he force likely to be made at the
instance of politicians, thus eliminating that objection; such saving
may be estimated at $20,000,000 per annum.

With the nation owning the railways the great number of expensive
attorneys now employed, with all the attendant corruption of the
fountains of justice, could be dispensed with; and there would be no
corporations to take from the bench the best legal minds, by offering
three or four times the federal salary; nor would there be occasion
for a justice of the Supreme Court of Kansas to render a decision that
a corporation chartered by Kansas for the sole purpose of building a
railway in that State has the right and power under such charter to
guarantee the bonds of corporations building railways in Old or New
Mexico, and shortly after writing such decision be carted all over the
seaboard States in one of the luxurious private cars of such
corporation. Under national ownership such judges would pay their
travelling expenses in some other way, and be transported in the
ordinary manner, and not half as many judges would travel on passes.
There are many judges whose decisions any number of passes would not
affect; but if passes are not to have any effect upon legislation and
litigation, why are congressmen, legislators, judges, and other court
officials singled out for this kind of martyrdom? If the men who
attain these positions remained private citizens, would passes be
thrust upon them?

Although the reports of the Victorian Commissioners show, in detail,
all the expenditures of railway administration, yet not one dollar is
set down for attorneys' salaries or for legal expenses, and it is
presumed that the ordinary law officers of the government attend to
the little legal business arising, and yet judging from reports made
by Kansas roads, the expenditures of the corporate owned railways of
the United States for attorneys' salaries and other legal expenses,
are at least two per cent. of the entire cost of operating the roads,
and yearly aggregate some $14,000,000, all of which is taken directly
from railway users, and is a tax which would be saved under national
ownership, as United States district attorneys could attend to such
legal business as might arise. This expenditure is incurred in endless
controversies between the corporations, in wrecking railways, in
plundering the shareholders, in contending against State and federal
regulation, in manipulating elections and legis