Speech of Senator Harry S. Truman to the National Forum of the Air Over NBC, Washington, D.C.
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OCR Page 1 of 7Speech of Senator Harry S. Truman of Missouri
to the National Forum of the Air over the
Mutual Broadcasting System Sunday evening,
ARCHIVES AND
if
March 26, 1939 at eight o'clock
TO BE RELEASED ON DELIVERY.
I thank the Mutual Broadcasting Company for this opportunity to
discuss a subject in which the Congress and the entire nation is so vitally
interested -- the railroad problem.
Our great country, to preserve its economy and to maintain its social
order, must have an adequate and efficient system of transportation; one which
and
will move to the
markets, to the distant consumer, at the lowest
1
possible cost, the cotton of the South, the manufactured products of the East,
the potatoes of Idaho and Maine, the fruits of Californie and Florida, the grain
of the Northwest and the mules of Missouri. Such a system, to be truly adequate,
embodies more than a single form of transportation. It embraces the fullest use
not only of railroads but also of motor transport, waterways and airlines.
The economic importance of railroads cannot be overestimated. They
constitute the nation's most important form of transportation. They are at
present beset with conditions which endanger their continued operation. Approx-
imately one-third of all the railroad mileage in this country is bankrupt,
another third totters helplessly on the very brink of bankruptcy. The railroads
have reached a crisis. Their financial condition challenges the right of the
public to unimpaired rail service.
Our whole economic structure is at present suffering because of the
financial condition of railroads. In 1923, railroad purchases of fuel,
materials and supplies totaled over one billion, seven hundred million dollars.
Their average purchases of supplies between 1921 and 1930 was about one billion,
four hundred millions of dollars. In 1938, their purchases of such goods
amounted only to about six hundred million dollars. Any time a billion dollars
a year, or any sum approaching that amount, is taken from the stream of commerce,
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