Page:Fagan (1908) Confessions of a railroad signalman.djvu/67

Rh necessary in running round sharp curves, and the rules on all railroads are plain and emphatic on the subject. But the authorities who investigated this accident treated it as an isolated instance of individual carelessness. Within a period of six months these gentlemen are called upon to pass judgment on probably twenty wrecks, every one of them bearing the same earmarks of disobedience as this disaster near Troy, yet no one ever dreams of hunting up a common cause for dozens of accidents that are exactly similar and brought about in the same way. To be precise, this accident at Troy was the result of a habit. At a glance we perceive that the public is a hundred times more likely to be interested in the uprooting of such a bad habit as running recklessly round curves than it is in placing the responsibility or punishing the offender in any particular instance. Yet who ever heard of a verdict that placed the blame for an accident on a habit? The reasons for the oversight are obvious. A dangerous habit, long continued and unchecked, is a decided reflection on men and management, and, indeed, on the Railroad Commissioners, whose vigilance it has escaped; and consequently no evidence or facts in regard to these bad habits are ever permitted to find their way into investigations. It will be evident, therefore, that the confessional method can be profitably employed in supplying a few missing