the country as
naturally and
state Commerce Commission is the
development of
The second factor laid down for the guidance of the Inter-

value of commodities in general over
justifies an increase in the revenues of the western lines.
western freight rates, it appears that consideration of the market
en, and as over a longer period of time prices have far out-distanced
recent years prices have risen while western freight rates have fall-
established were not unjust and unreasonable. Consequently, as in
and has reported in its various general rate changes that the rates
under the legal compulsion of maintaining just and reasonable rates,
period of time, prices have increased very much more than have
western freight rates. The Interstate Commerce Commission has been
while prices have had a marked upward trend, and that over a longer
the past few years western freight rates have decreased materially
a reasonable period of years

country cannot devel

a

whole.

rail and water or coast-route compe
to compel the all-rail lines to acc
Atlanta. The Georgia Railroad C
rate from Macon to the coast is low
car-load than the Atlanta rate to th'
rate by the coast is lower from Macc
the low cost of the part rail and par
pel the low rate of thirty-four cent:
force a still lower rate at Macon i
higher rate of thirty-six cents maint
tion of the defendants that coast-rout
justifies a lower rate from Atlanta tha3
son City is contradicted by the hig
which the coast-route is shorter, less
the competition is more controlling.
To avoid its effect or to explain the
rates the defendants state the fact th
Atlanta is first carried there by railro
rate from the mills, and this fact is Po
the charge from Atlanta should be lo
When freight is offered to the der
shipment it is their duty to take it for
above a reasonable compensation for
formed by them and not below a rate
profit. The duty of equalizing rates
line is not imposed on them as receiv
ment. What concerns them relates t
the goods and the charges for the serv
goods or the fact that lumber comes t
mill or over some other railroad or ov
an element which enters into the ques
reasonably demand for the transporta

to render. This equitable rule is no
under consideration by the statement
of one of the defendant companies w
"We have already brought that lumbe
to Atlanta." When freight is taken up
and delivered at Atlanta for sale or o

dent and necessary to through transp

It

is

natural and obvious that

proper the

is complete, and when such freight is forwarded the carriage from Atlanta is a new undertaking. The character of a local shipment between the cities or between the mills and cities of Georgia is the same when made by the defendants or some one of them as if made by some other railroad company, and whether made by one or the other it cannot legally have the effect of raising or lowering the charges for transportation of the freight when re-shipped.

The investigation shows that the Atlanta Lumber Company, doing business at Atlanta, owns saw-mills at Amoskeag, Georgia, on the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia road, nearer the coast than Atlanta or Macon. The rule insisted upon by the defendants permits the Lumber Company to bring its lumber through Macon to Atlanta for sale, and if that is not satisfactory, then the lumber may be re-shipped. to Boston or other markets two cents lower, because it has once paid a railroad charge. No such preference is offered to the Lumber Company or other shippers who would test the Macon Market. When that market has been tried without success the property may be re-shipped, but at no lower rate in consideration of the freight having paid a local charge over a railroad to Macon; that preference and advantage is given to Atlant alone. The rule contended for makes unjust discrimination easy and encourages undue preference to particular towns and cities to the unreasonable disadvantage of others. The distance to Atlanta from Amoskeag is greater than to Macon, but the rule insisted upon applies as well to freight carried the same distances to both places, when carried by railroad. It was shown that there are no mills at Atlanta, and that lumber is not manufactured there. The same could be shown, and is true, as to Macon, but the fact does not affect the question.

The defendants further urge in justification of their rates what is stated in the testimony of one of their officers. He says, "We carry a good deal of machinery into Georgia, and lately have been carrying a great many iron rails;" and, again, "almost our entire lumber business during the past twelve months has been brought from Georgia in cars that went there loaded with machinery." This was said by the

traffic manager of the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia. Railway Co. of that road and its lumber traffic in the past. year, but gives us no information as to the tonnage of the road other than lumber. We are without information as to the aggregate of its tonnage in different directions, while over the Norfolk & Western, which connects with the East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia, traffic north and south is nearly equal. That the defendants have carried freight to Georgia. in cars for some of which profitable return loads were not always obtainable will hardly be disputed. But there is nothing in this fact nor does the investigation show anything to warrant the conclusion that the freight over defendant's line is exceptional in the direction of movement or varies from the rule applicable to roads generally that at one period or season of the year more freights go in one direction; at another season more in the opposite direction. The rates in question are not casual and the result of a condition of things first existing in the last twelve months. They were permanently established and substantially the same before the Act to regulate commerce was passed. When the preponderance of freight is so largely in one direction that the supply of empty cars exceeds the demand for return loads at full rates, it is not unlawful to encourage business by affording transportation on less profitable terms. Such a policy of business prudence applied to the case we are considering does not make it necessary to receive any greater compensation for the shorter distance. The receipts would be the same and the expenses less if the empty cars were drawn to Johnson City and there loaded with lumber at the same rate obtainable for the longer distance.

Next it is urged in justification of the rates made that the Johnson City "rate per hundred pounds per mile" should be greater because the poplar is of greater bulk, and also that it is of much more value, and on these grounds should bear a higher rate than the yellow pine. The space required is rightly taken into account in the adjustment of freight charges when the bulk is so considerable in comparison with weight as to occupy space which if taken up by heavier freight would yield larger receipts. This is not such a case.

Here it is shown that Georgia pine lumber is of such a character and manufactured in such lengths and shapes that the car-load is lighter and the freight charges less at the same rate per hundred pounds than on the car-load of poplar. It thus appears the expense to the carrier is not greater for the poplar. The ascertained facts show that the difference in the price at the place of shipment, with the transportation charges added, and the price in the eastern market leaves the larger profit on the pine. The service is therefore worth more to the dealer in pine. Some varieties of pine are worth double as much as others, both in Georgia and in Massachusetts markets. In Boston the poplar is worth ten dollars per thousand less than some qualities of pine and ten dollars more than other varieties. The defendants have in their published ratesheets classed all descriptions of pine and poplar lumber together and named the same rate on each. We think they are correctly so classed and rated.

The disproportion in the charges on lumber made by defendants is found in greater degree in their charges on goods classed and rated higher. The Boston rate from Atlanta on goods of the first-class is $1.14. From Moore's Mills, ten miles farther south, it is $1.33. From Macon, still nearer the coast, it is $1.09. From both Holton, ten miles farther from the coast, and Bullard's, fifteen miles nearer to the coast than Macon, the rate is $1.33. The alleged existence of coast-route competition by rail to the coast, thence by ocean carriage, is urged as a justification for this system of transportation charges. But we find the same system prevailing where the influence of the Georgia Commission regulation and the coast-route competition is not felt. Over defendant's Memphis line the rate between Memphis and Bristol is ninety-two cents. Between Memphis and Johnson City, the shorter distance, it is one dollar and eight cents. And while the local Georgia rates to the sea and the low cost of ocean transportation are influential in fixing lumber and other rates, these relatively unequal rates are largely the result of a vicious system under which carriers too frequently exact unreasonably high rates at places where there is no other carrier to take the freight.

A further complaint is that in carrying lumber at the rate named the defendants perform for some of their customers greater service for the same compensation, and for others greater service for less compensation than is demanded and received from the complainants. The relative inequality

of the charges made as compared with the service rendered is here presented and urged by the complainants as affording evidence that the rate charged from Johnson City is unjust and unreasonable and should be reduced. Practically, the only matter of interest to the complainants is how much they are to pay and to the defendants how much they are to receive for carrying lumber from Johnson City to Boston. The complainants aver that their business is injured, its growth and development prevented, by these freight charges. Whatever may be the effect of the disputed rates on the complainant's business, it will hardly be questioned that long-distant transportation charges on lumber make so large a part of its price that any considerable disadvantage in the rates paid prevents that fair competition in which the public has an interest.

The transportation charges on lumber from Johnson City to Boston are considerably more in the aggregate than they are from West Virginia stations on the Baltimore & Ohio road nearly as distant, or from West Virginia stations on the Chesapeake & Ohio road more distant, or from North Carolina stations on the Richmond & Danville road more distant. Distance is not always the controlling element in determining what is a reasonable rate, but there is ordinarily no better measure of railroad service in carrying goods than the distance they are carried. Asheville and Hot Springs, North Carolina, are practically in the same territory with Johnson City, and on a line over which, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, we must assume freights are no more steady or in no larger volume than over the line of the defendants. Unexplained, these lower rates are not without significance,. for in comparison with them the Johnson City rate is excessive. In the division of the Atlanta rate twenty-five and one-tenth cents per hundred pounds ($60.24 on the car-load) is the part accepted by the other defendant companies for the haul