of the Control system. During a period of three years and nine months the Board made a net profit of $9,825,000. After setting aside $574,000 for a Reserve Fund and $247,000 for the Mothers' Pension Fund, the balance was divided in the proportion of $3,545,000 to the municipalities, $957,000 to Hospitals, $4,502,000 to the Consolidated Revenue Fund for the public service of the Province, these profits derived from a total revenue of nearly forty and one-half millions. So much for the economic side. Opponents seeking to discredit the system, draw attention to the dangers of lack of competition, political interference, corruption of officials, and the embarrassment to the State of being placed in a fiduciary capacity for the liquor interests, but it is self evident that successful Government Control can only be secured by a clear sense of duty on the part of those entrusted with its affairs, disinterested enforcement of the statute, and a broad interpretation of the law without recourse to legislative expedients in the interests of one or other section of the population. Moreover it is patent that Government Control and Prohibition are passing through a period of probation, and during such period a more dangerous feature than the liquor itself is the corruption of public morals in a contempt for law, where restrictive legislation proves too drastic.

The field for inquiry into the use and abuse of alcoholic liquors is so wide that it is difficult to investigate any one aspect without resort to casuistry, but as suggested by Dr. Archdall Reid, it may be accepted as an axiomatic belief that

resistance to the attraction of alcohol is a mental peculiarity which a race only acquires through long exposure to the influence of abundant alcohol, and that populations are resistant just in proportion to their past exposure to it—as is true in the main of epidemic and endemic diseases and that in both cases this is due to selection.

It has been demonstrated that Government Control of the liquor traffic is rapidly passing out of the experimental stage, and its widespread acceptance throughout Canada may prove an important contribution to further legislative efforts in this direction.

REGINALD E. HOSE.

MURDER ON THE RAILS

BY "ENGINEER"

THE managements of railroads and the supervisory and executive and legislative branches of the Government hold no greater responsibility than that of adequately protecting the safety of the traveling public. No one in this wide world is more helpless to protect himself from injury or sudden death, than a passenger on a railroad train. He pays for and is entitled to expect safe transportation. He is placed in a closed container (as a steel car) where he is as helpless against the effects of a collision or derailment as a babe in arms. His life and destiny are absolutely in the keeping of the engineer at the throttle, who, in turn, depends upon such a slender thread as the line of vision of the human eye looking out through space, sometimes in fog or rain or snow, or under other conditions where visibility is low, picking up an indication from a signal out on the roadside. Sometimes in the sleepy hours of the morning vigilance relaxes for a few brief moments, or a locomotive defect detracts attention from the signals, or there is a misunderstanding of signals, and then a bloody chapter is written into railroad history. Investigations are held, and the findings are that "this accident was caused by Engineer Blank failing to observe and to be governed by restrictive signal indications;" to which the Federal investigators add: "An adequate system of automatic train control would have prevented this accident." Then the stage is ready for another similar catastrophe.

No class of men are more dependable than locomotive engineers. Many of them go to their deaths with a clear record covering a period of years and at last give their lives as a forfeit; martyrs to their profession; faithful unto death; but victims of a mental lapse or of circumstances which they cannot control, and with them go the lives of other human beings, snuffed out like the light of a candle by a sudden breath, sacrificing their lives,

their fortunes and their happiness on the altar of unsafe operation.

It is not alone the locomotive engineer who is at fault, but rather the method of transportation that will permit such accidents. It is impossible for a man to be one hundred per cent. perfect, physically, mentally and functionally at all times. Recognizing these facts, it is fair to assume that the human at the throttle, high grade as he may be, must be backed up by an automatic agency to prevent disaster, when for any reason the human agency fails. It should be impossible for a locomotive engineer, even if temporarily insane, to run a train at high speed, freighted with human lives, into another train in his path, also freighted with human lives. It would be as reasonable to operate elevators without automatic control, or steam boilers without safety valves to limit steam pressure within safe limits, as it is to operate a high speed train without automatic speed restriction when closing in upon a train ahead.

The fact is that thousands of helpless passengers, who are paying for safe transportation, are killed or injured when means to prevent such accidents are available.

How long, then, before Federal statutes will be enacted holding the railroad managements responsible and making them criminally liable for manslaughter or murder on the rails, where automatic train control protection is not installed and where the lives of passengers are destroyed as the result?

It has long been recognized that some form of protection should be provided to prevent railroad collisions. This subject has been a live issue since 1880. In 1906, Congress passed an act directing the Interstate Commerce Commission to investigate the subject of Automatic Train Control. As a result, the Commission appointed the Block Signal and Train Control Board, which was more or less active until 1912. In 1913, the Bureau of Safety assumed charge until 1919, when the United States Railroad Administration created an Automatic Train Control Committee which functioned during the Federal Administration of railroads.

In 1922, under Section 26 of the Transportation Act of 1920, the Interstate Commerce Commission issued Orders 13413, citing forty-nine railroads to show cause why an order should not be

entered requiring installation of automatic train stops or automatic train control devices upon designated portions of their respective lines. Hearings were held before the Commission, as a result of which the Commission made its order permanent on June 13, 1922. On January 1, 1924, the Commission issued a second order requiring installation of ninety-two additional operating divisions and fixed the date of completion for the territory covered by this second order as of February 1, 1926. This order included an additional division on forty-seven of the carriers contained in the first order. During this period the personnel of Division 1 of the Commission having charge of Automatic Train Control was changed, and, as the result of a sinister influence, the requisites of the Commission were altered to permit the railroads to install automatic train stops with a forestalling feature, so arranged that a locomotive engineer may nullify operation of the device at will.

Subsequently, the order for installation on forty-five railroads covered by this second order was indefinitely suspended by the Interstate Commerce Commission, and since that time numerous extensions of time have been granted by the Commission upon application by the railroads. In fact, upon one of these divisions the railroad has been entirely relieved from installation of automatic train control and has been granted permission to install automatic block signals in lieu thereof. To point out the fallacy of this decision it is only necessary to refer to the recent serious collisions on the Pennsylvania Railroad at Monmouth Junction, N. J., and Gray, Penn., where automatic block signals of the best type were disregarded and where two of the most disastrous collisions occurred.

During the time the Interstate Commerce Commission has been investigating this subject, and in the period 1906-1921, as shown in the records of the Commission during the 1922 hearing, there were 106,473 train accidents in which 6,142 persons were killed, 95,936 injured, and a property loss of $80,386,694. Of rear end collisions there were 17,043, in which 1,914 persons were killed and 25,974 injured, with a property loss of $21,507,894. Of head-on collisions there were 9,255, in which 2,412 persons were killed and 34,708 injured, with a property loss of $19,461,769.

In territory protected by automatic block signals, between July, 1911, and March 31, 1921, there were 111 collisions caused by failure of engineers "to observe and be governed by signal indications", in which 510 persons were killed and 2,458 injured, with a property loss of $1,539,074. All of the above losses in life and property occurred while the Interstate Commerce Commission was investigating automatic train control from 1906 to 1921 inclusive.

On March 11, 1924, the Hon. Homer P. Snyder, Congressman from New York, delivered a speech in the House of Representatives outlining the status of automatic train control and urging strenuous action. In his speech Mr. Snyder called attention to the fact that the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railway had installed an automatic train control system on a full operating division of 165.4 miles of double main track and 102 locomotive equipments. This installation was completed in November, 1923, and approved by the Interstate Commerce Commission on December 17, 1923. He stated that this progressive railroad had complied with the order of the Commission and completed its installation and received the final approval of the Interstate Commerce Commission one full year before the time limit fixed by the Commission, and that the installation was completed at a total cost of $235,789, equivalent to $713 per mile of track. Further, that, in addition to the conservation of life and property, experience has shown tremendous savings in operation due to this scientific improvement in railroad service, as under such a train control system not alone is safe operation assured but, substituting the principle of spacing trains by restricting their speed rather than by stopping them (as is done under the present antiquated method of railroading), train control becomes an asset and a distinct earning power.

He stated, further, that whereas the American Railway Association rules provide that trains shall stop at automatic block signals in the stop and then proceed under a certain speed prescribed by rule alone, this system compels the train to reduce speed and compels the engineer to indicate his alertness to the situation by acknowledging the stop signal, and permits the train to proceed under safe speed without stopping; that such