The republic., 1851-04-09
Pennsylvania.

eff what the Wheeling Tsmss says of the Balti-
IAore and Ohio Railroad il true, namely, that the
land along its line in Virginia has increased the
average three hundred per cent? what advantage
may we not hope for from our great line of Gen.
trail Railroad? The thousands who now annually
wend their way to the far West, being, when a
thousand miles beyond the borders of our State.
almost accessible to market they have hereto
fore been when located in the fertile valleys that
separate the rugged mountains Of middle Pennsyl-
vania, will longer, after the completion of our
new contemplated improvements, have induce
ments to separate themselves far from friends
and civilization There millions of acres of un-
cultivated land in Pennsylvania, within from six
to twelve hours ride from this the second city of
tie Union, and port open the year round to the
market Of the world"
So says the free trade Public Ledger, whose
the West facilitates the transport of the produce
of cheap western lands to compete with the al
ready cultivated land of her State, and offers
new inducements for abandoning the old States
and settling in the new ones In saying this,
we desire not to be regarded as objecting to the
construction Of roads, but only to the present
almost exclusive devotion of the attention of
the nation to that work, to the exclusion of all
consideration of the mode in which we may OBJ
tain an increase in the quantity of things to be
carried on the roads.
Pennsylvania does, as the Ledger informs US,
abound in lands uncultivated--lands that have
no market value, and that have changed hands
from year to year, as each successive owner
abandoned them in preference to paying the
trivial tax assessed upon them; and yet vast
bodies of these lands abound in coal and iron
ore, and would have now immense value, but
ment has been adverse to the development of
the resources of the State.
Her own people have done their duty by
themselves, so far as relates to the application
of capital and labor, more than a hundred mil
lions having been applied to the making of roads
and canals, the opening of mines, and the
building Of furnaces; but the result has thus
far been, that in almost every case the great
works thus created have proved ruinous to
those who created them. Time and again have
her coal operators been ruined by the changes
Of our financial system. Her furnaces have
proved ruinous to ive-sixths of those who have
built them The Union canal-the Schuylkill
canal-the Lehigh canal--the Susquehanna ca
nal--the Reading railroad-the Little Schuyl-
kill ralroad-the Danvlle and Pottsville road
the State works, have all similar history. They
have proved runous TO the constructors, and
they have done 80 because the whole tendency
OF the system Of their DEMOCRATIC friends has
been TO crush Pennsylvania interests. Under
the tariff of ls42 the consumption of coal
trebled in four years, and now, under the Dem
ocratic tariff Of 1916, the consumption has re-
mained for four years nearly stationary, al
though the professed object Of that tariff was
that of diminishing the price, thereby increasing
the consumption.
We yesterday recommended our southern
friends to study ADAM SMITH, and we now re-
peat the advice, addressing it to our Pennsyl-
vania friends, and particularly to the editor Of
the Ledger. A careful study Of his works will
satisfy any OF all Of our readers that we are not
now IN the road to free trade, but that we were
five years since, under the Whig tariff Of 1912,