This was all very well for the larger shipper and the
railroad, but in the meantime what became of the small shipper, whom Mr.
Rockefeller was enabled to annihilate by means of his contracts with the
railroad companies? The small shipper saw himself forced out of
business, because corporations to whom the state had granted special
privileges as common carriers, had a private interest in doing business
with his bigger, more daring, and unscrupulous competitors.
Of course no such result could have happened, if at any point in this
vicious circle of private interests, there had been asserted a dominant
public interest; and there are several points at which such an interest
might well have been intruded. The circle would have been broken, if,
for instance, the granting of illegal rebates had been effectively
prohibited; but as a matter of fact they could not be effectively
prohibited by the public authorities, to whom either the railroads or
the large shippers were technically responsible. A shipper of oil in
Cleveland, Ohio, would have a difficult time in protesting against
illegal discrimination on the part of a railroad conducting an
inter-state business and organized under the laws of New York.
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