ABSTRACT
Before the First World War Americans demanded and eventually received protection from discriminatory and excessive railroad rates. In this first surge of government regulation, shippers and consumers were concerned to prevent the railroads from charging high and unfair rates. With the advent and spread of the automobile, the motor coach, the truck (lorry) and the airplane, government regulation took on a broader canvas. The long-distance bus industry in the USA originated in the second decade of the present century when numerous entrepreneurs throughout the country started local services between nearby towns or beyond the suburbs, using elongated saloon cars. The Motor Carrier Act applied generally ‘to the transportation of passengers or property by motor carriers engaged in interstate or foreign commerce and to the procurement of and the provision for such transportation’.
