could be more remote from the truth than such
inferences. It is true the powers and duties of
the State's agents were intended to be transferred
to the commissioners of public works; but more
numerous and other equally important duties and
authority were imposed on the latter. Their attention
or visits were not confined to internal im-
provement companies, for whose directors the
State held a right of voting, but to all such com-
panies as were indebted to the State of Maryland.
To exercise a diligent and faithful supervision
over them to perform such other duties as might
be prescribed by law, and to review) from time
to time, the rate of tolls adopted by any such
company, and to obtain the establishment, of rates
of tolls which might prevent an injurious com-
petition between the companies to the detriment
of the interest of the State. Of the necessity
for the exercise of this latter power conferred on
the commissioners of public works by the amend-
ment of the gentleman from Baltimore county,
[Mr. Howard ] it appeared to him that no mind
not warped by interest or prejudice, could enter-
tain a moments doubt. He entertained the most
thorough conviction (and it was not his habit, to
draw hasty conclusions from light and insufficient
promises,) that if a proper board of public works
had controlled the operations of the Chesapeake
and Ohio Canal company during the present
year, it would have paid into the State Treasury
more than $200,000, and for every succeeding
year a much larger amount. But under the
management of its present board of directors and
State's agents, he has not the faintest hope that,
during the year, this company will pay the first
dollar into the State's treasury.
It has been said by the gentleman from Mont-
gomery, (Mr. Davis,) and reiterated by the gen-
tleman from Prince George's, (Mr. Bowie,) that
the State's agents having exercised the power of
appointing directors, those, directors, in discharg-
ing the duties and exercising the powers given to
them by law, were subject to no controll from the
State's agents, and that any attempt on the part
of the latter to direct the operations of the for-
mer was contrary to law, and that to suggest to
them the mode in which they should discharge
their duties,, would be an insult to the directors.
That Judge Archer had decided that in the ex-
ercise of their expressly delegated powers, the
States agents had no legal right to control them.
The decision of Judge Archer being given on the
assumption of a right, by the agents, to change
the place where the company's office was held,
when the charter of the company delegated this
authority to the directors only. This objection
to the appointment of the commissioners, with
the powers designed to be conferred on them, is
rather too technical to satisfy plain, sound-judg-
ing men, who are influenced more by substance
than form. No body pretends that the State's
agents or commissioners could, according to the
letter of the law, or the exercise of any legal
authority, coerce the directors in the exertion of
their clearly delegated powers. But, because he
cannot reach his place of destination by the
nearest and most direct route, a prudent man |
would not abandon his journey if he could arrive
at its termination by a convenient, safe, certain,
though more circuitous route. Although the
commissioners could not immediately depose the
directors, or by means technically legal, compel
them to comply with their wishes; yet as the
directors are but beings of their creation, the
mere representatives of the State, and designed
to protect and promote its interests, can it be
doubted that if the State, speaking through the
commissioners, its only organ for the communi-
cation of its wishes, were to remonstrate with
the directors at their pursuing a course ruinous to
its interests, and urge them to change it, can their
compliance he doubted? But, if contrary to all
reasonable expectation and a proper sense of
duty, the directors should refuse to comply, they
are at the mercy of the commissioners, and at
the next annual election can be turned out of
office, and be succeeded by those who would more
faithfully discharge their representative obliga-
tions.
The idea of his friend from Montgomery, [Mr.
Davis,] that suggestions or remonstrance of the
State's agents or commissioners, with the direc-
tors, as to the policy or effects of their acts when
representing the State, might have had some
weight in the days of ancient chivalry, but was
founded on notions too punctilious and transcendental
for the practical, common sense age in
which we live. Of the ability, then, of the com-
missioners of public works, to procure the assent
of the Canal company in the adjustments of the
rate of tolls, he assumed that there was no diffi-
culty.
But it is insisted that over the Baltimore and
Ohio railroad company, the commissioners can
exercise no influence to induce it to assent to any
adjustment of tolls by which both it and the canal
company are to be governed. It is true that
over the Baltimore and Ohio railroad company,
the State has no such power as it possesses
over the other internal improvement companies,
by reason of their immense indebtedness to the
State, and the authority conferred to secure the
payment thereof. This railroad has always com-
plied with its contracts with the State, has never
been a defaulter in any way, and therefore coercively
the commissioner can exercise no control
over it. But in effecting the designs of the State,
its interests and those of the railroad company,
are identical. Such a rate of tolls on the canal,
as the State desires, to give it a handsome income
from that work, the railroad desires to relieve it
from the ruinous competition under which it now
bledes, and will continue to bleed much more
profusely. That the ten directors in the rail-
road company representing the State, and the
twelve representing the private stockholders in the
city of Baltimore, and the eight directors repre-
senting the city of Baltimore, (which together
constitute the entire board of railroad directors,)
will all cheerfully unite with the commissioners;
will unite most cordially in establishing a reason-
able and just rate of tolls, protecting all the in-
terests of the State and of the city of Baltimore,
he thought no sane mind could doubt. Were he |
