ITEMS OF INTEREST September 5, 1908 Issue

ITEMS OF INTEREST

The Interstate Commerce Commission has been asked by Secretary Cortelyou for a list of such railroad stocks and bonds as could be used by currency associations under the Aldrich law as security for circulation. He was led to make the request because certain New York bankers wrote him to find out what railroad securities would be acceptable. The chairman of the Commission replied that it is utterly without means of listing the sixteen billions of railroad securities of the country, but that it would undertake to investigate the standing of any railroad securities that might be presented to the Treasury Department. The Commission is expected to remind Congress that legislation is needed that will make it practicable to undertake valuation of the roads and give it the force needed to list the securities.

Plans for the forest service field headquarters, which are soon to be established in the West, are being worked out in detail. Each headquarters will be modeled after the Washington office. In all there will be six district headquarters, located probably at Portland, San Francisco, Albuquerque, Salt Lake, Denver, and Missoula, Montana. At the head of each office there will be a district forester and an assistant district forester. Under these will be experts in charge of the various lines of work. A chief of grazing will have charge of range matters; a chief of products, of the preservative treatment of timber and strength tests and the study of market conditions; a chief of lands will look after such matters as land examinations.

The Government's petition for a rehearing by the United States Court of Appeals of the case against the Standard Oil Company of Indiana has been filed. "On but a single point involved in the trial up to the return of the verdict of guilty," says the petition, "are the rulings of the trial court criticized by the Court of Appeals. In all other particulars his rulings are sustained. The point on which the trial judge is reversed by the Court of Appeals relates to his ruling on evidence and his charge to the jury with reference to ignorance on the part of the Standard Oil Company of the lawful rate as a defense. The Court of Appeals in its opinion has not correctly stated how the judge ruled on this subject."

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