the ebb and
flow of trade and a hundred other things, may
be the cause of his failure to make a profit.
But here comes the fifth citizen, Mr. F.,
with a wad of money which he chooses to in
vest in railroading. Nobody compels him to
make that investment. He acts of his own
free will. With eves open he walks into the
market and buvs railroad stock’s and bonds.
All right—that’s his privilege. But the mo
ment he has made his purchase, he puffs him
self up with arrogance, and greedily claims
that he is entitled to a net Profit.
Why so?
What rights have his dollars over those in
vested in the Book store, the Barber shop, the
Newspaper and the Store?
Are not all five of these citizens free and
equal? Is not the money of each of them
equally sacred in the eyes of the law?
The citizen who keeps the Book store docs
not demand that the State shall guarantee
him a net Profit. That's his lookout. If he
doesn’t like the returns on his investment, he
quits the business.
So with the publisher, the barber and the
merchant.
But your pampered railroads must be guar
anteed a profit!
Why so?
The State docs not control this business:
why, then, should the State answer for rc-
THE WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN
suits? If the State should take control of the
property, I grant you that the State would be
responsible for consequences. But these cor
porations resent State interference, defy State
laws, ignore Commission orders, violate the
Federal statutes, MISUSE their Franchises,
lavish their revenues upon unlawful, unneces
sary and hurtful expenditures, LEAVING
UNDONE A MULTITUDE OF THINGS
THAT OUGHT TO BE DONE TO EARN
SUCCESS!
How then can they demand to be left un
taxed, or unbridled in their charges, until
they have first made a clear Profit?
We say to them: Manage your roads right,
and you will earn a net Profit.
But even if you don’t, that’s nobody’s affair
but yours.
You voluntarily bought your stock. You
are equally at liberty to sell it. You can quit
the railroad business, if you wish. No law
compels you to stay in it. If you will get off
our Public Roads, the State will get on.
Suppose you do lose money—will you be
the only one? Thousands of merchants fail
every year. Thousands of bankers, miners,
lawyers, publishers, barbers, hotel-keepers
fail everv year. Why, then, should the rail
roads not get caught, once in a while, like the
common run of us?
THEY MUST TAKE THEIR RISKS
LIKE THE REST OF US.
Let us set up no Privileged Class in busi
ness.
Let us have no Aristocracv created bv law.
Let us have no absurd and vicious doctrine
of Divine Right applied to Dollars put .into
Railroads.
Away with such dangerous heresies!
When the citizen buvs railroad stock, let
him understand that he TAKES HIS
CHANCES, just as though he were buying
shares in a Grocerv Company, a Lumber
Company, an Oil Mill, or a State Bank.
If any corporation lawver thinks this is not
sound logic, let him prance into the columns
of the Teffersonian and expose the fallacy.
He shall have a fair fight. Come along, my
son!
M M R
Editorial Notes.
Some six weeks ago, this paper called at
tention to the fact that the States of the Un
ion had full power to deal with the railroad
corporations. Since that time the procession
has been moving right along. State after
State has asserted its power against its cor
poration bosses, and the result is that the
bosses are in a panic. So far, good.
M M
Less than two years ago the Railroad Pres
idents were mocking and defying the Federal
Government. The corporation kings liotlv
resented rate regulation by Congress. Sam
uel Spencer, President of the Southern, de
nounced the proposed Roosevelt plan of reg
ulation as “Lynch Law,” and spent tens of
thousands of dollars of the Southern’s earn
ings in lobbying against the measure in
Washington.
Had Spencer spent the same amount of
money in improving the service on his road,
he might be alive today.
But note the changes wrought by time.
The Railroad Presidents are now grovelling
at the feet of Mr. Roosevelt, begging for
more “Lynch Law.”
They plead for Federal Control to save
themselves from State attacks.
H *
Yes, the States can master the corporations,
if we can just get honest men elected Gov
ernors, and honest men elected to the Legis
latures.
We can break up everv Trust, if we are
united and determined. We can drive out the
Standard Oil thieves, the Lumber Trust rob
bers. and Wall Street pirates generally.
All we need is to go after them in the same
spirit that would animate us were there a
gang of plunderers in the homes.
What we have chiefly to fear is the insid
ious arts of the lobbyist, the weakness of the
flabby editor, and the dishonesty of those who
hold high places.
We must watch, as well as pray.
H * R
The rumor that Mister Colonel Scott, who
manages the Georgia Railroad for Wall
Street, has supplied each engineer with a tal
low candle to be used as an addition to the
oil lamp headlight at night, proves to have
been unfounded. We didn’t take much stock
in the report from the first.
H * *
President Finley of the Southern Railway
System has been down to Atlanta talking
sweetly to the Chamber of Commerce.
Talk is cheap, and railroad presidents are
flooding the country with it just now. Nev
ertheless, they continue to pour water into
the stocks, and to shed the blood of the pas
sengers who patronize their roads.
If the said Presidents don’t wake up to the
fact that there are other people to be con
vinced and placated besides those who con
stitute “Chambers of Commerce,” they are go
ing to fool themselves badly.
*
What the masses want, AND MEAN TO
HAVE:
(1) An honest appraisement of the value
of the railroads, and an end put to this gigan
tic rascality of stock watering.
(2) Safety appliances adopted that will put
a stop to railway murders growing out of
criminal negligence.
(3) Decent accommodations at all passen
ger stations.
(4) Obedience to State Constitutions, State
laws, and Federal Statutes.
(5) Reasonable rates and impartial service.
(6) The expenditure of a sufficient propor
tion of the earnings on the property itself to
maintain it in first class condition. This ever
lasting squeezing of the whole country for
the benefit of a handful of New York million
aires must cease. These roads are our roads,
and must be run, first of all, with reference to
our convenience, our benefit and our safetv.
A handful of New York millionaires are
now using the railroads of the South and
West merely as instruments of robbery.
The people of the South and West are
going to drive these Wall Street highwaymen
off their public roads and are going to devote
the roads to their true purpose—the service
of the Public.
M
%
In his pleasant speech to the pleased Cham
ber of Commerce, President Finley did not
say a word about Restitution. Yet he is
President of a System whose Wall Street
chiefs committed the most high-handed rob
bery that the people of the South have known
since the days of the Yazoo Fraud.
I allude to the gutting and scuttling and
sinking of the Central Railroad.
No blacker crime, of its kind, was ever per
petrated !
Finley’s boss, J. P. Morgan, was the chief
criminal.
Where is that chief criminal —he that looted
the Central Railroad and beggared hundreds
of real widows and actual orphans whose lit
tle hoards were invested in the stock?
Where is he—THE ROBBER?
Is he in the Penitentiary, where he belongs?
Is he scorned and shunned bv all self-re
specting people, as he should be?
No, indeed. A few weeks ago he outbid an
Emperor for a few choice paintings and at
this time he is taking his usual spring jaunt
in Europe.
Few higher heads are to be seen anywhere
than that of J. P. Morgan. Presidents give
him special audience, and royalty delights to
do him honor.
Yet the Wall Street financier, following
