The Caucasian. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1874-1875, 1874-08-01
That Rail Read Again.

That Rail Read Again.
The advocates of the rail road
scheme Of Mr.. F. w. Kellogg, have
secured from the President of the
Police Jury a call for q special
meeting Of that body to entertain
his proposition. We were in hopes
that this matter would not 20 this
far, considering the fact that not q
single property owner or voter in
the parish, except perhaps on Bay.
You Boeuf, is in favor of this par
ticular scheme and that they all
condemn it in unmeasured TERMS.
To the uninitiated 1t would seem
that both the Democrat and the Ga.
zette are in favor Of it. The fact is
that the rail road articles in both
those papers were written by the
Attorney of the rail road, and pass.
ed of on the community as the
opinions and sentiments of the pa.
pers themselves. We dare either
Of them to deny that their leaders
were written by that gentle,nan.-
lie shoots a long Bo,o-but is not
the man that the people Of Rapides
wish tn advise them. All his rev.
sonng bears the impress Of the paid
Attorneys pleading and will not
bear the light Of day. We have
challenged these rail road gentle
men to meet us upon the points at
issue and they have avoided meet.
ing uupon them most scrapulous.
". The question Of - guaranty that
they would build any more of the
road after we had paid them $780,
600 to build the sixteen miles from
Alexandria to Lecompte, they have
never touched at all. In Wednes-
days Democrat, the tcriter purpose
~ mixes our two calculations, one
upon a parish paper and the other
a greenback basis, and consequent.
" misrepresents us entirely. He
could not answer our figures and he
must needs pretend not to under.
stand them. This is the course
pursued by all these gentlemen ever
since this discussion came UP
They seem to desire to hoodwink
our people by all sorts of specious
reasoning and BY trying to hide the
real points at issue.
Now we have this to say to the
Police Jury. The great body Of the
people Of Rapides are opposed tn
this scheme, but not opposed TO
rail roads; you are the guardians
of the people and it is your place to
keep them from being swindle.l and
it is your duty to refuse to put this
proposition to vote OF the people.
If you do so put it, it goes before
them with your endorsement, and
if YOU endorse it you W II not he the
faithful guardians Of the rights and
Interests of the people. Never mind
about the fifty signatures to the rail
road document, nor the section of
their charter, which seeks to de-
prive you OF all discretion in the
matter. They cannot take your
discretion away from you and you
have right to say that you will
not put this or any other particular
rail road proposition before the peo-
pie. You have n right to refuse
and you ought to refuse. Let them
'nandamus you, if they wish to-
These gentlemen are not acting the
open and fair parts of honest men
and are now falsltying their solemn
protestations made three years ago,
when they defeated Corse's propo-
sition, by telling us that they "did
not want cent of the peoples mon
ey, they only wanted their Charter
and they would build the rod
with their own money ETC." Now
the first thing they did was to get
in their Charter q clause authoriz.
ing any fifty signatures to force the
Police Jury to put before the peo-
pie any scheme no matter how wild
or unfair it may be. Nor have these
gentlemen got the record here that
entities them to any consideration
at our hands. They fooled our pco-
pie here out of Thirteen thousand
Dollars a year or two ago, by max
ing contracts with them for ties
and when they had delivered them,
never paying any one of them. Now
Mr.. Kellogg says if we give them
this donation he will pay this debt,
and il not. that he will never nav q