My Story by Elizabeth J. Hauser Read Free Book Online Page B

campaign.
    I went to Indianapolis to see Mr. English in the hope of interesting him in my fare-box. He said to me,
    â€œI don’t want to buy a fare-box, young man, but I have a street railroad to sell.”
    My business dealings with him were so unpleasant and the charges which my lawyer (afterwards Governor Porter of Indiana) brought against him in a law suit so severe, that the petition embodying them was used by his Republican opponents as a campaign document. That fight with Mr. English was my first great business struggle, and it was a fight for a privilege — for street railway grants in the city of Indianapolis.
    I had some money, but not enough for my purchase. Mr. Bidermann du Pont, though he had no faith in my business associates and though the road was in a badly demoralized state, loaned me the thirty thousand dollars I needed with no security whatever except my health, as he himself expressed it. That loan meant a lot to me, but the confidence which went with it meant more, for Mr. du Pont was the first business man to give me any encouragement.
    When I made my final payment to him some five or six years later I told him that my money obligation was now cancelled, but that a life-time of friendship for him and his could not discharge my greater obligation for his faith in me.
    My father went with me to Indianapolis and became president of the company. When a friend asked him:
    â€œIf you are president of the road, what is Tom?” he replied, “Oh, Tom’s nothing! He’s just the board of directors.”
    As this board of directors, I speedily realized that our enterprise would be a failure unless we could free ourselves from Mr. English’s persecutions. He was old enough to be my father, and his attitude towards me was arrogant. He was the most influential man in Indianapolis and not above threatening us with his power over the city government unless we coöperated with him in every way, especially in getting tenants for his houses of which he owned about two hundred, and which he rented to employes of our road and to other workingmen.
    Mr. English was a typical representative of the powerful agent of special privilege of that day. He was president of one of the principal banks of the city.
    The people’s money goes into the banks in the form of deposits. The banker uses this money to capitalize public service corporations which are operated for private profit instead of for the benefit of the people. How incongruous that the people’s own savings should be used by Privilege to oppress them!
    Mr. English’s great asset was his domination of the local city government through which he controlled the taxing machinery of the city, thereby keeping his own taxes down at the expense of the small tax-payer.
    When I bought into the railroad he turned the office of treasurer over to me as his successor and at the first meeting of the board of directors we passed resolutions stating that his accounts had been audited and giving him a receipt for his stewardship. When I objected to this because I had not seen the books he said it was a mere matter of form and that he would turn them over to me immediately after the meeting. It was eleven months before I ever got a look at those books and then my right to them had been established by a lawsuit. After going through the books I forced Mr. English to make several restitutions of very large amounts of money to the company. Once we had a disastrous fire and he immediately notified the insurance companies that the damages must be paid to him. We had to consent to this or expose ourselves to expensive and annoying litigation.
    He kept us in constant hot water. We had paid ten per cent. of the purchase price in cash and given notes running through a period of ten years for the remaining ninety per cent. His reason for selling to us in the first place seems to have been to rid himself of some partners whom he did not like. He evidently