It is a principle of the common law that common carriers must be impartial. “They cannot legally give undue or unjust preferences, or make unequal or extravagant charges.... They are bound to provide reasonable and sufficient facilities. They must not refuse to carry any goods or passengers properly applying for transportation.... They have no right to grant monopolies or special privileges or unequal preferences, but are bound to treat all fairly and impartially.”^[1] That is the rule of the common law which represents the crystallized common-sense and practical conscience of the Anglo-Saxon and every other civilized race. The legal principle that a common carrier must be impartial was established long before the Interstate Commerce Act was passed, or the Granger laws enacted,—yes, before railways or steamboats were born. They inherited the family character and the family law. It has been applied to them in innumerable cases. There is a solid line of decisions from the infancy of the English law to the present time. Constitutional provisions and State and Federal statutes have been passed to affirm and enforce the rule. The railroads themselves declare the rule to be right. And yet, in spite of the railway conscience and the common law, the universal sense of justice of mankind, and the whole legislative, executive, and judicial power of the government, the rule is not obeyed. On the contrary, disregard of it is chronic and contagious, and constitutes one of the leading characteristics of our railway system. In spite of law and justice our railway practice is a tissue of unfair discrimination, denying the small man equal opportunity with the rich and influential, and breaking the connection between merit and success.

The railways unjustly favor persons, places, and commodities, and they do it constantly, systematically, habitually. If every instance of unjust discrimination that occurs to-day were embodied in human form and the process were continued for a year,^[2] the outlaw host would dwarf the Moslem hordes that deluged southern Europe in the days of Charles Martel, outnumber many fold the Grand Army of the Republic in its palmiest days, and, shoulder to shoulder, the dark and dangerous mob would reach across the continent, across the ocean, over Europe and Asia, and around the world.

The railways discriminate partly because they wish to, and partly because they have to. The managers favor some interests because they are linked with the interests of the railways or the managers, and they favor some other interests because they are forced to. The pressure of private interest is stronger than the pressure of the law, and so the railroad manager fractures his conscience and breaks the statutes and common law into fragments.