Great Fortunes from Railroads | Page 7

nor was any
attempt made to forfeit them. They comprise to-day part of the great
copper mines of the Copper Trust, owned largely by the Standard Oil
Company.
The St. Mary's Falls Canal Company likewise stole large areas of rich
copper deposits. This fact was clearly revealed in various official
reports, and particularly in the suit, a few years ago, of Chandler vs.
Calumet and Hecla Mining Company (U. S. Reports, Vol. 149, pp.
79-95). This suit disclosed the fact that the mines of the Calumet and
Hecla Mining Company were located on part of the identical alleged

"swamp" lands, granted by Congress in 1852. The plaintiff, Chandler,
claimed an interest in the mines. Concluding the court's decision,
favoring the Calumet and Hecla Mining Company, this significant note
(so illustrative of the capitalist connections of the judiciary), appears:
"Mr. Justice Brown, being interested in the result, did not sit in this
case and took no part in its decision."
Whatever superficial or partial writers may say of the benevolent origin
of railroads, the fact is that railroad construction was ushered in by a
widespread corruption of legislators that put to shame the previous
debauchery in getting bank charters. In nearly every work on the
subject the assertion is dwelt upon that railroad builders were regarded
as public benefactors; that people and legislatures were only too glad to
present them with public resources. There is just a slight substance of
truth in this alleged historical writing, but nothing more. The people, it
is true, were eager, for their own convenience, to have the railroads
built, but unwilling to part with their hard-wrung taxes, their splendid
public domain, and their rights only that a few men, part gamblers and
part men of energy and foresight, should divert the entire donation to
their own aggrandizement. For this attitude the railroad promoters had
an alluring category of arguments ready.
CASH THE GREAT PERSUADER
Through the public press, and in speeches and pamphlets, the people
were assured in the most seductive and extravagant language that
railroads were imperative in developing the resources of the country;
that they would be a mighty boon and an immeasurable stimulant to
progress. These arguments had much weight, especially with a
population stretched over such a vast territory as that of the United
States. But alone they would not have accomplished the ends sought,
had it not been for the quantities of cash poured into legislative pockets.
The cash was the real eloquent persuader. In turn, the virtuous
legislators, on being questioned by their constituents as to why they had
voted such great subsidies, such immense land grants and such
sweeping and unprecedented privileges to private corporations, could
fall back upon the justification (and a legitimate one it seemed) that to

get the railroads built, public encouragement and aid were necessary.
Many of the projectors of railroads were small tradesmen, landlords,
mill owners, merchants, bankers, associated politicians and lawyers.
Not infrequently, however, did it happen that some charters and grants
were obtained by politicians and lawyers who, at best, were
impecunious sharpers. Their greatest asset was a devious knowledge of
how to get something for nothing. With a grandiloquent front and a
superb bluff they would organize a company to build a railroad from
this to that point; an undertaking costing millions, while perhaps they
could not pay their board bill. An arrangement with a printer to turn out
stock issues on credit was easy; with the promise of batches of this
stock, they would then get a sufficient number of legislators to vote a
charter, money and land.
After that, the future was rosy. Bankers, either in the United States or
abroad, could always be found to buy out the franchise or finance it. In
fact, the bankers, who themselves were well schooled in the art of
bribery and other forms of corruption, [Footnote: "Schooled in the art
of bribery."--In previous chapters many facts have been brought out
showing the extent of corrupt methods used by the bankers. The great
scandal caused in Pennsylvania in 1840 by the revelations of the
persistent bribery carried on by the United States Bank for many years,
was only one of many such scandals throughout the United States. One
of the most characteristic phases of the reports of the various legislative
investigating committees was the ironical astonishment that they almost
invariably expressed at the "superior class" being responsible for the
continuous bribery. Thus, in reporting in 1840, that $130,000 had been
used in bribery in Pennsylvania by the United States Bank, an
investigating committee of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives
commented: "It is hard to come to the conclusion that men of refined
education, and high and honorable character, would wink at such things,
yet the conclusion is unavoidable." [Pa. House Journal, 1842, Vol. ii,