obey the requirements of the constitution, and to abstain from that bane of a republican government, special class legislation. By supporting only such men as would, in good faith, pledge themselves, as above suggested, and who, as legislators, would abide by their pledges, unjust discriminations would cease, and some of the rights of the people would be restored. But reforms must extend beyond the points named. Railroad companies being chartered and railroads constructed for the prosecution of the business of common carriers, having received aid in lands and bonds from the general government, and from states, counties, cities, and towns, bonds and taxes, as well as special privileges not granted to any other corporations, in contemplation of law, these companies are bound to act honestly. It was never the intent of the legislatures (if they acted in good faith) to create these powerful corporations, to grant them extraordinary aid and privileges, and then allow them, by false and fictitious reports as to the cost of their roads, to charge unjust prices for carrying freights and passengers. By the watering process to which we have referred, the pretended cost of the roads, as shown from their reports, is often two or three times the actual cost, and the rates that are charged for transportation are such as to pay dividends not only on the cost of the road, but on the fictitious or added stock. Indeed, in many cases the stock reported as paid up is not paid in a legitimate manner; but when the company is organized, by selling bonds it builds its road from the proceeds, and from the earning of the road pays not only the interest on its bonds but accumulates a surplus. This surplus is divided among the stockholders, not as dividends on their paid-up stock, but is capitalized and stock issued to subscribers. The road is made to pay the interest, and eventually the principal, of the capital borrowed to build it, and also to earn money enough to show a paid-up capital to the amount of the actual cost of the road. This species of financiering on the part of the company is robbing the people, and abusing the privileges conferred by the charter. No thorough reform of the abuses practiced by railroad companies can be effected until the legislatures, by statutes, compel each and every company to purge its stock of every spurious dollar, so that the stock of each company shall not appear to be in excess of the cost of its road. If the legislature does not possess the power to do this, then it has the power to create a corporation that, by arbitrarily increasing its stock to any amount it may choose, can extort from the people sufficient to pay the interest upon such amount, and defy the power of its creator. The position is not sound. Any and all abuses practiced by railroad corporations can be corrected by legislative enactment, unless we admit that the creature is greater than the creator.