Semi-weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1853-18??, 1859-03-12
The Staqoato.
REMARKS OF Il. c. JONES, ESQ,

Delivered a. tie House Of Commons at the tdte &c.
sion Of tic Legislature, on the Homestead bill
Mr.. SPEAKER: The object proposed by this bill is
the attaihment,6f permanent home by every free
vorable consideration and passage may, as of yore,
be arrayed that apparently strong argument--limi-
tation and restriction Of credit To this reply that
although credit is the life Of trade and commerce.
which freights our buoyant ships upon every sea,
Pounds our .populous towns and cities and renders
our country great in material wealth. yet it should
not be stimulated to such degree as to induce our
citizens to disrobe themselves of their necessary
garments, or to deprive themselves of that with
which they ought not to part, and rarely do. only
under the most urgent necessity or where the stern
edict of the law has gone forth that so it shall be-
Sir, our Legislators, in times past have set us the
glorious example. Upon our statute book are legi-
bly, written the principles set forth in this bill. 1t
there declares that the instruments or TOOLS with
which q man gains his livelihood, the raiment that
conceals his nakedness and warns his lfeblood the
bed upon which he reposes, and the little store Of
food which he may have garnered up, shall be his
above and beyond the law. We only ask you to 60
step further to put it in his power to have and
hold little tenement whose frail shelter may serve
the kindly purpose of protecting him from the win
try blasts and the summers sun; place wherein
to deposit that humble bed upon which he may pros
trate his weary limbs and enjoy the greatest luxury
known to the poor man-calm, refreshing sleep
bought only with the price of physical labor. Sir,
invoke all to follow in the footsteps of our prede
cessors who moved by sympathy supported by
reason, have placed upon record this one great act
of humanity, which will ever rebound to their credit
aud mark the period as one of refinement and i'm
provement. Is there man within the sound of my
voice ready to deny that home is indispensable to
life, to comfort happiness and prosperity? If not,
why withhold your hands from doing the noble
deed? Upon one side stands credit with all its
power grandeur, pomp and poverty; upon the other,
home around which clusters the thronging mem
cries of the past appreciation and enjoyment of the
present. and bright hopes of happiness and prosper
ity in the future.
But sir, it is urged this bill will impair credit I
take issue with the proposition and contend on the
contrary that it will give healthy activity to sound
judicious credit 1t will add to population and
increase, immeasurably increase, the number of
those whose labor and whose strength will be ex-
pended upon native soil, wherein all riches lie
many of whom now but moths upon honest
mems labor. 1t will form the strong armed and the
strong hearted soldier whose interest and whose at
tachment, contented in their homes, will form our
safeguard in time of war; and in time of peace assist
in swelling the list of our expectations to q degree
never before witnessed.
Sir, emigration from our State has never yet
ebbed its flood but in continuous outpouring
stream flows her wealth. her strength and her po2u-
latiOn. Year by year, yes, day by day, her sons
and daughters are bidding adieu to the scenes of
their childhood, exiting themselves from the land
Of their nativity, and seeking new homes and new
friends in the land of strangers. Do YOU wish to
turn back this tide of depopulation, and see our
country smiling under the happy influence Of their
hands? Provide them home which to them and
theirs will be lasting inheritance, around which
they may plant their vineyards and fig trees, sure
to enjoy the fruits thereof Sir, the benefits of this
bill are as expansive the limits of North Carolina
and their salutary effects upon the moral social and
political condition of our people, Us perpetual as
time itself; and although in their broad comprehen-
sons all classes castles of society included yet
they are not peculiarly intended for those whose
ample means enable them to enjoy all the comforts,
which wealth can only procure, nor those whose
nagTancX renders them at ONCE the object Of our
whose sun of property has been dimmed and over
Swallowed by clouds of adversely, who, ever ready
to strive, but despair because improvement becomes
impossible under the heartless mandate of the law
To them it will be the beacon light which will lead
them safely over the darkness of the sea of life and
save them and their unofending offspring from want
and misery, from dishonor and an untimely grave
Virtue sir, unprotected virtue first great
est and most priceless treasure is supplant at our
feet appealing to our manhood and beseeching of
US in the name and memory of those most sacred
and dear, home which may shelter them from vile
contact with the trappings Of gilded crime. Sir,
place this bill upon Statute book, side by side
with that which has gone before and you will dis
seminate throughout North Carolina home feeling,
home desire and a home pride Hold out to them
this great boon of home however homely, and you
will arouse and refreshen that longing after home
which, by the wise providence of God has been i'm
planted IN the bosom of man. Sir you will touch
the sympathetic cord that vibrates in every heart.
and from the cesspools of crime and degradation,
from debauchery, profigacy and squalid misery,
from inactivity, indifference, rresolution and des
pair, you will draw out your thousands to the hon.
orable and compensating pursuit of agriculture
Yes SIR it is my humble but honest opinion that it
will accomplish more for the comfort and well being
OF our people and their posterty than any act ever
passed by the General Assembly of our State Sir,
thus the bowling of countless heads, the cheerful.
contented song Of the mk-maid the woodsmen's
axe, as it makes the welkin ring the curling smoke
arising from fine fresh raised homes, the constant
buz of the loom, the spindle and the saw and the
busy form Of commerce will soon give cheering to-
kens Of rapid development Of our now dormant but
vast resources and that the plains of eastern
North Carolina now silent as the tomb, will be alive
and abound with human habitations as if the fruc-
tfying rill had poured forth its water thereupou
and the barren spots upon our western hills where
vegetation has never dared peep FORTH will smile
and bloom, as though some genii bard had touched
them with its magic wand.
report of the Stockholders of the Petersburg Rail
road Company, for 1885, showing in compact form
the business of the road during the year named
was laid before us on yesterday The document i,
from the press of O. Ellyson, printer, Sycamore
street. and is = very credtable specimen Of the ar
of Typography.
From it We learn that the road is in prosperou.