paid by the creditors and share-holders, $12,463,942, with the excellent results of the year's business, enabled the companies on January 2, 1888, to terminate the receivership and resume possession of their properties and business (p. 13). (Page 19.) Various items to the amount of $20,043,775.83, which have been carried as assets on the books of the railroad company for a number of years, have been charged to profit and loss and closed into the capital accounts of the company.

The same action yas taken in respect to $13,301,740.73 standing upon the books of the coal company. This cool method of getting rid of a small debt of $33,345,516.56 by the book-keeping trick of charging it to profit and loss and to capital account is one which individuals are not able to follow. Is it honest?

But the specific point in his testimony we are seeking is the remark. able statement in speaking of Mr. McLeod, general manager:

While we have done an increased business (after eliminating the transportation charges from the gross receipts and expenses of the coal company) shows an increase in the gross receipts of both companies of $4,820,582, and a decrease in expenses for both companies of $273,867.

Just how the transportation expenses on coal could appear in the gross receipts of the coal company, though they would in the gross receipts of the railroad company and in the gross expenses of the coal company, is something of a conundrum to the uninitiated.

So it seems that John Doe, carrier, has mercifully forgiven the debt of John Doe as coal miner, when he was not "able" to pay freight, but that hereafter no foolishness of that sort will be tolerated. The railroad company does not intend to let the coal company "stick us any more"and Mr. Austin Corbin said that without the suggestion of a smile!

CONCEALMENT OF ACTUAL RATES ON COMPANY'S COAL.

The ignorance of the Reading officials as to the rate of freight paid on their own coal was very surprising. President Corbin did not know, nor did Superintendent Whiting. General Manager McLeod could not say, and the President of the coal company, George de B. Keim, was charmingly uncertain. His company shipped in 1887 6,246,422 tons, which it sold for $18,856,550, and on which it paid freight to the railroad company, $6,014,051, or one-third of the receipts. So large an item of expense should naturally impress itself upon the responsible executive officer. Yet, listen to Mr. Keim, who abounds in "impressions:"

Q. What would it cost me to transport that coal over the Reading to Philadelphia ?— A. That is the question you asked Mr. McLeod. I do not know.

Q. And he said he could not answer it. You have been shipping a great deal of coal and ought to know.-A. I have been connected with the company a long while, but the toll sheets change somewhat and I can not tell you. I can only tell you by reference to memorandum.

Q. Do toll sheets vary much in the course of two or three months?-A. To a certain extent they do. The traffic manager is here and could answer those things.

Q. Do you know what the price would be from Schuylkill Haven to Philadelphia ?— A. I think it is $1.80 a ton, but will not be positive.

Q. One dollar and eighty cents a ton?-A. That is my impression; it varies very

much.

Q. Twenty-five tons would be $45 per car to draw that car 90 miles; is that correct-A. Yes; your figuring appears so. If I am correct in my prices the deduction is very easily inade.

Q. Does your mining company pay the railroad company $1.80 a ton for carrying your coal for that distance?-A. We pay to the railroad company exactly what others pay. That is my impression. My impression is that the rate is $1.80 to the city of Philadelphia.

Q. I understand that you pay what others pay?-A. Yes, that is my impression of what we pay, and when you asked me I tried to tell you. I may not be right, but as actual consignors we would be " charged" that amount, and we would pay that or try to pay it (and there he let the cat out of the bag).

Q. In a small way I do some shipping myself, and I know just what it costs me a car to ship from one point to another. You are shipping millions of tons of coal, and it does seem to me that if you would press your memory a little that you ought to form some idea of the cost of shipping this coal.-A. I propose to show you; I told you that it was $1.80 a ton.

Q. Is it not about the fact that no account is kept between the coal and the railroad company for freights?-A. No, sir; the account is kept to a farthing.

Q. Is it kept every day?-A. Yes, sir; without knowing that I say yes, sir. Every day just as regular as anybody else.

Q. Just as with other shippers?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. The books of the coal and iron company show that?-A. They would.

Q. Can you produce those books and let us examine them? We would like to know, something about this in some way.-A. Yes, sir (but did not).

CONTROL OF PRODUCTION BY WITHHOLDING RAILROAD CARS.

One of the most glaring outrages practiced by the carrier on the producer is that of regulating the number of railroad cars which the operator may have. Mr. Brumm, member of Congress from that district, stated (pp. 3 and 4) that a man named Brennan, nicknamed Dunnan, has been for years employed by the railroad company to gauge the capacity of a mine, and to decide the number of cars to which it would be entitled under the allotment system.

A collier might be able, if he were permitted to work just as he pleases, and he were given all the cars he wanted, to ship three hundred cars a day. But the Reading system says to him, "You shall not ship your three hundred cars a day, because if you do so you will ship more than we do. Your capacity must be limited to our capacity, and you must get cars in proportion to our capacity." And it is Mr. Brennan's business to gauge these capacities. They employ this man, and they make the allotment. They are masters of the situation, and give just as many cars as they see fit.

Mr. Corbin (122) admits the employment of Dunnan, and states that the "object is that the mines shall not be supplied with any more cars than they used, and if we are short of cars they shall be fairly divided with the people who ship over the road. Sometimes we have a large supply of cars; then again we do not have so many. We endeavor to furnish the various parties who ship over the road as near evenly as we can."

Mr. Whiting, general superintendent of the coal company (p. 173-175), speaking of the 18 per cent. of the total production which at one time was allotted to the coal company, says that "it was made according to the relative capacity of the different producers, their relative capacities to produce as ascertained by the production of previous years." That Brennan had been for a number of years employed by the railroad company, and "known as a car-rater;" that it was his duty "to visit colliers that wanted their collieries rated as to their producing capacity. He went through certain formula, examined the capacity of production, etc., and deduced from that formula the number of railroad cars that collier could ship."

Jno. McCutcheon, a gray-haired miner, selected by fellow miners at Shenandoah to give evidence, also speaks of Dunnan (471) to the effect that he divided the cars to the shipper according to his estimate of the capacity of the mine. Whether Dunnan is now upon the pay-roll of Doe as carrier, or of Doe as coal company, is immaterial. He is paid by Doe, and does what Doe bids him to do.

INDIVIDUAL OPERATORS "DISCIPLINED" BY WITHHOLDING RAILROAD CARS.

W. H. Lewis, superintendent of the William Penn colliery, near Shenandoah, an individual operator, and dependent upon the railroad com

pany for cars, after a deal of close questioning (pp. 381-2) let out the fact that the railroad company, under the allotment system, had apportioned the output, and had said:

"Unless you unload these cars we can not give you any more." We could not unload without we found a purchaser, and sometimes it was pretty hard to unload them. Q. If you could not find a purchaser, what did you do?-A. If I could not sell the coal I did not want the cars.

Q. I want the fact as to whether you were limited in the number of cars ?--A. I do not think we were.

Q. Could you get all the cars you demanded ?-A. Oh, no; we could not.

Q. Why ?-A. Because they were loaded; that is why there were no cars. I could always get cars when there were empty cars, and I could get my proportion of them. The coal exchange, when it could not sell its coal, would resolve not to work for three days until they satisfied themselves the cars were unloaded.

Q. Now, I ask you whether there were not individual operators who wanted to work and wanted cars, and the company refused to give them?-A. Some of the parties were corrected that way.

Q. Who was corrected?-A. I suppose there were individual operators who wanted to take advantage of their neighbors and run when nobody else was running. I think we had an operator up here at one time who tried to do that. I do not know how he succeeded.

Mr. Coxe, an individual operator, also indicates the same practice. The mere fact that Dunnan was employed, and is to day employed, to rate the number of cars which should be supplied to each mine, according to his estimate of its capacity, tells the whole story. The allotment, of which abundant proof has been given, could not be enforced except by the railroad company; and the long continuance and present existence of that system is the best evidence that it was and is absolutely enforced by the withholding of cars.

THE RAILROAD COMPANIES BUY THE OUTPUT OF INDIVIDUAL OPERATORS.

It is probable that the railroad company, through the coal company, buys at the mines the great bulk of coal produced by individual operators; first, because it can force them to sell, and second from the evidence.

Before the examiners Mr. John H. Jones testified (Exrs., 156):

I suppose it would be proper to explain there that a good deal of the tonnage of some of the northern companies, the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western and the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company, is what is called contract tonnage; that is to say, they buy or contract to have coal mined from the mine, and they take the entire product of the colliery, of course, and may supply one month to the Delaware and Hudson and another month to another company, according to the way the coal is sold.

Q. Do you mean to say that the railroad company purchased coal, or merely agreed to transport it to market ?—A. I understand it to be the practice of some of the companies (railroad), although I do not know that it ever was the practice of the Philadelphia companies to not only mine coal and sell, but to contract of different parties and take the product under an arrangement of their own; they call them contractors. Q. As purchaser?—A. Yes, sir; I do not say that the railroad companies did that. Q. It was a sort of leasing of the property?-A. Yes, sir. It is a practice that prevailed to a greater or lesser extent during my whole knowledge of the coal business. In the case of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western, I believe they conduct their whole business within their own corporation, and buy and sell just as a corporation. The Delaware and Hudson Canal Company do the same. What I mean by that is, They have no auxiliary companies respecting coal interests.

Mr. S. C. Harris, sales agent of the Reading Company (Exrs., 195),

said:

Q. What do you mean by operators; miners?-A. No; those who operate and work coal mines we call operators.

Q. And those who ship coal also?-A. Operators at times ship their own coal, but they sell it to shippers as à usual thing.

Before your committee, Mr. W. H. Hines, of Wilkes Barre, speaking of the Lehigh region (533), says:

Nearly all these individual operators do not send their coal to market. They prepare it, and they sell their coal in the cars to these larger coal companies, who are in a combination. Individual operators are controlled by the combine.

Hon. Eckley B. Coxe (621) says:

One-third of our capital is invested in the selling business. We buy from people who do not have a selling department. They do not put any capital in their selling department, and they sell to A, B, C, or anybody. They, of course, have to take less than a man who has a selling department, because they save all that capital, all the trouble, and all the risk. If I buy 10,000 tons of coal from you and sell it, you get your money from me at once, instead of waiting, and there is always a certain amount of losses.

Q. If you buy of me 10,000 tons of coal, I ought to know just what you make?-A. You do not know, because we may buy the coai when the market is dull and pile it up, because we have the capital to do it. There are always people who simply mine coal and have to sell as they produce it. There are times when a man is loaded up with coal and comes to you and asks you to take $5,000 or $10,000 worth of coal.

The statement of the sales agent of the Reading Coal Company clinches the matter; it is the largest seller of anthracite, and has the most extensive selling department: Operators at times ship their own coal, but they sell it to shippers as a usual thing.

EFFECT OF THE RAILROAD MONOPOLY ON WORKMEN.

We turn to another great branch of the subject, namely, the effect upon miners and laborers of this continued and ruthless domination by the carrier.

During the first forty years the mines were worked by individuals, just as are farms. The hundreds of employers were in active competition with each other for labor. The fundamental law of supply and demand alike governed all parties. As to engagement, employer and employé stood upon a common level of equality and manhood. Skill and industry upon the part of the miner assured to him steady work, fair wages, honest measurement, and humane treatment. Should these be denied by one employer, many other employers were ready to give them. The miner had the same freedom as to engagement, the same reward for faithful service and protection against injustice, that the farm hand possesses because of the competition between farmers employing hands. With the development of the railway system and its peculiar methods. the law of competition was steadily restrained, and finally suspended. To-day seven great carrying companies are the real operators in the whole region, and have either driven out the many individual operators or else absolutely control the few that remain. This virtual combination of all employers into one syndicate has practically abolished competition between them as to wages, and gradually but inexorably the workmen have found themselves encoiled as by au anaconda, until now they are powerless.

FIRST POINT OF DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MINERS AND OTHER ARTISANS;

LIMITED DEMAND.

It is difficult to exaggerate the degree of their helplessness. In order to fully realize it one must remember that the vocation of an anthracite miner requires distinctive knowledge and deftness, just as in other industries. He is a skilled artisan, who only by years of experience attains proficiency. This is more or less true of all the varied forms of

labor in preparing coal, for while boys pick out slate, yet even that requires practice. Furthermore, the skill of the miner has no value in other vocations. Bar the anthracite region against him, and he is reduced from a skilled to a common laborer. The fruits of a long apprenticeship and practice are thereby taken from him. In the mine he is a superior workman, and commands wages accordingly. Out of the mine both his superiority and wages vanish.

Another fact is, that mining is the sole industry of the anthracite region proper. Relatively, there is neither agriculture nor manufactures. The few towns which supply the wants of its population would disappear with the extinction of mining. Hence the demands for labor are in the mining, preparing, or transporting coal. As one witness put it, "the only work a man can get here is either at a mine or on the railroad." If the anthracite fields were as extensive and scattered across the continent as are the bituminous fields, or as is the demand for carpenters, then the miner could better his condition by migration. But now he must either remain in the region or, throwing away his skill, must begin life anew by learning a different vocation. Just to the extent that men of experience, with dependent families, can not afford this sacrifice are they in the grip of the operator. Here is the first point of vital difference between the status of an authracite miner and that of other artisans.

SECOND DIFFERENCE: FALSE STANDARDS OF PAYMENT.

A second point of difference lies in the fact that while mechanics generally are paid a fixed and known sum for a given amount of labor, the wages of the miner are indefinite, variable, and not foreknown. A carpenter agrees for $4 to do ten hours' work, or a printer for so many cents will set 1,000 ems. The wages to be paid are precise and foreseen. But the wages of the great majority of miners so far from being, say, 40 cents a cubic yard, or 10 cents an hour, are a percentage of the price for which the coal sells, and this price varies with every sale.

The method of determining wages is clearly stated by Hon. C. N. Brumm (7) as follows:

In the Lehigh region the wages are fixed at what is called the $5 basis, which means that miners shall get a certain sum of money per week, day, hour, or car, whenever coal sells at $5 at Elizabethport, the New York shipping point. That is, that the laborers outside or inside the mine shall get a certain rate of wages. This rate at Elizabethport is the price of the coal, including the cost of mining and the freight, owing that the freight is an element that is calculated in fixing the price, and that it ought to be separate and distinct, and have nothing to do with what freights are to Elizabethport.

In the Schuylkill region the basis is $2.50. A great many do not understand why it should be $5 in one region and $2.50 in another. It is simply because the price is regulated by the scales at tide-water or by the scales at Schuylkill Haven or Port Carbon. Mr. Gowan, ex-president of the Reading Railroad, at one time regulated the price of wages by the tolls (freight rates), not by the price of coal at Schuylkill HaYes; hence, when Mr. Corbin tells you that the present price of coal will not warrant the payment of higher wages, it is because they regulate the price of coal at the shipPg point, and if it is losing at that point they can make up the loss by raising the ire gut rates.

Should a farmer for years agree to raise wheat at, say, 60 per cent. of the price obtained in New York, he would certainly be entitled to know just what that price was and just how much the carrier charged for transportation. To deny him this knowledge would justify the sus picion of rascality somewhere, and if an arrangement were perfected by which neither he nor the public could ascertain what the New York price was, this suspicion would be intensified.

H. Rep. 4147-6