The Beef Trust has compelled the railroads to fix a very low minimum carload limit—20,000 lbs. on dressed beef, etc., against 26,000 to 30,000 lbs. on products the big Trusts are not interested in. If a load is below the carload limit it has to pay less-than-carload rates, which are 20 percent or more higher than carload rates. It is for the interest of the railroads to keep the minimum carload limit at a good height to prevent hauling cars with small loads and low rates, and to reduce the effect of the prevalent custom of billing Trust cars at the minimum no matter how heavily they are really loaded. The railroads have made efforts to unite on a higher carload limit, but without avail so far. On Dec. 12, 1903, it is said, 16 presidents and managers of the greatest railroads in America met in New York and decided to make 24,000 lbs. the minimum on dressed meats. The proceedings were under promise of secrecy by all concerned. But within two days the Trust people knew all about the secret meeting, and they took measures which prevented the new order from ever taking effect. No agreement has ever been formulated that will stand against the power of the Trust, the seductiveness of its promises of diverting new masses of business to the yielding road, and the terror of its threats of withdrawal of traffic from the unyielding. These advantages—excessive mileage rates, high speed, exclusive contracts, exorbitant icing charges, espionage of competitors, control of tariffs, low carload limit, and go-as-you-please inspection—have the same effect as a very large rebate; the private-car owners can ship at very much lower cost than ordinary unprivileged shippers. The profits are immense—$72,000 a day, it is said for the Armour cars. It is estimated that the railroads pay the Beef Trust’s car-lines about $25,000,000 a year in rebates or payments in practical violation of the law. On the basis of the very moderate Beef Trust Report of the Department of Commerce, Mr. Baker figures the annual profits on the 14,000 Armour refrigerator cars, from rentals alone, at $200 net per car, or $2,800,000—nearly $3,000,000 a year, not including the enormous sums extorted in excessive icing charges, nor the rebates and commissions paid by the railroads in addition to the mileage. The estimate of $200 a car is probably too low, for Mr. Robbins, manager of the Armour Car-Lines, has testified that they rent old, inferior cars to breweries, etc., at $204 to $280 per year. Mr. Baker says: “Can any simple-minded person see any difference between a payment of $3,000,000 net profit on mileage annually to a favored shipper like Armour, and an old-fashioned cash rebate of $3,000,000? I confess I cannot.”[287]