"From this meridian" (_i.e._, the meridian passing through the centre of the transit instrument at the Observatory at Greenwich) "longitude shall be counted in two directions up to 180 degrees, east longitude being plus and west longitude minus." Mr. RUTHERFURD, Delegate of the United States. Mr. President, In submitting this resolution to the Conference, I wish to say that the remarks of the Delegate of Russia have increased my confidence in the belief of its propriety. Mr. W. F. ALLEN, Delegate of the United States. Mr. President, the establishment of a prime meridian has, from the force of circumstances, become of practical importance to certain interests entrusted with vast responsibilities for the safety of life and property. These interests bear an important relation to the commerce of the world, and especially to the internal commerce of an extent of country embracing within its limits about sixty-five degrees of longitude. Exactness of time reckoning is an imperative necessity in the conduct of business. On November 18, 1883, the several railway companies of the United States and the Dominion of Canada united in the adoption of the mean local times of the seventy-fifth, ninetieth, one hundred and fifth, and one hundred and twentieth meridians, west from Greenwich, as the standards of time for the operation of their roads. The system under which they have since been working has proved satisfactory. They have no desire to make any further change. A large majority of the people in the several sections of the country through which the railways pass have either by mutual consent or special legislation adopted for their local use, for all purposes, the standards of time employed by the adjacent roads. Upon the public and working railway time-tables generally the fact has been published that the trains are run by the time of the seventy-fifth or ninetieth, etc., meridians, as the case may be. The same standards are used by the Railway Mail Service of the United States Post-office Department, which had previously used Washington time exclusively for through schedules. It will at once be apparent how undesirable any action would be to the transportation interests of this country, which should so locate the prime meridian as to require these time-standard meridians to be designated by other than exact degrees of longitude. That these standard meridians should continue to be designated as even multiples of fifteen degrees from Greenwich is regarded as decidedly preferable. To change to different standards, based upon exact degrees of some other prime meridian, would require an amount of legislation very difficult to obtain. At a convention of the managers of many important railway lines which control through their connections fully three-fourths of the entire railway system of this country, held in Philadelphia on October 9, 1884, certain action was taken, of which I have the honor to present a duly attested copy.