The railways contend that a relative order would be sufficient. The Commission could say what percentage of the Omaha rate the advance for Wichita should be, and in the Kansas case the rate on oil could be determined in reference to the rates on other commodities. It is true that a relative order could be made, but it might be more embarrassing to the railroads to have a group of rates tied up by each decision so that they could not vary any of them without changing the rest, than it would be to have one rate definitely fixed; the subtraction from elasticity might be greater, and the difficulty of determining the true relations between various rates might be far more serious than the fixing of a reasonable rate in the particular case. It would be possible to give the Commission the option to make a relative order or to definitely fix a reasonable rate providing that it should carefully consider the preference of the carrier as to the form of order, the reasons for that preference, and the guarantee the carrier may be willing to give as to _bona fide_ compliance with the order, and then make up its judgment in the light of the circumstances in such a way as to accomplish the purpose in view with the greatest certainty and the least friction or interference with the freedom of railroad management. But the railroads object to the fixing of rates in any manner by a public board,[406] declaring that such a board could not be in sufficiently close touch with traffic conditions all over the country to adapt their rulings to the needs of business, that tariffs would lose the elasticity requisite to keep them in harmony with changing economic conditions. A rate that is reasonable to-day may be unreasonable to-morrow. It is said that it keeps several hundred men, 500 to 700 skilled traffic men, working all the time on the adjustment of rates, and that it is beyond the power of half a dozen men to pass on the rate question of a country like this; that Congress cannot delegate to a commission the power to fix rates; that it would destroy the initiative of railroads and hurt their power of borrowing money for improvements, injure investors, and throw the whole railroad world out of gear; that the centralization of power would be dangerous, the disturbance of business and interference with development disastrous, and the practical confiscation of railroad properties and values unjust; that a flood of litigation would follow, and that discrimination would not be removed, for agents hustling for business would cut under commission-made rates as quickly as they cut railroad-made rates.