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“In whatever direction we look in any section of our vast republic, we find prodigious combinations of railway capital actually perfected, or progressing rapidly toward complete absorption of all smaller lines. This tendency to consolidation is irresistible. The economic advantages are so great, the temptations to vast profits are so incalculable, and the allurements to ambitious and able men afforded by the control of these mighty social machines are so enticing, that the movement must go forward.”
-Source: George Henry Lewis, National Consolidation of the Railways of the United States, 1893