The Railway agent and station agent Volume 9-10; A monthly magazine devoted to the interests of ticket and freight agents and the traffic departments of the railway service

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1889 Excerpt: ...board of commissioners. It goes without saying that that discretion ought not to be hampered or controlled by the attempted regulation of particular details and management in the law itself, and it is therefore a matter of astonishment and concern to find in all laws authorizing this sort of regulation, sections prohibitive of certain details of management from which the discretion of the board is withdrawn. This object is well illustrated by the act of February, 1887, commonly known as the interstate commerce law. Section one provides that rates shall be "just and reasonable." Section two that they shall be " equal." Section three that they shall be " non-discriminatory." Section six that they shall be "stable and uniform." These sections embody all the elements which are necessary to the impartial administration of railroad properties, but on account of the different circumstances and conditions surrounding the question of railroad transportation, the details of applying these elementary principles must necessarily vary. The legislators cannot foresee and cannot provide for exact regulation of all these details, but they can provide a board of commissioners to whose controlling discretion such matters may be confided, and it is quite necessary that in such a statute ample plenary power should be given to the administrative board. Referring again to the interstate commerce law, the third section, which prohibits discriminations, was copied from the English railway laws where it had received a definite construction and the English courts had construed this section, which was incorporated into our law, as being prohibitive of the greater charge for the shorter haul. (Budd v. London & N. W. R. Co., 36 L. T. N. S., 8...