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roads, in their effort to conduct their business without personal and unjust discrimination, have centered the power of deciding various questions in their main offices,—with the result that sometimes there is considerable delay in deciding questions. A man wants a side-track to his warehouse, and in order to decide that question properly considerable information must be obtained and some one has to render a decision whether the company shall spend the one thousand dollars needed to furnish the track. Another man will build a manufacturing plant if he can get rates that will enable him to reach his market in competition with some other point. In order to decide this intelligently, an investigation must be made of prices, cost of doing business, the relation of other factories producing the same article, and all of the other factors that enter into the making of the price of his product at the point of consumption. This takes the time, thought, and study of a great many men on the railroad and causes some delay. Give a commission power to fix rates and you would