It is apparent that a readjustment of a railroad’s affairs is more difficult than the readjustment of those of an individual. A railroad is a complex financial, as well as a complex operating machine. Especially when it has been built up by the union of numerous small properties, each of which has been allowed to retain a certain individuality of its own, are the relations between the different parts intricate and involved. The obligations which have been incurred in the course of its career, and the kinds of paper which represent these obligations, disclose a variety which the debts of an individual seldom or never present. This complexity in railroad capitalization inevitably leads to clashes in interest between different classes of securityholders. Divergencies in interest seem to appear even while a road is solvent. If classes of securities exist upon which payment of interest is optional, it is to the advantage of the junior issues to prevent payment of interest or dividends upon others until earnings are such that payment may be made upon all. If common stockholders can reinvest in the property sums which normally would be paid in dividends on the preferred stock, they advance the day upon which they can secure dividends for themselves at the expense of their seniors. The same situation may also arise as between the preferred stock and the income bonds. Or, again, it may be to the advantage of speculative stockholders to pay dividends to themselves by means of the accumulation of a floating debt, and to sell out at top quotations, leaving the floating debt to take precedence even of mortgage bonds.[681] Both this and the preceding operation are facilitated by the control which the least valuable portion of the capital, the common stock, usually has over the policy of the entire company. But it is when a reorganization becomes necessary that these conflicts in interest become most apparent, and it is as a compromise between contending forces that a reorganization plan must take its shape.