farther from the truth. There
is no law so stringent but that it will be violated; there is no
government so vigilant but that it will at times be imposed upon. It is
true, our government sanctions no monopoly, but the very liberty of
action which exists here among corporations as well as individuals
offers to organized wealth and power a wide field for abuses.

We have seen in the foregoing that almost from time immemorial efforts
have been made to monopolize transportation and trade, and that these
efforts were successful whenever either from ignorance or weakness the
masses fell into political apathy. There is a natural tendency among men
to utilize commercial advantages to the detriment of others. In modern
times the opportunities for building up large monopolies have greatly
increased and have been turned to the most profitable account by
designing men. Great and even unbearable abuses have always followed
where the greed and ambition of such men have not been checked by
governmental agencies. In this respect the people of the United States
have had about the same experience as the rest of mankind. Ever since
the introduction of railroads into this country there has been a
well-marked drift toward monopolizing the transportation business.

As long as the dangers of monopoly remained unknown to the American
people, legislation for the control of railroads and other public
carriers was both scarce and crude, and shrewd railroad men were not
slow in taking advantage of the situation. It is foreign to the design
of this treatise to give a complete history of railroad monopoly in the
United States. The author will therefore confine himself to showing that
transportation companies will, like the great commercial organizations
of the past, when left to follow their instincts, invariably use their
power to oppress the public by exacting excessive charges for their
services, or to discriminate against the many by extending special
privileges to the few. Hundreds of cases might be given to illustrate
the above rule, but a history of two of these corporations will suffice
to show to what extent corporate abuses can be carried, and to serve as
a warning against the adoption of any "_laissez faire_" policy in the
railroad legislation of the future. The corporations selected for this
purpose are the Camden and Amboy Railroad and the Standard Oil
Companies, both typical representatives of the Rob Roy policy which
organized wealt