They take an identical carload of the same commodity, and when it is going to the Pacific Coast for domestic consumption the rate is 65 cents a hundred, or 5.76 mills per ton-mile. If they were to apply that rate at the Utah common points—the same 65-cent rate—it would pay 8.65 mills per ton-mile. But they say, “We cannot afford that; you must pay 10.84. We haul it for a man in Russia for 3.54, but that is only the out-of-pocket cost. We will make you a rate of 10.84, which is a lower rate than you are entitled to. I think any article, whether it is transportation or anything else, that could be produced at some profit at a price of 3.54, when you pay 5.76 for it you are paying a handsome profit; and if you pay 8.65 for it you are paying an abnormal profit; and if you pay 10.84 for the same thing you are being outrageously imposed upon, which is what we are doing.”[406] The second objection of the interior cities is that the system of transcontinental rates limits the territory in which intermediate wholesale firms can do a distributing business; and the third ground of complaint, resulting from the other two, is that the policy of permitting low rail rates to the coast cities has the effect of building up large cities on the seaboard at the expense of the whole interior country. Reply of Railroads In replying to these objections the coast towns take the position that they are not especially concerned with the rates to intermountain places, nor indeed with the rates which the railroads make from coast to coast, except in the sense that the greater the number of carriers which participate in transcontinental business, the better the service is likely to be. Secure in the possession of adequate water connection, they do not expect to pay higher rates than they have paid in the past, whatever policy the railroads may adopt. They have no controversy with the intermediate territory, and only support the present adjustment because they conceive it to be for the best interests of the country as a whole.