“Local discriminations, though not at first so unjust and offensive, have nevertheless been exceedingly mischievous, and if some towns have grown, others have withered away under their influence. In some sections of the country if rates were maintained as they were at the time the interstate commerce law took effect, it was practically impossible for a new town, however great its natural advantages, to acquire the prosperity and the strength which would make it a rival of the towns which were specially favored in rates; for the rates themselves would establish for it indefinitely a condition of subordination and dependence to ‘trade centres.’ The tendency of railroad competition has been to press the rates down and still further down at these trade centres, while the depression at intermediate points has been rather upon business than upon rates. “The inevitable result was that this management of the business had a direct and very decided tendency to strengthen unjustly the strong among the customers and to depress the weak. These were very great evils and the indirect consequences were even greater and more pernicious than the direct, for they tended to fix in the public mind a belief that injustice and inequality in the employment of public agencies were not condemned by the law, and that success in business was to be sought for in favoritism rather than in legitimate competition and enterprise. “The evils of free transportation of persons were not less conspicuous than those which have been mentioned. This, where it extended beyond persons engaged in railroad service, was actual favoritism in a most unjust and offensive form. Free transportation was given not only to secure business, but to gain the favor of localities and of public bodies; and while it was often demanded by persons who had, or claimed to have, influence which was capable of being made use of to the prejudice of the railroads, it was also accepted by public officers of all grades and of all varieties of service. In this last case the pass system was particularly obnoxious and baneful. A ticket entitling one to free passage by rail was even more effective in enlisting the assistance and support of the holder than its value in money would have been, and in a great many cases it would be received and availed of when the offer of money made to accomplish the same end would have been spurned as a bribe. Much suspicion of public men resulted, and some deterioration of the moral sense of the community traceable to this cause was unavoidable. The parties most frequently and most largely favored were those possessing large means and having large business interests.