Page:The History of the Standard Oil Company Vol 2.djvu/114

 Standard pipe-line, by the agent who had been collecting and dividing the freight money. This check for $340 was the amount the pipe-line had received on Mr. Rice's shipments between March 20 and April 25. The agent was instructed to send the money to the receiver, and later, by order of the court, the money was refunded to Mr. Rice. But the Standard was not out of the scrape so easily.

Receiver Pease filed his report on November 2, but the judge found it "evasive and unsatisfactory," and further information was asked for. Finally the judge succeeded in securing the correspondence between Mr. Pease and Mr. Rapallo, quoted above, and enough other facts to show the nature of the discrimination. He lost no time in pronouncing a judgment, and he did not mince his words in doing it:

"But why should Rice be required to pay 250 per cent. more for the carriage of his oil than was exacted from his competitor? The answer is that thereby the receiver could increase his earnings. This pretence is not true; but suppose it was, would that fact justify, or even mitigate, the injustice done to Rice? May a receiver of a court, in the management of a railroad, thus discriminate between parties having equal claim upon him, because thereby he can accumulate money for the litigants? It has been repeatedly adjudged that he cannot legally do so. Railroads are constructed for the common and equal benefit of all persons wishing to avail themselves of the facilities which they afford. While the legal title thereof is in the corporation of individuals owning them, and to that extent private property, they are by the law and consent of the owners dedicated to the public use. By its charter and the general contemporaneous laws of the state which constitute the contract between the public and the railroad company—the state, in consideration of the undertaking of the corporators to build, equip, keep in repair and operate said road for the public accommodation, authorised it to demand reasonable compensation from everyone availing himself of its facilities, for the service rendered. But this franchise carried with it other and correlative obligations.

"Among these is the obligation to carry for every person offering business under like circumstances, at the same rate. All unjust discriminations are in violation of the sound public policy, and are forbidden by law. We have had frequent occasions to enunciate and enforce this doctrine in the past few years. If it were not so, the managers of railways in collusion with others in command of large capital could control the business of the country, at least to the extent that the business was dependent on