Excerpt from State Regulation of Railroads in the South IN this study the author has endeavored to outline the development of state regulation of railroads in the South, with special reference to the growth and present status of regulation through the various state commissions. The chapters on Charters, Early Laws, Constitutions, and Recent General Railway Legislation are to be under stood as introductory, merely, to the main body of the monograph. That there is a need for some treatise upon the subject with which this one attempts to deal has for some time been recognized by southern scholars. But whether the publication of the pages here offered is justifiable, in view of the brief treatment, only, which the author has been able to give to this immense field, is a question concerning which he has long had the gravest doubts. He has concluded to offer the treatise in its present form, however, in the hope that students in the various colleges and universities of the South may be encouraged to take up the study of railroad regulation in each one of the southern states, aided by the brief sketches here pre sented, and that thus the whole field may be the sooner covered in the adequate manner to which its importance entitles it. The reader will notice that the treatment of the sub jcet in this study has been confined to those states, only, which lie east of the Mississippi and south of the Ohio rivers and that, accordingly, the states of Maryland. Missouri, Arkansas and Texas are not touched upon. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Includes 2 charts, 7 maps, 7 figures and 5 Illustrations. Renowned Military Historian Dr Christopher Gabel charts the decline of the Confederate Railways system that was to spell ultimate doom to the outnumbered soldiers of the Southern states. Military professionals need always to recognize the centrality of logistics to military operations. In this booklet, Dr. Christopher R. Gabel provides a companion piece to his “Railroad Generalship” which explores the same issues from the other side of the tracks, so to speak. “Rails to Oblivion” shows that neither brilliant generals nor valiant soldiers can, in the long run, overcome the effects of a neglected and deteriorating logistics system. Moreover, the cumulative effect of mundane factors such as metal fatigue, mechanical friction, and accidents in the civilian workplace can contribute significantly to the outcome of a war. And no matter how good some thing or idea may look on paper, or how we delude ourselves, we and our soldiers must live with, and die in, reality. War is a complex business. This booklet explores some of the facets of war that often escape the notice of military officers, and as COL Jerry Morelock intimated in his foreword to “Railroad Generalship,” these facets decide who wins and who loses.

During Reconstruction, an alliance of southern planters and northern capitalists rebuilt the southern railway system using remnants of the Confederate railroads that had been built and destroyed during the Civil War. In the process of linking Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia by rail, this alliance created one of the largest corporations in the world, engendered bitter political struggles, and transformed the South in lasting ways, says Scott Nelson. Iron Confederacies uses the history of southern railways to explore linkages among the themes of states' rights, racial violence, labor strife, and big business in the nineteenth-century South. By 1868, Ku Klux Klan leaders had begun mobilizing white resentment against rapid economic change by asserting that railroad consolidation led to political corruption and black economic success. As Nelson notes, some of the Klan's most violent activity was concentrated along the Richmond-Atlanta rail corridor. But conflicts over railroads were eventually resolved, he argues, in agreements between northern railroad barons and Klan leaders that allowed white terrorism against black voters while surrendering states' control over the southern economy.