The Sunday tatler and Jersey City express. (Jersey City, N.J.) 1883-1886, 1886-02-21

BY Senator Fish--Mr. President, if there
is no objection, win answer that ques
ton.
The President--The Senator from At
lantic has the floor, and if he desires t.
/ yield his time tor that purpose now, it may
be done, but will state that all OF the
Senators will have an opportunity to
make their answers in due time.
/ Senator Gardner-I will conclude in
few minutes what have to say,
and let the legal gentlemen cross.
| question each other. The great obiec'
ion urged to the bill Yesterday was con-
| stitutional one, which have endeavored
to answer, and another which was not O
fundamental one at all, but mere matter
Of detail. Senators insisted that the Leg.
islature was not proper body to pass upon
the structure of the bridge they were not
a board of engineers, they were not this
and they were not the other. It struck me
at that time, Mr.. President. that there was
in that objection something which
rat this moment messenger appeared
! on the floor from the House, and stated that
the members of the House awaited the
presence of the Senate for the purpose of
holding joint meeting, whereupon the
Senate adjourned to attend such meeting
4 iOROu tuc IC-16dCAAO1Ank VI t4d 6CA4Qbp
the debate was resumed as follows j
Senator Gardner-We were. considering
| that which was insisted upon by those who
! opposed this bill, that the Legislature was
not the proper body to pass upon the plan
of structure. 1t might also be insisted
with equal propriety that the Secretary Of
War is not an engineer, and therefore is
not competent to pass upon like plans.
! He. we learned in the course of the debate,
would naturally call in the engineers of the
War Department. and / merely suggest
| that it would be possible for even as wise a
body as the New Jersey Legislature to take
counsel with engineers. 1t might be posi-
BILE, indeed it certainly ought to be, for
those Senators who are willing to concede
all of this to the National Government, who
are willing to accept whatever structure
the Secretary of War should authorize to
that class Of legislators and citizens it would
be an easy matter to simply approve what
ever plan the Secretary of War might sug-
gest. In other words, all those who stand
here to-day ready to approve by legislation
plans which the Secretary of War may
ready to- approve them next year, aud
those who to-day are not willing to approve
them in advance, but who want to see
them first, | think would be likely to
accept plan for proper structure, and
the only matter of propriety of which they
would be the tribunal would be how it
interfered with that commerce which is
carried on waters that ought to belong to
the State, and that commerce which is Pc
culiarly the commerce of the State.
If, Mr.. President, the people of New
Jersey are to-day a unit in favor of the
general railroad law and of maintaining in
Its integrity that law, it is because they
have seen that its operations have been
Deneficent. What have been the results of
that law that has SO attached the people of
the State to it, that Senators stand here
and allege that they are a unit for it's MAIN
tenance? It is because they have seen
railroads built under it. it is because they
have seen new railroads, reaching new
places and in competition with old roads,
always upon the soil of the State. 1t is be-
cause they have seen railroads terminating
upon the soil of New Jersey, building
warehouses, elevators and docks and buy
ing the riparian lands of the State be-
cause they have seen railroads making
their termini on the soil of the State and
have seen valuable structures erected
thereon which are contributing largely to
the revenues of the State and pouring taxes
into the municipal treasury and State
treasury and which have furnished money
to the school fund for the purchase of this
riparian land. In word, they favor the
general railroad law because it has been to
the advantage of New Jersey but when
they shall see the elevators and the ware
houses and the docks going beyond the
reach of their assessors and their tax levy
when they see the steamship lines that
carry the grain and the freight across the
ocean, landing in another State, and con-
tributing to the revenues of that State
when they shall see the general railroad
law not operating, as it does operate, to
build up and improve and increase values
and give employment in the State, but
when they shall see it carrying not only
the new termini and the new improvements
beyond the line of the State. but the old,
perchance forced by competition to go
there in q word, when they shall see the
general railroad law not building up and
improving, but despoiling the State, leav-
ing barrenness and ruin and loathsemeness
where there is now commerce and business
and value then will the people Of New
Jersey be unit in favor of the general
railroad laws. Aye, they would damn it,
and damn the Legislative stupidity that did
not stop off the possibility of bill like
this. We are told that there is not much in
these terminal taxes. only depot. Not
much of this, muck of that and much of The
other, but the facts remain, and it Is not
worth while to recapitulate them that
the elevators are there the docks are
there the improvements and the ripar-
ian lands are there; the railroad termini
are there and the values are there and
the taxes ARE paid upon them and every
Senator can see that for himself and MORE
over the steamship lines that must carry
this freight pay taxes somewhere. If they
land on the shores of New Jersey and their
docks are in New Jersey they will pay
State of New York they will pay them
there, and if the Baltimore and Ohio Rail-
road, which is dragged into this debate, il
to be the institution that it is said it is,
the great competing line it is claimed to
be, and is to open the vast country that it
| is claimed that it will do, and is to bring
the incalculable amount of commerce that
il is claimed it will, is it not apparent that
| it must have and will have steamships to
carry it, and they too will be taxed some
| where? Shall that somewhere be in New
| Jersey, or on Staten Island If the con-
| struction of the general railroad law is to-
! day what it is claimed that it is, then that
defect in it defeats the intention of those
i vic advocated it and those who passed it
| II is not what Il has been thought to be,
and it is what it ought to be, and it is not
what loyalty to New Jersey would leave 1t
and there is but a. single argument when
| all the sophistry is brushed sside, there is
but apparently single point in my judy
| ment apparently worth consideration, and
| that is the one that we have endeavored
to answ erthat talk about interstate