New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1875-02-21
FRIENDLY ADVICE FROM THE BRIDGE

FRIENDLY ADVICE FROM THE BRIDGE
The following, from the st. Louis GLOBE
OF the seventeenth instant, is respectfully
referred to our Chamber of Commerce.
Perhaps suitable apology is due to st.
Louis for the presumption of the RE-
PUBLICAN and other friends of the canal
and common sense:
The New Orleans REPUBLICAN has dis
covered that a board Of army engineers
once reported the bridge at this city to be
an obstruction to navigation. and it puts
those worthy gentlemen to shame by re-
printing their report We notice it be-
cause the people Of St. Louis had almost
forgotten that the bridge was an obstIuc-
tioh. We have to go to New Orleans to
learn such things, and, in return, We can
only wish that the New Orleans people
would occasionally come to st. Louis and
learn some OF the ways BY which sensible
men succeed in their undertakings That
city, which can not understand why its
prosperity ia passing away, has fought
harder against the improvement of the
against proposition to block it up for
ever, and is apparently determined to
ENJOY no prosperity that can possibly be
averted.
st. Louis has almost forgotten that the
Eads bridge is an obstruction to the
navigation Of the Mississippi, and yet
New Orleans has not entirely forgotten
the fact. How strange! st. Louis, bound
up in itself and in its bridge, wonders
why other communities, out-of-the-way
settlements, outlying villages, so to speak,
like New Orleans and the little villages on
the upper Mississippi and Missouri,
should not have almost forgotten it.
Let us send some carefully selected men,
bers of our Chamber of Commerce to St.
Louis to be enlightened, by the savans
to be found there, and to return as mis-
sionaries to instruct our people as to their
real wants. We feel that we need better
knowledge of our wants than we have at
and we are obliged to think that
st. Louis is the only proper place to go to
for instruction.
1t is hard to be charged by such an au-
thority as the st. Louis Daily Globe with
not understanding why the prosperity of
our city is passing away, but we must bear
up under the charge. 1t is hard to think
that we have fought harder against the
improvement of the mouth Of the river
than we would have done against pro-
position to block it the MOUTH up for
ever. Yet we must plead guilty to the
charge-in all honesty. We have been SO
blind as to want no mouth to the river.
but IN lieu of it canal, in which, until
our eyes were opened by our st. Louis
friends, we firmly believed. That we
have not fought against blocking the
mouth OF the river is entirely due to our
faith that the government of the United |
State would give US our canal-we were
foolish enough to think so. For enter
Eaining this notion thirteen members of |
Dur Chamber of Commerce have already
apologized in the name of the Chamber
1t is to be hoped that this action WILL at
my rate, pour oil upon the feelings of the
iaily Globe from which it is hoped the
1nguent may spread over the whole of St.
Louis.
Since we can do no better, of course we
must submit to the blocking up process
prescribed by the Illinois and St. Louis
Bridge Company, and certified by the
tockholders Of the bridge. We are
title unwilling, but then, you know, that
makes no difference. What right has
title one-horse town to set up its opinions
gainst st. Louis. When we get big and
'roud, we will prescribe for the improve
nent of the upper Mississippi and Mis-
ouri, but until we grow little we will
lot attempt anything of the sort but let
ur big neighbors, twelve hundred miles
way prescribe for us.