a competing line by purchasing a majority of its capital stock or
by leasing it, nothing was said about one railroad having a
minority investment interest in another. A minority investment,
even though it be as low as ten or twenty per cent, usually
constitutes a dominating influence if held by a single interest,
for in most cases the majority of the shares will be owned in
small blocks by thousands of investors who never combine for a
definite, practical purpose. Thus the interest which has the one
large block of stock usually controls the voting power, and runs
little risk of losing it unless a contest develops with other
powerful interests--and this is a contingency which it almost
never has to meet.

Carrying out this policy of promoting harmony among competing
lines, the New York Central and Pennsylvania Railroad early in
1900 acquired a working control of the Reading Company, which in
turn controlled the New Jersey Central and dominated the
anthracite coal traffic. Later the Baltimore and Ohio shared this
Reading interest with the Lake Shore of the New York Central
system. The New York Central and the Pennsylvania acquired a
working control of the same kind in the Chesapeake and Ohio
Railway, which was an important element in the soft coal fields
and was reaching out to grasp soft coal properties in Ohio and
Indiana.

These and other purchases, and the consequent voice acquired in
the management, established comparative harmony among Eastern
railroads for a long time; they stabilized rates and enabled
formerly competing roads to parcel out territory equitably among
the different interests. Later, Harriman, and to some extent