Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

“ Why should the railroads pay for what, after all, are private connections? We see no reason. And, moreover, even on this strained construction, they refrain from paying at the peril of a fine, if they turn out wrong in their guess that, in the particular case, the court will hold the demand not authorized by the act. If the statute makes the mere demand conclusive, it plainly cannot be upheld. If it requires a side track only when the demand is reasonable, then the railroad ought, at least, to be allowed a hearing in advance to decide whether the demand is within the act. ”

“ So far as we see, a grain elevator stands in no stronger position than a stock yard. If, as intimated, the elevators with which the Missouri Pacific connects charge too much and wrong the farmers, there may be other remedies; but manifestly the apprehenson expressed by the supreme court of Nebraska, that the company, unless checked, will have power to establish a monopoly, is not to be met merely by building another elevator,-the physical limits of that kind of competition are too easily reached. ”

“ But if we assume that circumstances might make it reasonable to compel a railroad to deliver and receive grain elsewhere than at its own elevators, or those that it had made its own by contract, the circumstances must be exceptional when it would be constitutional to throw the extra charge of reduplicating already physically adequate accommodations upon the road. ”