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routes were ordered by the Commission, the complainant would have to look to the Illinois Central to supply the necessary cars for the cabbage movements; and that it is a general understanding and custom among carriers that the line having the longer haul will supply cars for movements over through routes. He also explained that it would be impossible for a short line like his own to equip itself with sufficient refrigerator cars for the traffic in question.

The complainant has through routes and joint rates in effect with the Wisconsin Central Railroad Company. And for a period of one month and seventeen days through routes and joint rates to the markets in question were in effect under a joint tariff filed by the complainant and the Illinois Central Railroad Company. Several carloads of cabbages were moved over the through routes and under the joint rates thus established. But the Illinois Central Railroad Company soon canceled the tariff because, as claimed by the complainant, objection had been made to it by the Chicago & Northwestern Railway Company. Officials of the Illinois Central Railroad Company, who testified on the hearing, stated that the joint tariff was canceled because it had proved unsatisfactory; that the complainant had no car equipment of its own, and that the Illinois Central, being short of cars, was disinclined to give its own equipment to roads that could not reciprocate.

The fact that the complainant has no refrigerator cars of its own in which to move this commodity, if the through routes desired are established by the Commission, is not only admitted by the petitioner, as heretofore indicated, but it also admits that the Illinois Central Railroad Company "has the right to refuse to supply empty cars to its connecting lines." And it confesses that the Commission would be unwarranted in compelling the establishment of joint rates and through routes unless the Illinois Central Railroad Company will voluntarily supply the necessary cars after the routes and rates have been established, or unless the complainant, as a matter of law, can compel it to do so. The record indicates the unwillingness of that defendant to supply the required empty cars to the complainant. And the complainant meets that situation by maintaining that after the through routes and joint rates have been established it will have further redress against that defendant on the ground that if the Illinois Central Railroad Company, notwithstanding the custom which requires the carrier having the long haul to supply the cars, should refuse the complainant this privilege while supplying cars under similar conditions to other small carriers, its refusal would be an unjust and illegal discrimination that could and ought to be corrected by this Commission.

13 I. C. C. Rep.

In addition to its lack of refrigerator cars the complainant has no cabbage houses or any receiving station at either of the two sidings in question. There is no commercial settlement at either place, or any community except such as may be found in any well-settled farming country. Moreover, the defendants pointed out at the hearing that the two sidings are not the public property of the complainant, but are the private property of Piper and Hanche, respectively. This suggestion is met by the complainant with the assertion that the publication by it of a schedule of rates from these sidings is, in itself, its guaranty that both are or will be available to the general public and that this Commission must therefore accept them as public stations. At the time of the hearing the complainant had no track scales either at these sidings or elsewhere on its line, but the testimony showed that track scales were then being installed at Racine.

At Berryville the Chicago & Northwestern Railway Company, besides the usual side tracks and freight houses, has a long siding running to two separate cabbage houses at which for years it has received the cabbage product of the neighborhood for shipment to the southern markets which the complainant desires to reach. While there was some car shortage last year, in general there has been little complaint by cabbage shippers of the facilities or service offered them by that company. It runs about 15 trains daily by which this commodity may be moved to the cabbage consuming markets. In addition to the outlet offered by that company to southern markets, the cabbage shippers of the neighborhood can readily reach the siding and receiving station of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company at Racine Junction, about 2 miles away; and during the last year there was a considerable shipment to southern markets from that point. As an indication that these services and facilities have been sufficient in the past and have afforded and will continue to afford reasonable and satisfactory routes to the markets in question some stress is laid by the defendants upon the fact shown of record that the cabbage acreage of this neighborhood has increased over 500 per cent during the past ten years and several hundred per cent during the past five years. The production of cabbages in the district has been concededly a successful and profitable business. But the complainant urges that cabbage producers can not profitably haul their product more than 3 or 4 miles to a railroad station, and the claim is made that the establishment of the through routes asked for in the petition would tend to develop and enlarge the cabbage-producing territory to the west.

On these facts the defendants insist that reasonable and satisfactory through routes now exist over which the cabbage product of

the district described in the petition may readily and promptly find an outlet to the desired markets in the South. The complainant on the other hand denies that a reasonable and satisfactory through route exists; and in this connection its counsel puts an interpretation upon the provision of law under which the Commission is authorized to act in such cases that has not heretofore been suggested. The language of the clause in question is as follows:

The Commission may also, after hearing on a complaint, establish through routes and joint rates as the maximum to be charged and prescribe the division of such rates as hereinbefore provided, and the terms and conditions under which such through routes shall be operated, when that may be necessary to give effect to any provision of this act, and the carriers complained of have refused or neglected to voluntarily establish such through routes and joint rates, provided no reasonable or satisfactory through route exists, etc.

And counsel for the complainant insists that the contention of the defendants that "the territory through which the petitioner is operating is also served by the Chicago & Northwestern Railway Company and that reasonable and satisfactory rates (routes) now exist " is based upon 66 a perverted reading of the proviso" of that clause. Counsel's own reading of it apparently is that there are no reasonable and satisfactory routes because "there is no joint rate or through route from points on the petitioner's line to points upon the line of the Illinois Central." In other words, his contention. seems to be that it does not satisfy the requirements of the law if the neighborhood or territory, in which the shipping community is and through which both lines run, is already served by a reasonable and satisfactory through route; but that the law means that if there are already no reasonable and satisfactory through routes to the markets in question from points on his line in that neighborhood or territory the Commission has the authority to and must establish such through routes.

We are unable to perceive the force of this suggestion. It proceeds apparently on the theory that the sole object of the provision above quoted was to afford a means by which new lines, with the aid of the Commission, may profitably force their way into shipping districts built up and already well and adequately served by older lines, and thus seize and divide with the latter such traffic as may be offered for movement. If that be the import of the clause in question, it is too well concealed to be readily discernible. With the development of the power of the Commission to regulate rates and to protect the public interests by readjusting them when in excess of reasonableness and fairness, the need of competing lines becomes less vital to shipping communities whose transportation facilities are already ample.

And had the Congress intended thus to interfere in the competitive struggles of carriers for traffic it can not be doubted that its policy would have been announced in more definite language. We regard it as clear that the purpose of the clause was to afford relief to shipping communities, and not to aid carriers to acquire strategic advantages in their contests with one another. While it may not be doubted that a railroad company is competent to file a complaint before us under the clause in question and to demand an order establishing through routes and joint rates with its connections, its right to such relief is to be tested by the needs of the community which it seeks thus to serve, and not by the fact that stations on its line in such communities have not been accorded such routes and rates by connecting lines. The only question therefore that remains to be considered is whether, in the language of the proviso, any "reasonable or satisfactory through route exists" from the cabbage producing district described in the record to the southern markets which the complainant desires to reach. The proper solution of such an inquiry must depend, of course, upon the special facts and circumstances of each case and upon the transportation requirements of the particular community involved. A trading point or commercial center where many different commodities are dealt in and are the subjects of transportation may present the question in an aspect quite different to that presented by a country district with traffic limited in variety and often, as in this case, consisting of practically only one commodity of any importance from a traffic point of view. Under all the facts and circumstances disclosed upon this record, we must hold that the district in question already enjoys the advantages of reasonable and satisfactory through routes. A freight-receiving station in an agricultural community that is close at hand to one farmer or producer must of necessity be further away from his next neighbor. And unless it be that every farmer is entitled to have the rails run to his own door a farming community that is required to haul its products no farther than three-quarters of a mile to a mile and a half, as shown in this record, in order to reach the freight-receiving stations of well-established lines, must be held to be reasonably well served. That the shipping district here referred to has been well served by the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad Company is shown by the fact that it has enjoyed a prosperity and growth beyond the average of concededly prosperous farming communities.

This view of the controversy would doubtless be clearer to the complainant if there were a competing line only three-quarters of a mile to the west of its own tracks. It is scarcely necessary to add that the apprehension of counsel that the merits of complainant's contention

may be prejudiced or obscured by the fact that it is an electric line is without foundation. The act makes no distinction between railroads that are operated by electricity and those that use steam; nor has the Commission thought at any time to make such distinction. Both are subject to the act when engaged in interstate transportation and are entitled to equal consideration in any controversy before us. Moreover, progress in the science of electricity and the rapid increase of new devices for its application have led many practical railroad men to think that we may be measurably near its general use as the chief motive power in transportation.

The complaint must be dismissed, and it will be so ordered. 13 I. C. C. Rep.

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