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Mr. MOSELY. They are revoked upon recommendation by the hack inspector to the District Commissioners.

Mr. BURDICK. The hack inspector is a policeman?

Mr. MOSELY. The hack inspector of police. He is on the Metropolitan police force. As to the cause of crabbing, there has been some reference here as to crabbing and a continuous circling of public vehicles around Union Station. It is well known that for every cause there is an effect, and for every effect there is a cause, and the crabbing that has been complained of on the part of the authorities that has been exercised by the public-vehicle chauffeurs at various places has been caused by the fact that the business that the public chauffeurs are after is located at the station, or on the curb adjacent to the hotels, and these public-vehicle chauffeurs are prohibited by law from parking there and letting the business come to them, and consequently, if the public-vehicle chauffeur gets any business, he is forced to drive where the business is.

Now, if proper provision, or any provision, is made whereby the hackers, under any system, would be permitted to park where the business is then the crabbing nuisance would be greatly relieved. Mr. BURDICK. That is the cause of the crabbing?

Mr. MOSELY. That is the cause of the crabbing.

Mr. BURDICK. Now, you say there is an effect for every cause. What is the effect of that crabbing? Is it such as has been de

scribed here?

Mr. MOSELY. The effect of crabbing has not been the full effect as has been described here. It is true that hackers drove in front of the Union Station. It is not true, and I do not believe there has been a single case shown in the police court record where any hacker, at any time, ever knocked down any person in front of the Union Station, in the act of crabbing, and it is not true that this continual driving around there, as has been asserted, was any danger to life, because the vehicles drove at a rate of speed of not more than 3 or 4 miles an hour.

Mr. BURDICK. Did it prevent access of other vehicles to the station? Mr. MOSELY. It did not.

Mr. BURDICK. Or interfere with the pedestrians?

Mr. MOSELY. It did not. The point of crabbing in front of the Union Station existed only at the main entrance where we have the three arches immediately in front of the station, where the people walk out to come to the street cars, the parking space where vehicles which had been permitted to go up and discharge passengers, either in front of the station or in the curbway, north or south; that is, vehicles which were not driven by hackers, were permitted to park, and the driving of the hackers in front of the station only affected the front door, if you might term it that way, and did not affect the coming in of any private car to discharge or unload or take on passengers or guests.

Now, the District Commissioners, or some authority, realizing the possible nuisance that the hackers were bringing about by their continual driving in front of the station, issued an ordinance or regulation, you might call it, requiring that hackers should drive or crab, as they termed it-four times per hour-that is every 15 minutes and that they should be not less than 15 feet apart.

Now, the hackers carried out this regulation, I believe, to the letter. There are few, if any, cases in the police court record where they were actually arrested or convicted for driving there either a greater number of times per hour or for a closer distance apart. Now, driving 15 feet apart and at a slow rate of speed, I might add, would not intimidate or jeopardize pedestrians coming out of the station to go toward street cars. Neither would it prevent a vehicle that was privately owned coming in between such cars and stopping to discharge their passengers or take on their frien ls.

Mr. BURDICK. Were there not some cases brought that are now pending in the police court?

Mr. MOSELY. Yes, sir.

Mr. BURDICK. Are they still pending?

Mr. MOSELY. So far as we know.

Mr. BURDICK. They were just test cases, were they not?

Mr. MOSLEY. Well, they were cases carried out under the regular process of the law, and, of course, there were contentions from both sides, and they were considered as test cases. However, considering the test-case idea, the test case only existed from the side of the corporations, whereas from the side of the independent hackers, judgment has been handed down in every case of arrest. For instance, in the case where a Terminal taxicab was arrested and carried down and required to put up collateral under the loitering act, and a public vehicle was carried down and required to put up collateral under the loitering act, that was a test case, but no more terminal taxicabs, so far as we know, have been arrested and brought to justice, whereas continually every day, as a matter of fact, hackers are being arrested and carried down, and judgment is being passed, and they are being fined, and they are paying their fines. So, from our point of view, it is not wholly a test case, because in the case of the corporation taxicabs, they are not molested further, under the decision that is handed down, whereas in the case of the public hackers, they are every day subject to any number of violations and liable to be arrested and be carried down, and are not let off, but each time are required to put up $40 collateral, and they may be arrested any number of times in a day and carried there under such circumstances.

Mr. BURDICK. It takes a good many $40?

Mr. MOSLEY. Now, we feel that inasmuch as there is a difference in legal opinion as to what is the status of a public vehicle; that is, what is a public vehicle, we feel that this committee should take this opportunity to offer some legal opinion that the courts and those who have the power to exercise the law, or carry out the law, may have something to go by. and so that the public vehicle drivers themselves will know what they are, and the corporation taxicab company, which owns the cabs, will know just what status they are in, and so that it will prevent further litigation or proceedings.

At the present time we have several various kinds of vehicles in the District of Columbia which are doing a passenger-carrying business and collecting fares under various names. The first we will call the hack. Now, so far as we know, the hacks, the public vehicles. are governed by acts of Congress; that is, the amount of license they should pay and the amount of fee they shall collect.

Now, we have another style known as the corporation taxicabs, whose fares are regulated, so far as we know, by the District Commissioners, or what is known as the Public Utilities Commission. And we have another kind of taxi service, you might say a one man taxi service, or what they call a flat-rate auto, which, on telephone call, publishes a flat rate for certain distances, so that the patrons will know exactly what price they will pay, because they can see the flat rate on the card, but still they do not pay any hacking license the same as corporation taxicabs, whose fares are regulated by the Public Utilities Commission, and yet from our point of view, they are doing a public vehicle business, in that they are carrying passengers and collecting fares.

The corporation taxicabs are in direct competition, from every point of view, with the public hackers as to the kind of passengers they carry and the destinations to which they carry them, and from our point of view they are public vehicles, and yet the Public Utilities Commission has seen fit not to require them to pay a hacking license. The Public Utilities Commission has also seen fit to permit them, while not paying a hacking license, to charge higher fares than Congress has permitted public vehicles to charge, and there is one kind of taxi service-that is, the flat rate-which has not come to the attention either of Congress or of the Public Utilities Commission, and therefore they get out easier than anyone else.

So that the committee can easily see that there is a large field wherein the law should be made very elastic, so as to cover all points, And as to the time when a taxicab company should come under the regulation of the Public Utilities Commission, that is an important matter, because of certain legal proceedings which occurred, which brought about the designation of the Terminal Taxicab Co. as a public utility. If I am not mistaken, this was brought about through proceedings wherein a colored man brought suit against the Terminal Taxicab Co. for not carrying him, and he won his suit in court upon the point, so far as I can remember, that they were a public utility, and as such were required and should be required and are required by the sense of the law to wait on him, and the court ruled that they were a public utility.

At present there are other companies whose rates are governed by the Public Utilities Commission, but these companies, because the court has not passed judgment against they that they are public utilities, do the same thing for which the Terminal Taxicab Co. was adjudged a public utility, and therefore I say that the committee should take cognizance of this point and lay down some definite rule as to what is a public utility.

Now, for a long period of time the public vehicle chauffeurs of the District of Columbia have been endeavoring to remedy the unjust condition under which they are forced to labor in the District of Columbia. This is a summary of the majority of the grievances of the public vehicle chauffeurs, and with the consent of the committee I should like to file this in the record.

Mr. ZIHLMAN. There is no objection.

(The matter referred to is as follows:)

GRIEVANCES OF THE PUBLIC VEHICLE CHAUFFEURS OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

For a long period of time the public vehicle chauffeurs of the District of Columbia have been endeavoring to remedy the unjust conditions under which they are forced to labor in the District of Columbia.

The first important complaint is the fact that the public vehicles are not permitted to stand in front of any of the large hotels in the District of Columbia, nor are they granted the same privileges as is the Terminal Taxicab Co., at hotels, Union Station, and steamboat wharves, and the Federal taxicabs at hotels. The contention of the public vehicle chauffeurs is that as all streets and roadways in the District of Columbia are public thoroughfares that under their licenses they ought to be allowed the same privileges as are granted the corporation-owned public vehicles.

Another point at issue is that there should be certain established hack stands, equal in importance as the one occupied by corporation-owned public vehicles, whereas, as a matter of fact, these so-called stands are far from the center of any business. Any vehicle may now drive upon the supposed allotted spaces and park so that many times there is often no space for a public vehicle to park in order to be in a position to wait for a fare.

There are 2,150 public vehicle chauffeurs in the District of Columbia engaged in the business with the consent of the governing powers of the District. They are required to pay a revenue, public vehicle license and identification card fees as well as a District license charge. Also a personal tax and income tax is levied.

The public vehicle operators of the District of Columbia naturally must look for their business among that class of people who patronize the public chauffeurs, and it may not be generally known, but it is a fact, that the best places to secure trade is in the vicinity of large hotels and at the Union Station. What seems to be absolutely unfair is the fact that the corporation public vehicles are permitted to stand in front of the large hotels and Union Station, whereas the individual public vehicles are not allowed the same privilege, but are forced to stand in obscure places. It can be proven that most of the hotels of the District of Columbia receive a percentage of the business contributed by the patrons of these houses to the various taxicab corporations. It is not generally known that at the Union Station the Terminal Taxicab Co. has secured a garage license for $65 a year, which permits them to stand their cars along the public thoroughfares to the exclusion of all other vehicles. Since when is the open air space of a public thoroughfare a garage?

It can be conclusively proven that certain police are continually aggravating this matter by impositions heaped upon the public vehicle chauffeurs, boasting that they are getting their instructions from the "higher-ups." When a public vehicle chauffeur is arrested for a minor offense, invariably the collateral at the station house is $40, but from evidence gathered and now in the hands of the representatives of labor of the District of Columbia, when the driver of a corporation vehicle is arrested for any infraction of the regulations the collateral imposed at the police station, if any at all, is very small, usually being a few dollars. Why this discrimination?

On July 11, 1919, the Congress of the United States approved of what is known as the "Anticrabbing law," as follows:

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'SEC. 12. That the loitering of public cabs and hacks or vehicles of all descriptions around or in front of the hotels, theaters, or public buildings in the District of Columbia, either by stopping, except to take on or discharge a passenger, or unnecessarily slow driving, is hereby prohibited, and any driver of any such cab or hack who willfully causes the same to loiter either by stopping or slow driving as aforesaid shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and punished in the police court of the District of Columbia by a fine of not less than $10 nor more than $40 for such offense. The Commissioners of the District of Columbia are hereby authorized and empowered to make any regulation that may be necessary in furtherance of the purpose of this section, and are hereby given authority to revoke the license of the driver of any public hack or cab who is convicted of a violation of this section."

This section was passed by Congress as a rider to the District of Columbia appropriation bill and the public vehicle chauffeurs feel that a grave injustice was done them, since no opportunity was given for a hearing. It certainly

is a fact that if every man following the business of automobile driver was given an equal opportunity with corporation public vehicles there would be no necessity of any such regulation as quoted above.

Because of the unjust conditions this class of workers are practically outlawed, since they have no public hack stand in reality and are forced from pillar to post by the police, and yet any citizen who inquires into the matter can see for himself that at the points of advantage in the District of Columbia, where business is good, the corporation-owned vehicles can be seen standing in rows sometimes a block long and often three deep. Why should the District Commissioners and the police department overlook the fact that a certain class may occupy the thoroughfares of Washington to the exclusion of another class of individually owned public vehicles.

Having failed to remedy matters the representatives of Public Vehicle Chauffeurs' Unions 625 and 654 called upon Congressman Zihlman of Maryland, to introduce a resolution, which he did on October 14, 1919, and which is known as House resolution 334, which provides for an investigation of the arbitrary hacking laws now inexistence and for an investigation of private corporations which are granted privileges to the detriment of the individual public vehicle drivers.

This resolution has been referred to the Rules Committee of the House, and it is to be hoped that a favorable report will soon be made upon the same. This resolution has been indorsed by the Washington Central Labor Union, which represents some 80,000 union workers. Thus organized labor of the District of Columbia is going to cooperate with the Public Vehicle Chauffeurs' Unions, and do everything in its power to endeavor to have this resolution favorably reported and passed. It is to be hoped that every Senator and Congressman can be convinced as to the justice of these complaints, and that the public in general will render every aid in righting a wrong—a very unjust wrong.

Mr. MOSLEY. Now, as to the Union Station, it seems from all outward indications that there is just ground for necessary action on the part of Congress, which inadvertently created a station, or the possibility for a station, at Union Station; and in our minds the only solution is to legally transfer all the property, not a limited parking space laid off, but all the property not covered by the terminal station proper, to the District of Columbia, in order that the District authorities might have supervision over it, and then all complaints on the part of the citizenry of the District of Columbia would be addressed to the authorities of the District of Columbia for review, because of their having authority over such matters.

As to the arch under the west portico, as long as it is open and accessible to vehicular traffic, it also should be considered a public thoroughfare the same as any side street leading off from a main street for the convenience of houses that have their rear end abutting on the street, for taking out trash or other matter. It is necessary for vehicles to go into the roadway and return, and they should have free access thereto. I do not intend to illustrate that part of the situation, but one experience that I noticed last Saturday was so striking that I thought it would be not out of place to recall that experience to the committee. I was driving through the main portico about 10 o'clock Saturday evening, and on the outside of the second platform I noticed a taxicab standing out there in the middle hole at the lower end, and taking some considerable time to get its passengers out, and I became curious. First I saw a soldier get out, or attempt to get out, and two red caps went over to assist him, and one red cap then went away and got a rolling chair and brought it. ap on the elevated curb of the station proper, which was across the hallway in which the terminal taxicab was standing. While the red cap was gone after the chair, the soldier, who had only one leg and one

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