The condition of things in 1890 is shown by the reported statement of a Chicago railroad manager quoted by the Commission. “The situation in the West is so bad that it could hardly be worse. Rates are absolutely demoralized, and neither shippers, passengers, railways, nor the public in general make anything by this state of affairs. Take passenger rates for instance; they are very low; but who benefits by the reduction? No one but the scalpers.... In freight matters the case is just the same. Certain shippers are allowed heavy rebates, while others are made to pay full rates.... The management is dishonest on all sides, and there is not a road in the country that can be accused of living up to the Interstate Law. Of course when some poor devil comes along and wants a pass to save him from starvation, he has several clauses of the Interstate Act read to him; but when a rich shipper wants a pass, why, he gets it at once.”[57] Complaints and investigations from time to time in subsequent years showed the continuance of these conditions. For one concern a large number of cars of corn were carried from Kansas City to St. Louis at 6 cents per hundred lbs. while the tariff was 15 cents.[58] In the traffic to Chicago one firm shipped all the grain over one road, and another firm “had the rate” on another line. It was clear that these shippers had advantages that enabled them to keep other shippers out of the field.[59] A wholesale grocery house getting 25 percent rebate on its shipments established branches in various cities. Through a disagreement with one of the railroads that thought it was not getting its share of the business, the rebate enjoyed by one of the branches was withdrawn, and the branch in that city went out of business. A leading dry-goods firm declared that so long as it secured a rebate of 25 percent it had no objection to existing methods of rate-making.[60] The International Coal Company declared, in a suit against the Pennsylvania Railroad for damages, that it was driven out of business by discrimination, its rival receiving rebates of 20 cents per ton in 1898–9 and 10 cents per ton in 1899–1900. The railroads show a disposition to back each other in disregarding the law. Mr. McCabe, traffic manager for the Pennsylvania lines west of Pittsburg, said the Pennsylvania system would stand by any rate made by its connecting lines.[61] CHAPTER IX. SUBSTITUTES FOR REBATES.