Hill

in such a way as to undo quickly what had taken
years to accomplish. The plan to insure stability
in control took form late in 1901 in the organi-
zation of the Northern Securities Company, a
holding company to act virtually as trustee of
the Great Northern, Northern Pacific, Burling-
ton, and other properties associated with Hill's
name. The new company, of which Hill was
elected president, had a brief and litigious ca-
reer. It was attacked almost at once by the State
of Minnesota, by the Interstate Commerce Com-
mission, and by the attorney-general of the
United States, as contrary to the Sherman Anti-
trust Act of 1890. Hill had believed, and com-
petent counsel had advised, that the Sherman
Law did not apply to railroads, but in March
1904 the Supreme Court, by a five-to-four de-
cision, declared the Northern Securities Com-
pany contrary to law. Steps were taken at once
to dissolve the company but there was further
and protracted litigation over the method of
liquidation followed by the company, which was
upheld unanimously by the Supreme Court on
Mar. 6, 1905.

The failure of a plan which he believed to be
economically sound and in broad public interest
was a great disappointment to Hill. The disso-
lution of the Northern Securities Company left
the relations between the so-called Hill roads the
same as they were in 1901, and the joint interests
of the Great Northern and Northern Pacific were
expanded in 1905 when the two companies joint-
ly organized and began construction of the Port-
land & Seattle Railway (later Spokane, Portland
& Seattle). In 1907 Hill resigned the presi-
dency of the Great Northern and became chair-
man of the board. Succeeded by his son, Louis
W. Hill, he did not give up his close contact with
the affairs of the railroad, yet he took more time
henceforth for matters of broad public interest.
In 1912 he resigned the chairmanship but until a
few days before his death in 1916 his interest in
railroad matters was keen and constructive.

The fact that Hill had an important part in the
first years of the Canadian Pacific Railway, com-
pleted from coast to coast in 1885, is obscured by
his greater achievements in the Northwest. Don-
.ald Smith and George Stephen had been of in-
valuable assistance to him-when he acquired the
St. Paul & Pacific. It was natural that they
should turn to him for assistance when later the
project of the Canadian line was taking form.
He was a member of the original syndicate that
underwrote the project; for a few years he was
a director of the company; and personally he had
much to do with the selection of the route and
the policies of construction. The man to whom

Hill

belongs the greatest credit for carrying the un-
dertaking to completion, William C. VanHorne,
was recommended to the board by Hill. His in-
terest was not entirely dissociated with that of
his own railroad. For a time, construction ma-
terials in large quantities moved over his rails
from St. Paul to the border while Canada was
without a connecting link of its own through the
rugged and inhospitable territory around the
northern shores of Lake Superior. It was Hill's
belief that the wise policy of the Canadian com-
pany would be to defer the construction of that
difficult section of the line and during the early
years to concentrate upon colonizing the prairies
of the Canadian Northwest while continuing to
use the American route through St. Paul. Van-
Horne, however, thought otherwise and persuad-
ed the board to undertake the construction of
the Lake Superior section simultaneously with
that of the far-western section. As soon as it ap-
peared that the interests of the two companies
would be competitive rather than mutually co-
operative, Hill resigned (1883) from the Ca-
nadian Pacific board.

During the last twenty years of his life Hill
was frequently called upon to make addresses on
important occasions when questions of railroad
regulation, finance, rates, and operation were un-
der discussion. He usually responded freely to
requests to talk to those who were interested in
agriculture. The Great Northern was a pioneer
in the running of agricultural demonstration
trains, with expert lecturers, and Hill personally
imported from England a substantial number of
blooded bulls which he distributed gratis to farm-
ers throughout the Northwest. He was an early
advocate of the doctrine of conservation of natu-
ral resources and was active in leadership of the
movement of 1908 in that direction. His views
on such public questions were expounded by him
in more complete form in a volume, entitled
Highways of Progress (1910).

Hill's lifelong interest in Japan, China, and
India led him to undertake an ambitious experi-
ment intended to stimulate trade and commerce
between the United States and the Orient. The
Great Northern's balance of traffic, after a few
years, was eastward in products of forests and
•agriculture* The westward traffic was so much
•smaller that a substantial portion of the west-
bound trains consisted of empty cars. If a new
traffic in commodities for export to the Orient
could be developed, the commodities could be
moved at relatively slight additional expense and
subnormal freight rates would be justified. Hill
had sent men to the Orient to make exhaustive
studies and he knew the possibilities in the ex-

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