Here just to prove your a clueless twit yourself and really know nothing. This is part of Roosvelts Portland speach.
Let us go back to the beginning of this subject. What is a public utility? Let me take you back three hundred years to old King James of England. The reign of this king is remembered for many great events--two of them in particular. He gave us a great translation of the Bible, and, through his Lord Chancellor, a great statement of public policy. It was in the days when Shakespeare was writing Hamlet and when the English were settling Jamestown, that a public outcry rose in England from travelers who sought to cross the deeper streams and rivers by means of ferry-boats. Obviously these ferries, which were needed to connect the highway on one side with the highway on the other, were limited to specific points. They were, therefore, as you and I can understand, monopolistic in their nature. The ferry-boat operators, because of the privileged position which they held, had the chance to charge whatever the traffic would bear, and bad service and high rates had the effect of forcing much trade and travel into long detours or to the dangers of attempting to ford the streams.
The greed and avarice of some of these ferry-boat owners were made known by an outraged people to the King himself, and he invited his great judge, Lord Hale, to advise him.
The old law Lord replied that the ferrymen's business was quite different from other businesses, that the ferry business was, in fact, vested with a public character, that to charge excessive rates was to set up obstacles to public use, and that the rendering of good service was a necessary and public responsibility. "Every ferry," said Lord Hale, "ought to be under a public regulation, to-wit: that it give attendance at due time, keep a boat in due order, and take but reasonable toll."
In those simple words, my friends, Lord Hale laid down a standard which, in theory at least, has been the definition of common law with respect to the authority of Government over public utilities from that day down to this.
With the advance of civilization, many other necessities of a monopolistic character have been added to the list of public utilities, such as railroads, street railways, pipelines and, more lately, the distribution of gas and electricity.
The principle was accepted, firmly established, and became a basic part of our theory of Government long before the Declaration of Independence itself. The next problem was how to be sure that the services of this kind should be satisfactory and cheap enough while at the same time making possible the safe investment of private capital.
For more than two centuries, the protection of the public was vested in legislative action, but with the growth of the use of public utilities of all kinds in these later days, a more convenient, direct and scientific method had to be adopted--a method which you and I now know as control and regulation by public service or public utility commissions.
Let me make it clear that I have no objection to the method of control through a public service commission. It is, in fact, a proper way for the people themselves to protect their interests. In practice, however, it has in many instances departed from its proper sphere of action, and, I may add, has departed from its theory of responsibility. It is an undoubted and undeniable fact that in our modern American practice the public service commissions of many States have often failed to live up to the very high purpose for which they were created. In many instances their selection has been obtained by the public utility corporations themselves. These corporations, to the prejudice of the public, have often influenced the actions of public service commissions. Moreover, some of the commissions have, either through deliberate intent or through sheer inertia, adopted a theory, a conception of their duties wholly at variance with the original object for which they were created
I'm in awe...
...in the totality of your lack of comprehension (that's kinda like saying, "cluelessness") you baboon-faced, knuckle-dragging, own-quote-uncomprehending, nitwit.
