Two facts presently gave great impetus to the movement; in 1886 the United States Supreme Court, reversing its previous decision, decided that no State could fix rates for railroad lines outside its own borders, in other words, that interstate rates were exclusively within the jurisdiction of the Federal authority *; and a Senate committee, under the chairmanship of Shelby B. Cullom, conducted an investigation of railroad conditions which made clear the need of immediate reform. As a consequence, Congress passed the Interstate Commerce Act, which received President Cleveland's signature on February 4, 1887. This measure specifically made illegal rebates, pools, higher charges for short than for long hauls (when the hauls in question were upon the same road); it required railroads to file their tariffs, and it established a commission of five members, who had powers of investigation, including the right to make the companies produce their books. This commission received power to establish systems of accounting and the like, but it had no prerogative to fix rates. Inadequate as this measure seemed to the radical element, it was generally hailed as marking the beginning of an era in the Federal control not only of railroads but of other corporations, and this impression was increased by the high character of the men whom President Cleveland appointed to the first board. * Wabash, St. Louis and Pacific Railway Company vs. Illinois, 118 U.S. 557. The Interstate Commerce Commission lasted essentially in this form for nearly twenty years. On the whole it was a failure. Such was the judgment passed by Justice Harlan of the United States Supreme Court when he remarked in one of his decisions that the commission was "a useless body for all practical purposes"; and such, indeed, was the judgment of the commission itself, for in its report of 1898 it declared that the attempt at Federal regulation had failed. The chief reasons for this failure, the commission said, were the continued existence of secret rates and the fact that published tariffs were not observed. * The managers of the great American railroad systems would not yet admit that the fixing of railroad rates was the concern of any one but themselves, and they still regarded railroad management as essentially a private business. If they could obtain large shipments by granting special rates, even though they had to do it by such underhanded ways as granting rebates, they believed that they were entirely justified in doing so. Thus rebates flourished almost as much as ever, passes were still liberally bestowed, and pools were still formed, though they sometimes took the shape of "gentlemen's agreements." * But it should be added that the effectiveness of the commission as an administrative and regulating body was diminished by decisions of the courts, notably the decision of the Supreme Court in the maximum rate case. See 160 U.S. 479.