Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1859-05-05

service required involved pecuuiary saeA
| fee.
If the proposition before US was to lease
the Public Works for a term of two years
i: would be very different question. The
voice of the people could then be heard il
the next Legislature on the subjec. of sale
and plan could be matured and perfected
upon hich to sell out, i: the people demand
ed it. before these improvements shall be
come perfectly worthless.
FIVE years ago the Public Works would
have brought in market probably over four
millions of dollars. At the present time they
would do well to bring one million. Rem,
them out now for term of five or ten years
and what would they bring, Does any gen.
tlsman on this floor suppose we could give
them away at the end of ten years. lease!
If SO, confess he is more credulous on this
subject than am.
The friends Of the Canal policy claim
that the State can we'll afford to be taxed
moderately to keep up system which has
contributed SO much to her general prosper
ity in opening up and developing her re-
sources. That the Public Works of the State
haze contributed largely to the development
of her resources is no part of nv business
to deny, but on the contrary feel gratiied
in believing such to be the fact. For an ex-
penditure of fifteen or twenty millions Cor
the internal Improvement of the State.
which had produced no other beneficial re-
suits than the very limited dividends arising
from the Public Works, would be set down
as most signal failure. The Canals, in
:heir palmiest days, yielded net revenue
10 the State of less than three per cent. on
their cost. Contrary to the opinions of the
founders of the system, they have largely
failed from the beginning to pay the inter-
est on the cost of construction. The system
although unequal and to some portions of
the State oppressive, was acquiesced in by
those portions with the understanding long
since expressed that the system of publis
Improvements ty the State should cease,
and that the public debt should not be in
creased. This feeling, which had become
somewhat general. very properly found its
way finally into the organic law of the State.
The revenues arising to the State from
the Public Works, have gradually diminish
ed :or the last twelve years, until the ex-
denditures exceed the receipts, in the aggre-
CRATE, for the last three years, to the amount
Of $167,O3O. Thus showing too plaiLly to
admit of mistake, that the Public Works Of
the State are no longer self-sustaining, and
will hereafter have to draw upon the re-
sources Of the Treasury fer their annual sup
port, unless mole economical system be
adopted in their management than we have
any very good reason to expect.
Does any person suppose, Mr.. Speaker,
that the people of OHIO would ever have
entered into this system of internal improve
ments at the public expense, if they had
supposed for moment they would become
public charge to the Ststel Most assured
ly not. The active friends of the system m
claimed, and no doubt honestly entertained
the opinion, that these Improvements would
not only pay the inte rest on the cost Of con-
s,ruction, but finally pay the principal. But
this hope or opinion has long since been
abandoned, and the question has within the
last few years assumed very different char
acter.
Can the Public Works of the State be
made te. susts in themselves, and answer the
purposes of their creation! This take to
be the practical question involved in the
present controversy, the affirmative of which
proposition hesitate not to assume. But
this end can only be accomplished perma-
nently, by sale and trans er of these i'm
provements to private persons or companies.
The State never should have engaged in a
work of this kind, from the simple fact that
it almost universally costs the public from
fifty to one hundred per cent more to ex.
ecute job of work than it does private in
dividuals; nor is this at all strange. The
Stste works by agents, and those agents
work less time, do less work. and get more
pay than private persons. The same spirit
of lberality enters into all the contracts
and controls their every action. Whether
necessarily so or not is immaterial to the
question; the .act exists, and with this we
have to do. Add to this the too frequent
incompetency and faithlessness of public
agents to the trusts reposed in them, and il
will not appear exrravagant to assume that
the Public Works of Ohio have cost FIVE
millions more than would have been re.
quirec iu their constructions by private per.
sons. But while this NAV be admitted, many
claim that the work could not have been
done by private enternrise; that the under
taking was a mammoth one, requiring the
united energies and resources of a grea'
people-the sovereign power of a State tc
mplish-and that without the interpo.
sition of State authority, the Canals would
not have been made, and consequently thf
resources of the State have remained unde
veloped.
What reason, Mr.. Speaker, have we tc
assume any such thing! After the State hac
invested near $4,000 900 in internal i'm
provements, and public opinion had settlet
down into form stronger than that Of lega
enactment, that the prosecution of the worl
by the State should cease, and that the cred
of the State should no longer be used fo
that purpose, did the epterprising citizens
Of Ohio fold their arms and say it is enough
we have got $50 miles OF Canals. and 24eC
miles of turnpikes,and Herewith we will b
content: that we can do nothing as indivit
uas to improve The State and develope hsl
resources. Not at all; but they immediate
ly entered upon gigantic work, and have
completed within an incredible short perio,
of time 394s miles of Railroads, at a cost o
SI54. .7O5. 3O7, and still the work progresses
The difficulty is perhaps greater with ou
people in knowing just when to stop, thar
when to commence. or how to prosecute