Items of Interest December 13, 1913 Issue

Items of Interest

Conferences have taken place between the United States attorney-general and the chairman of the board of directors of the New York, New Haven & Hartford railroad, with the probable result that a basis of dissolution which would restore competition in New England transportation and meet the government's demands will be reached some time in the near future without a court fight. An agreement to meet the demands of the attorney general would provide as follows: For a separation of the New Haven and the Boston & Maine railroad; for a separation of the New Haven and its trolley lines in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and other states; for a relinquishment by the New Haven of its control of steamship lines, some of which are held by the department to compete for the New York Boston traffic; for the nullification of the New Haven's agreement with the Boston & Albany railroad.

On recommendation of Secretary Lane, President Wilson has withdrawn from entry forty-five thousand seven hundred and twenty acres of public land in southern California, believed by experts of the geological survey to be valuable for its oil contents. The reserve thus created includes more than two thousand acres in the Sunset district, located in the foothills of the San Emigdio mountains, forty miles west of Bakersfield, and nearly forty-four thousand acres in the Belridge-Lost Hills district, directly between two already well-developed oil fields. The President has restored to entry one hundred and twenty thousand acres of supposed coal lands in western Montana. Only a small part of the land was found to contain coal, and that was of a low character.

Additional suits were filed in the federal court at New Orleans, La., against the American Sugar Refining Company, by Louisiana planters, mannafacturers, and dealers. They charge the company with being a monopoly under the Sherman antitrust law, and that it manipulated the sugar market to depress raw sugar. The new suits ask for $16,457,023 damages. All similar suits now pending there ask for damages aggregating approximately fifty million dollars.

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