mpetition,
found at great trade centers such as New York and San Francisco;
second, differences in terminal facilities, making some places better
shipping-points than others; third, competition by other railroads,
which is concentrated at certain points, only one tenth of the
stations of the United States being junctions; fourth, the influence
of powerful individuals or large corporations and the personal
favoritism shown by railroad officials.

The effects of local discrimination are to develop some districts and
depress others; to stimulate cities and blight villages; to destroy
established industries; to foster monopolies at favored points; and to
sacrifice the future revenues of the road by forcing industry to move
in the competing points to get the low rates. The power of railroad
officials arbitrarily to cause rates to rise or fall is happily
limited in practice by the need of earning as large and as regular
an income as possible, but even as exercised it has been at times as
great as that possessed by many political rulers.

Sec. 11. #Personal discrimination#. Discrimination between shippers
(personal discrimination) is charging one person more than another for
substantially the same service. This most odious of railroad vices,
rarely practised openly, is done by false billing of weight, by
wrong descriptions or false classification to reduce the charge below
published rate-sheets, by carrying some goods free, by issuing passes
to some and not to all patrons under the same conditions, or by
donations or rebates after the regular rate has been paid. In some
cases a subordinate agent shares his commission with the shipper, and
the transaction does not appear on the books of the company. In other
cases favored shippers are given secret information that the rate is
to be changed, so that they are enabled to regulate their shipments to
secure the lower rate.

One group of reasons for personal discrimination is connected with the
interests of the road. It is to build up new business; it is to
make competition with rival roads more effective by favoring certain
agents, as was very commonly done in the Western grain business; it
is to exclude competition, as by refusing to make a rate from a
connecting line or to receive materials for a new railroad which is
to be a competitor; and it is to satisfy large shippers whose power,
skill, and persistence make the concession necessary. Another group of
reasons has to do wit