Central and the West Shore, a branch on each side of the river, but one system, do you think those roads would be worked in competi tion? Mr. THOм. Here is what your act says; it says "which does or may compete for traffic." Now, whether or not it does compete. I do not know, but, if it had the power to compete, it is subject to your act. I suppose if those two roads were under different ownership they might compete. The CHAIRMAN. If they were under different ownership-I agree with you, but if they are under the same ownership. Mr. THOM. But railroad lines do compete, especially where on one line the movement is partly by water. The CHAIRMAN. It seems to me in the case you spoke of, where there was a movement by the Old Dominion Line by water and by rail and the other by rail to the same termini it would be simpler to have sold the line. Mr. THOм. That would throw one of the most difficult questions that could be produced into litigation and all business of the country into turmoil. To have a great question of that sort, involving the ownership of millions of dollars of property and the right, under the law, to operate millions of dollars of property in this country into doubt through legislation of Congress would, in my judgment, be most unwise. This is one of the conditions at Norfolk. I want to say that the character of that steamship line from Norfolk to New York, the efficiency of its service, is created by the kind of traffic that it can invite. It has a double supply-the local supply and what the railroads give it for transportation between Norfolk and New York-and its superior service is founded upon its reliance upon the railroads for the traffic which they can give it. If you withdraw the traffic which the railroads can give it, and make it to the interest of the railroads to carry through by rail and divert freight from that line and reduce it to the local traffic such as the railroads can not divert by their all-rail lines, you are going to impair the character of the steamship service. Now, we have got another situation there. We have a line of boats in which we own a half interest running between the city of Baltimore and the city of Norfolk. It connects in the city of Norfolk by rail with our railroad. The Seaboard Air Line has another line of boats from the city of Baltimore to the city of Norfolk in competition with us. The needs of the Chesapeake Bay are substantially supplied by these two lines. Suppose you withdraw the railroad patronage and interest from those lines and make it to the interest of the railroads to carry all traffic by the all-rail route, what is going to become of those steamship lines? Another and perhaps more striking illustration-one in which I am not particularly interested, but interested because it occurs near where I was born-is this: The two little counties of Accomac and Northampton, on the eastern shore of Virginia-that is, separated from the mainland of the State by the waters of Chesapeake Bayhave this illustration. The Pennsylvania Railroad has built a line of railroad from the city of New York down to Cape Charles, into one of those counties. It operates a line of steamers and a line of barges on which it takes cars and transports them across the Chesapeake Bay to the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth, and thence on to the South. Suppose the Pennsylvania Railroad could not any longer continue that ferry service, would it be in the public interest to do that? So you may find, Mr. Chairman, there are an immense number of complicated and important situations grown up in the transportation business of this country, not present at this moment to the minds of any man around this table, even to those of us who represent railroads and are best acquainted with the conditions, but which, when you get into the radical change of policy involved in saying that no railroad company shall have any interest in a line of steamboats with which it is in competition you may be striking down, not only the facilities for transportation in this country, but you may be striking down the manufactures of this country and changing the map. Nothing seems to me more dangerous than to attempt to lay an iron hand upon the economic development of a nation, and without proper comprehensive appreciation where the grasp of the iron hand is going to oppress and crush, or to attempt to govern the economic development of a nation by statutory law. There is nothing, in my judgment, which should cause Congress, in its wisdom, to go slower or to act with more circumspection than this matter of regulating the economic conditions which have been the growth of centuries. The CHAIRMAN. I forgot to ask you if there is any probability of your Southern Railway, or any of your steamboat lines, using the canal when it is completed. Mг. THOM. I think not, sir. We are attempting now to establish by exclusive arrangements scheduled lines from the port of Mobile to South America. The CHAIRMAN. To the west coast of South America? Mr. THOм. To the east coast of South America. We already have one to Cuba and its ports. We have them to Liverpool and other foreign ports, and we are attempting to do this, not in connection with ships in which we will have a cent of interest, but we are attempting by giving them such cargo as we can control to encourage them to establish a line of steamboats from the port of Mobile to the eastern ports of South America. The CHAIRMAN. Do you really think, if you were prohibited from making the exclusive arrangement with the steamship line, and would be compelled to issue joint foreign bills of lading to any ship that the shipper might designate for his cotton, that there would be serious danger of the cotton crop of the South seeking North Atlantic ports for export? Mr. THOM. Either seeking the northern ports or being deflected into New Orleans away from the smaller port, because New Orleans already has enough traffic concentrated there to insure these lines. The CHAIRMAN. That is all. Mr. THOм. I thank the committee for its attention, and want to say that this is the first time we have had an opportunity of a hearing in connection with this bill. The CHAIRMAN. I was going to ask you if you presented your views on this to the House. Mr. THOм. As I understand it, this was presented on the floor of the House, and we were never afforded an opportunity for a hearing. Ex-Senator FAULKNER (interposing). I want to correct a little of that statement of Mr. Thom, as I feel I owe it to him. As I understand this matter, the amendment of the original provisions of the eleventh section was agreed upon in the evening after the committee had reported the original bill; with some other portion not with reference to this, and that that evening they held a meeting, and they directed the chairman of the committee to put in the bill that had been reported that amendment that was known as the Covington amendment, and there have been no hearings on this feature. although it had been requested that before the bill was finally taken up there should be hearings, but, as it was put in after reporting the bill, no one was advised of it. Senator TOWNSEND. I suppose also the fact is that that section was presented to the committee in tentative form and no action was taken on it, so that the members of the committee never discussed or voted on it at all. The CHAIRMAN. I have here "Revision of section 11," secured from the chairman of the House committee which was ofered as a substitute for the original, and, I think, adopted word for word as section 11. Is there any other gentleman desirous of being heard this afternoon? Whereupon, at 3 o'clock and 30 minutes p. m., the committee adjourned until 10 o'clock to-morrow morning, May 29, 1912. 165 APNANNAMA CANAL HEARINGS BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON INTEROCEANIC CANALS UNITED STATES SENATE SIXTY-SECOND CONGRESS SECOND SESSION ON H. R. 21969 A BILL TO PROVIDE FOR THE OPENING, MAINTENANCE, MAY 29, 1912 Printed for the use of the Committee on Interoceanic Canals Λ PART 11 WASHINGTON GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE |