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Dale:  Yes, it was the beginning of the end, along with the Panic of 1906-07. (The Wikipedia article linked above is not inaccurate but it is very incomplete.  A much better description is pages 52-59, "A History of the ICC, From Panacea to Palliative," Ari and Olive Hoogenboom, W.W. Norton & Company, 1976)In brief, the Hepburn Act gave the ICC big teeth.  It enjoined railroads to comply with its orders or sue in court, greatly enlarged the scope of its regulation into allied transportation businesses such as express and sleeping car companies and oil pipelines, and empowered the ICC to greatly enlarge its staff.  The Hepburn Act also prohibited railroads from hauling, except for their own use and excepting lumber, any product of their own production or manufacture, such as coal.  This was a focused attack on the anthracite roads which were actually arms of coal mining companies that used high railroad rates to drive from the field competing mining companies, in essence selling their coal at a loss and making their profit from the railroad.The effects were large and swift.  Rail rates were effectively frozen at 1906 levels, which were only slightly higher than the artificially low rates of 1899. Net investment plummeted from $1.5 billion in 1906 to $100 million in 1912.  1910 earnings failed to equal 1907 earnings, even though gross ton-miles had increased 10%.  The operating ratio for the industry climbed from 66 in 1910 to 72.2 in 1914.In 1910 the Supreme Court upheld rate reductions the ICC had imposed on the Rock Island and Burlington, in effect proving the validity of the Hepburn Act.  Railroad stock prices collapsed.In 1913 the Newlands Act gave the ICC enforcement over railroad labor relations originally contemplated under the Erdman Act of 1898, and thus began a pattern of squeezing the industry between higher costs and lower revenues. As a parenthetical comment, I'm not a fan of Albro Martin and his screeds, and I take no side in this battle.S. Hadid
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