Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1879-03-06
REPUTATION.
The Debt of Tennessee and the Move
ments OF Her LegislatOrs-TaN
Rates In the southern states
The Example OF AIissis-
sippi-What Calhoun
said Of south Car
OlinR-s Credit.

Rates In the Southern states
The Example OF 1fissis-
sippi-What Calhoun
said Of south Car
OlinR-s Credit.
"Gath's" letter in the Cincinnati Enquirer:
A few small northern cities ike Nyack, New
York, have relIuquIshed their charters
Memphis IS the largest city that has ever
done the same. Five railroads had been con
centrated at this city, coming from Little
Rock, Grenada, Chattanooga, Louisville and
| Paducah. This concentration, and the MIS-
sissippl river besides, should have made
| Memphis as important distributing point
and mart as Atlanta. l am informed thaJ
| the city of ST. Louis has taken large par, OF
the trade of Memphis, and by her railroad
Developments has sliced everything west OF
Memphis. The railroad from Memphis 10
| Little Rock, 13l miles long, the worst and
most difficult road TO maintain IN America,
| had a State loan of 81, 80, 900, besides 800,-
| 900 acres of land and mortgage Of Fl ,3UU,-
| 900. The Paducah railroad had about So
| 100000 obligations and was only finished a
| few years ago. Nashville city was LAID out
] in 1884, at which time there were
! only 5000 people IN all central and
| western Tennessee, and North Carolina ex-
| tended to the Mississippi. The State was IN
surgent and restless from the start, and Its
| founder, John Sewer, had his property con-
| 6scated by the old State legislature, and him
| self outlawed. Cotton began to be cultivated
below the Cumberland about 1888. Two
years afterward an independent Territory was
made of Tennessee which ought to have been
| named Cherokee, and William Blount be-
came the first Territorial governor, and also
| the first subject of impeachment, for endeav-
oriDg to sell the whole Territory to the British.
| The senate expelled him. but this made no
| impression on his constituents, who cheerfully
elected him president Of the State senate, and
he died at Knoxville in 1900. J0nesboro, In
| East Tennessee, where, | think, Andy John
! son once lived and John Morgan was shot,
\ was the seat Of the Hrst attempts to split Ten
nessee from North Carolina. Andrew Jack
son, at the age Of twenty-one, arrived at
Nashville in 1873, to be public prosecutor or
district attorney, and he travelled thence to
Jonesboro frequently, a circuit of $50 miles.
He boarded at Nashville with Mrs. DOnelson,
a widow, whose daughter, Mrs. Richards, he
married. Elected to congress before Wash
ingtOn retired, he was one of only twelve rep
resentatlves who voted against preparing a
respectful address to the aged President.
Thus early, under Sewer, Blount and jack
son, did INSTRUMENTATION become the example
Of Tennessee. jackson accused Sewer of land
frauds, and they came within an ace OF kill
ing each other. In 1870 Nashville became the
Territorial capital, and the first newspaper
was issued there. The State was ad
united to the Union in 1895. Through Ten
nessee Boone and the early settlers of Ken
lucky proceeded to found Harrodsburg, Lex
lDgton, etc. There were 100000 persons in
tennessee by the opening OF the war OF 1872,
including $4,000 slaves. Ia 1913 the Chicka
saw Indians gave up their lands IN Iennes-
see, and immediately settlement began there
upon. The Chlckasaw bluff was settled by
John Oyerton & Co. IN 1920, and IN May of
u l T..
there were 100000 people IN Western Ten
nessee alone. By 1910 Memphis was the
third commercial city on the Mississippi river,
and had 5000 people IN 1876. Tennessee
settled more States than any OF our western
commonwealth. Among her governors
have been Sewer, whose family long ruled
Arkansas; Blount, Sam Houston, Polk and
Andy Johnson. Mississippi State was de-
tached IN 1917, and Alabama in 1919. In
1886 Arkansas became a State, having been
seventeen years a Territory. Murfreesboro
was the capital of the State before Nashville
became so in 1912. The pride of Tennessee
| in her solvency and capital was exhibited
several years before the war, when, at an
| expense of more than 81 900, 900, she raised
| the finest capital building In the Union-238
| feet long, with tower 206 feet high; spent
$500, 600 on her waterworks, and $780, 900
on her bridges at Nashville. The popu-
| lation of Tennessee when she was led
into the rebellion was about l, 200,0 900, and
| she had increased less than eleven sper cent.
| IN ten years and only thirty per cent. in
| twenty years. Slavery was already wearing
| out the soil and dissuadiug immigration. The
| value of the slaves of Tennessee at the re-
belIion was about S9000O000; the debt of
| the State was nearly $4,000 900. She is
| sued $680,000 bonds to build the new capitol.
| Memphis was visited IN its wilderness state
| by DeSoto IN 1919, who might properly
| have given 1t his name The State voted
| against secession, refusing to call a cOnven-
| ton for that purpose, by neaely 1900 ma
| JorIty. Not disunlOn candidate was elected,
| yet the politicians never ceased their scheme
| of ruin, and voted $4,000, 900 bonds to b. gin
with for armIng There Is no authentic ac-
count of what the vote was On approving
league with the seeded States already made.
The success of the scheme is a long warning
to the people OF every State of the danger Of
their hired Legislators and jobbers bringing
them to desolation and beggary. In Just
eight months Tennessee was conquered and
became a mere stampiDg-ground, and her
Union men. Andrew johnson, William G.
Brownlow and Joseph Holt, are the only he
roes of the foolish struggle. Back of Mem
phis lived Fanny Wright, who emancipated
her slaves.
SOUTHERN DEBTS.
The debt of Tennessee is proposed to be
reduced by its bondholders forty per cent,
which, according to the table below, would
make it only 81, 100000, or possibly ten
dollars a head of the population. For this
petty tax the solemn legislature of the State
would proclaim themselves and constituents
paupers and absconders. The following
table shows, it is said, the Indebtedness of