oad
companies six years before Iowa did, and has for many years exerted a
more thorough control over her railroads than perhaps any other State in
the Union. The smallest increase is in West Virginia, which during the
period given gained an average of only 69 miles per annum; and yet in
West Virginia railroads charge their own rates and usually have their
own way.

Finally Prof. Hadley says:

"Where are we to find the limit to such unwise action? The
United States Supreme Court can do something and has shown a
disposition to do something. In the Minnesota cases it
repudiated the doctrine of uncontrolled rights on the part
of the legislature to make rates, as emphatically as it
repudiated the doctrine of uncontrolled rights on the part
of agents of the corporation in the Granger cases, twelve
years before."

It is evident that Mr. Hadley is as much mistaken in his interpretation
of the decision of the court as he has been in his other assertions, as
will be seen from the following extract from Judge Blatchford's opinion
in Budd vs. New York, in which he says, "The main question involved is
whether this court will adhere to its decision in Munn vs. Illinois."

The court first quoted from the opinion of Judge Andrew of the Court of
Appeals of New York, as follows: "The opinion further said that the
criticism to which the case of Munn vs. Illinois had been subjected
proceeded mainly upon a limited and strict construction and definition
of the police power; that there was little reason, under our system of
government, for placing a close and narrow interpretation on the police
power, or restricting its scope so as to hamper the legislative power in
dealing with the varying necessities of society and the new
circumstances as they arise calling for legislative intervention in the
public interest; and that no serious invasion of constitutional
guarantees by the legislature could withstand for a long time the
searching influence of public opinion, which was sure to come sooner or
later to the side of law, order and justice, however it might have been
swayed for a time by passion or prejudice or whatever aberrations might
have marked its course."

Judge Blatchford then said: "We regard these views, which we have
referred to as announced by the Court of Appeals of New York, so far as
they support the validity of the statute in question, as sound and
just.... We must regard the