Mr. MACKENZIE. We would ask for a speed limit, if we could get it.

Mr. BURKE. What do you think about it?

Mr. MACKENZIE. I think it is entirely impracticable.

Mr. STEVENS. Why?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Because you can not make a law which will give one section of the country a right to a speed of fifteen, sixteen, or eighteen miles, and in another part of the country have a speed limit of ten or twelve miles. I know of sections of the country where you can not make twelve miles an hour. If you do you are endangering the lives of those in charge of the cattle and the lives of the cattle. You go over the mountains in western Colorado, where it is more dangerous to go down hill than up, and it would be impossible to have a speed limit. There is another phase to it. If you insist upon a speed limit of eighteen to twenty miles an hour the railroads will have to reduce the size of their trains to such an extent that the prices of transportation must be materially increased. Otherwise the railroads could not do it. I have two or three railroads in mind where I know it would be utterly impossible to do so unless the size of the trains was reduced to ten cars or less.

Mr. SMITH. May I ask the witness one or two questions?

The CHAIRMAN. Very well.

Mr. SMITH. You testified that in the first twenty-four hours the cattle shrunk from fifty to seventy-five pounds, and that was without particular damage to the cattle or the flesh?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Yes, sir.

Mr. SMITH. And that after that there was a distinct shrinkage of the flesh?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Yes, sir.

Mr. SMITH. And you stated that it caused them suffering?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Yes, sir; it must.

Mr. SMITH. In view of that, you still say that the time should be increased from twenty-eight hours without food and water to thirtysix hours?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Yes, sir.

Mr. SMITH. Do you know, Mr. Mackenzie, that at eighteen miles per hour the average for twenty-eight hours would make five hundred and four miles?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Yes, sir.

Mr. SMITH. At fourteen miles an hour for thirty-six hours you make the same number of miles exactly, five hundred and four miles? Mr. MACKENZIE. Yes, sir.

Mr. SMITH. There was some testimony before the committee to the effect, I think, that there was one run which was in the neighborhood of twenty miles or more on the average?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Possibly.

Mr. SMITH. You have testified something about the number of miles between certain points?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Yes, sir.

Mr. SMITH. I will ask the chairman to permit me to insert into the hearings these distances between various points which I collated from the mileage book of the War Department.

The CHAIRMAN. We will give you an opportunity to be heard later. Mr. SMITH. I merely wanted to know if the committee should see

fit to make a minimum speed limit, having in view a distance of five hundred miles. Do you not think from your experience that would cover most of the runs?

Mr. MACKENZIE. I think it would be physically impossible to make that speed limit.

Mr. RYAN. You do not think it could be done?

Mr. MACKENZIE. No, sir.

Mr. SMITH. Would not five hundred miles cover most of the runs you make?

Mr. MACKENZIE. No, sir. I go a thousand miles. It is six hundred and fifty miles from my principal range to Kansas City, and I can not get any nearer than that.

Mr. SMITH. Is there any stopping point?

Mr. MACKENZIE. Yes, sir; but I do not want to stop if I can help it. It is more inhumane to stop the cattle in transit, take them off, and put them through the agony of having them punched than to send them on to the end of the journey and have them put out of their misery.

Mr. BURKE. Mr. Mackenzie had some resolutions that he wanted to offer, and a letter in connection with his testimony, to have printed in the record in connection with his remarks. The papers referred to are as follows:

SECRETARY'S OFFICE,

INTERSTATE ASSOCIATION OF LIVE STOCK SANITARY BOARDS. The following resolution was presented and unanimously adopted at the regular annual meeting of the Interstate Association of. Live Stock Sanitary Boards, held at Guthrie, Okla., September 12, 1905:

"Be it resolved, That the Congress of the United States should, in the interest of humane treatment of cattle in transit on railroads, amend the statute now in force concerning such transportation to the effect that calves under six months old be exempted from the time limit; and that the limit of twenty-eight hours for the transportation of cattle, excepting calves, be extended to thirty-six hours, and that said proposed amendment shall provide that in the case of any shipment of cattle where thirty-six hours shall have expired in such transportation, and where the destination of such shipment can be reached in six hours from the expiration of the time limit of thirty-six hours, such shipment may be carried by the transportation company to destination without unloading, provided the shipper, or person in charge, so requests. And provided further, that no shipment of cattle shall be required to be unloaded within twenty-four hours from time of last loading, unless some incident has occurred which will prevent the fulfillment of this order.

S. H. WARD, Secretary.

INTERSTATE ASSOCIATION OF LIVE STOCK SANITARY BOARDS,

Mr. S. H. COWAN,
c/o Willard Hotel, Washington, D. C.

SECRETARY'S OFFICE,

December 1, 1905.

DEAR SIR: I have been requested by Hon. M. M. Hankins, of Quanah, Tex., to forward you copy of the resolution passed at the last meeting relative to the time in shipment of cattle.

I have also forwarded you, under separate cover, a copy of our last year's

proceedings.
Very truly,

S. H. WARD.

TESTIMONY OF M. W. RANSON, ESQ.

Mr. RANSON was duly sworn by the Chairman, and testified as follows:

The CHAIRMAN. State your name, residence, and business.

Mr. RANSON. M. W. Ranson, Buffalo, N. Y. I am engaged in the live stock commission business. I am president of the East Buffalo Live Stock Association.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you wish to make any statement concerning this proposition?

Mr. RANSON. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, I have not come here with the intention of making any extended statement. I have come here with no set speech, no set argument. I have come here to listen, to gain information, and if, in my humble way, I can impart any, I am willing to do so.

The live stock market there in East Buffalo suffers under the provisions of this twenty-eight-hour law, since its enforcement last June. It necessitates the unloading of stock for our market, whereas heretofore it has always come through within the time limit, or, not within the time limit, but within practically the time limit. Since the enforcement of that twenty-eight-hour law our stock is being unloaded once, sometimes twice, and sometimes three times. The reason for that is, not on account of the great distance from the origination of the shipment to its destination, but for the reason that the connecting points, the junction points between different roads and different railroad companies lie where there are no feeding stations.

Mr. RYAN. Do you find that the condition of the cattle or the live stock of the different grades arriving at the Buffalo yards has improved any since the enforcement of the twenty-eight hour law? Mr. RANSOM. No, sir; it has become worse.

Mr. RYAN. You do not believe that the cattle arrive at East Buffalo in as good condition as they did prior to the strict enforcement of the law?

Mr. RANSON. No, sir; neither the cattle nor the sheep nor the hogs. Mr. RYAN. Can you give us some facts in regard to that—some shipments that you recollect?

Mr. RANSON. Anyone that is at all acquainted with the business knows that in loading and unloading stock there is a great deal of cruelty manifested in the way necessary to get stock out of the cars. You can not unload sheep without you catch hold of one or two and drag them out and pull them out. At night, if they are forced to be unloaded, they are always pushed and jammed around.

Mr. RYAN. How about hogs?

Mr. RANSON. They are driven out of nice comfortable cars, as some of those who have preceded me have stated, and it is true that they do not want to get out. When they are loaded the men that own the hogs, especially, feed from 2 to 4 barrels of corn into the car. That is the last thing that is done before they drag the hogs in. It is put in

every car.

Mr. RYAN. With regard to cattle, is it range cattle or fat cattle that are generally shipped to the Buffalo market?

Mr. RANSON. Very few range cattle come through to Buffalo. Most all are stock originating generally in the States of New York,

Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and some portions of Illinois reached by some of the lines in connection with the Lake Shore and Michigan; those are the principal points from which we receive cattle. I have myself seen train loads of cattle coming through Buffalo, where I will state under oath there were not over three cattle standing up, and the rest of them were lying down quietly, chewing their cuds, and having a good time in the car.

The CHAIRMAN. Are there a good many cattle shipped through Buffalo to Boston or to other north export points from Chicago? Mr. RANSON. Yes, sir; there are.

The CHAIRMAN. Those cattle, of course, come mostly, I suppose, from Chicago?

Mr. RANSON. A good many of them do.

The CHAIRMAN. They are corn-fed cattle?

Mr. RANSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. RYAN. They are all unloaded at the Buffalo yards?

Mr. RANSON. Yes, sir; and watered and fed there.

Mr. STEVENS of Minnesota. How long, as a rule, are they kept there?

Mr. RANSON. I do not know the number of hours as to what their general rule is, but they have sufficient time to feed and water and rest.

Mr. STEVENS, of Minnesota. They stop long enough to rest, then?

Mr. RANSON. Oh, yes; they do not care so much about that nowadays. Our minimum is different from what it is for the western points. Our minimum is 20,000 pounds, and all above that they are shipped by the hundredweight and not shipped by the carload. They used to ship by carloads. Some of the new roads built 36-foot cars, while the old cars were 28 and 30. In other roads the Nickel Plate, for instance-when they started in a few years ago, put in 36-foot cars, and they ran very closely in competition with the Lake Shore. They used to say: "Come over on our line, and we will give you regular barnyards to drive your cattle in." That was the system which resulted in a lower rate of freight.

The railroads of the Central Traffic Association fixed their minimum as 20,000 pounds for cattle and 25,000 pounds for hogs, double decked, and 18,000 pounds single decked; and 18,000 pounds for double decked sheep, 14,000 for single decked; and for all overweights, they have a man at each scale to take the weight of all stock, and they are paid for by the hundred, so much per hundred, so that it is not to the interest of the shipper to overload his stock, and he does not do it, except in very rare cases.

Mr. STEVENS, of Minnesota. It does not hurt your cattle to lie down in the car as it does the range cattle?

Mr. RANSON. No, sir; our cattle are a different class of cattle, mostly. I have seen a train load of Chicago cattle lying down in the cars lots of them.

The CHAIRMAN. You remember the period last summer, or in the fall, when the twenty-eight hour law was being strictly enforced by prosecutions and threats of prosecutions?

Mr. RANSON. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Can you inform us whether the cattle coming through the Buffalo market at that time showed the effects of the en

forcement of that law; and if so, what were the effects, in your judgment?

Mr. RANSON. Well, not having anything to do with those, Mr. Mann, I could not give you an intelligent answer with regard to that. The CHAIRMAN. What do you handle principally, cattle and hogs? Mr. RANSON. Cattle, sheep, and hogs our firm handles. I can just remember one car that came in last week, a load of hogs that came in on the road from somewhere in Illinois, and they were unloaded at Logansport and fed, and then at Peru, which is a very short distance, they were unloaded and fed again, and then they ran from Peru to Cleveland, where they were unloaded and fed again, and then they ran to Buffalo, 180 miles.

Mr. RYAN. What condition were they in when they arrived?

Mr. RANSON. The man thought he had lost his hogs before he got his returns from them. He did not know where they were or what had become of them.

The CHAIRMAN. That was an unusual thing, though?

Mr. RANSON. Yes, sir. But here is another question: They come there to Cleveland, and they have seven or eight hours to come on to Buffalo. There is no feeding station between Cleveland and Buffalo, which is a run of 180 miles, and they have only eight hours to run, and they have to take them back and unload them. If this limit was made thirty-six hours instead of twenty-eight they would have plenty of time, and it would not necessitate unloading them at all. The cattle would not be bruised and pounded up as they are when the law is strictly enforced, which necessitates repeated unloadings. Our buyers that buy the stock ask if the cattle have been unloaded. It bruises up the hips of the cattle, and knocks them off.

The CHAIRMAN. You say the buyers ask if the cattle have been unloaded?

Mr. RANSON. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. What is the effect on the purchase price? Do they pay more or less for them if they have been unloaded?

Mr. RANSON. They pay less when they have been unloaded, because the cattle have more bruises. Going in and out of the cars the cattle rush, and get their hips bruised. They are often standing tail to the door of the car, and they have to be headed around so that some of them can start out, and when they do start they all want to go at once, and they knock their hips and bruise them. You will see the beeves hanging in the market, and on the ribs and shoulders of the beef you will find red marks or bruises that are caused in that way. The more they are loaded and unloaded the worse those bruises are. The CHAIRMAN. Are these range cattle or corn-fed cattle?

Mr. RANSON. Some corn-fed cattle-that are fed in feed lots-are not as wild as these range cattle, of course, but they are excited, and have to holler at them and stir them up, or they will not get out of the cars, and when one goes the rest want to go, and too many want to go out at a time.

you

Mr. BURKE. Is it your experience that cattle that are not unloaded are not, as a rule, bruised much?

Mr. RANSON. Yes, sir; they are not bruised nearly so badly as where they are unloaded."

Mr. STEVENS, of Minnesota. What happens when the cattle have been carried at a great rate of speed? Does that make any difference?