Control of Railroads After the War

Abstract

It might be asked why it should be assumed that there will be or should be a change after the war in the plan of railroad control in effect before the war. In other words, in what manner has the war-which has caused a temporary change to government operation to meet a serious emergency, but for that emergency onlymade it incumbent on the country to revise its method of regulating the common carriers? Most certainly it does not follow that, merely because there has been a change in methods to meet war conditions, there should be a permanent change. But just as certainly it is true that the exigencies of war have emphasized some of the weaknesses in our methods of regulation and that it would be folly not to cure them now that they have been so plainly exposed. And just as certainly it is true that the necessary war operation of the railroads by the government has demonstrated methods by which efficiency may be increased through their permanent application, and not to take advantage of this knowledge would be equally foolish. So, not as a natural consequence, but merely because we have already learned many ways in which our handling of the transportation problem may be improved, and will doubtless learn many more before the war is over, it does follow that after the war, when the railroads are returned as they should be to their owners, there must be some revision in the machinery by which they are regulated: this, both for their own benefit and that of the shipping public. No one ought to attempt to say now with any degree of exactness what the after-the-war method should be. We are going through a historic period in railroad regulation and the experiment of government operation is as yet too new to justify any definite attempt at permanent application of the lessons learned-at least as long as there is so little prospect of an early end to the course of study. Whether we agree with what the government has done or not, it is done, and government operation will continue to the end of the war. We have all that time for observation and consideration as to what should be done when peace comes. Within a cer131