The Morristown gazette. [volume] (Morristown, Tenn.) 1867-1920, 1881-09-28
The Murristown Gazette.
A LOOK AHEAD.
what The United states VIII BE In
Half a Century More
rTror. t1,o TDstrost Free pSraan

AAsA A40 OMAbEA 0AE4AGB VIZ 2S -
Half a Century More
TFrom the Detroit Free PresS.I
The center of population in the United
States has, during the last ten years,
shifted from Columbus, Ohio, TO the
Indiana boundary line in few decades
more it viii reach the Mississippi river.
At Che rate Of increase prevailing during
the present century, the country viii, In
1920, contain between $50, 900, 900 and
$50, 900, 900. This is only forty years
hence, a space easily grasped by those
who can remember " the Harrison Pres
idential campaign" Ten or twelve
years more, equal to a look backward as
far as the days of jackson, notification
and the United States Bank, the country
will be found to contain 200, O00, 600
equal to the present population OF Eu-
rope exclusive Of Russia, Austria and
Turkey.
It is hard to imagine the changes In
the social and commercial phases OF the
country which this population implies !;
the immense domestic trade, the large
interior cities-Chicago larger than New
York Or Philadelphia, Cincinnati and
St Louis than Brooklyn, Boston and
Baltimore Cleveland, Detroit and
cities of that grade containing 500, 900 of
people. Already the New England and
Middle States are falling behind the
average rate of growth, and they will
tend moro and more to the stationary
point, when their annual increase will be
insignificant.
Under these circumstances, there Is
every reason to suppose that there will
grow up In this central portion an i'm
mense city, perhaps more than one,
which Will be the great metropolis and
distributing point of the continent. 1t
may be Chicago. 1t may be, also, Kan
sas City, or some other point farther
West For, when this country contains
100000, 900 of people, certainly when
east Of the Mississippi it begins to ap-
proach the density of European popula-
ton, its domestic commerce viii be
more important than its foreign COM
merce, aud it's interior cities more i'm
portant than its seaports. The netrop-
oils will not be New York, but the CEN
trail point of distribution and exchange.
This is true of nearly every country and
its metropolis the world over, and there
is no good reason for doubling that it
Will prove true of the United States.
London, Paris, Rome, Berlin, Vienna,
Madrid, Pekin, in modern days, Athens,
Babylon, Bagdad Palmyra, in ancient
times, are, or were, all interior cities.
1t viii attract, as they have attracted,
the swarming multitude, the intelligent,
the energetic, the pleasure loving, the
adventurers from the immense reservoir
of populations around it. 1t may be
less cosmopolitan, but it will be more
American than the seaport cities, just as
Paris is the most distinctively national,
MarseilIes one of the most cOsmopoli-
tan cities in the world. New York So
cially, Boston intellectually, are already
dominated to some extent by foreign in
huences, and are not likely to become
less 50 in the future. They are already
settling down into hard, fixed modes of
thought and life.
The newspaper press of the different
kinds of cites IN the United States be-
gins t. family prophesy their respective
tendencies. The press of BOstOns and
New York IS comparatively provincial.
Almost wholly IN its news, and mainly
in its comments, it scarcely recognizes
the existence of any interest west of the
Alleghenies. If there is any striking char
acteristic in the New York press at all, its
management and tone partake of the En-
giish type. On the other hand, the
Chicago papers show on their very face
that they are published at q central
point. Every point Of the compass is
fully represented. Their drag-net of
enterprise is thrown over the whole con-
ti't"nt. This will be the law of their
future growth, and the law of the future
gsoNth If Chicago or whatever the great
central metropolis may be. It is to be
vitalized, energetic, distinctively conti-
mental center of commerce, art, liter
AZURE aud amusement, and will suck into
its whirling current of business and
pleasure the teeming millions which
viii then swarm in the great central
States of the Union.