The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1892-08-12
OUR COUNTRY ROADS.
They Are the Worst in Any Civilized
Country-Their Improvement.

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worse than those to be found
in any other country IN the
world pretending to be civilized
and ENJOYING stable form of gov
eminent. AS it has long been an
axiom that the common highways
of country are at once the means
and the measure of Its civilization
it is somewhat strange that in this
country where we boast of enjoying
a higher type of civilization than is
to be found elsewhere, our roads
should always have been SO wretch.
eddy bad.
Even in the colonial times the
necessity to make better the condi-
ton of the common roads was SER
lously felt, and in those parts of
the country settled by particularly
longheaded people, as, for instance
in the neighborhood of Boston,
there have always been pretty good
public highways. But as a rule
all over the country from then till
now We have been content with
dirt roads, which, in the winter, are
muddy quagmircs and in summer
streaks of dust. Both Washington
and Hamilton, after the establish
ment of thu Republic, appreciated
fully the importance of general
system of common highways.
Washington recommended to
Patrick Henry, then Governor of
Virginia, that the location the
building and the repairs of roads
be taken out of the hands of the To-
cal authorities; for he saw, what
we see yet more clearly to-day, that
where our highways are left to the
tender mercies of the local authori-
ties they are mismanaged, badly
built, and even in their worst con-
ditlon harmed by any attempts to
make them better. This is not be-
cause these local authorities would
not like to have good roads but it
is because they have no means to
do much better than Is done, and
If they did have the means they
lack the requisite knowledge, with
out which no decent roads can be
managed.
Strange though it may seem, the
farmers. as rule, take less inter-
est in this matter of road improve
ment than any other class of peo-
pie. Very few of them are travel
ers, and very few realize how bad
the country roads are. When they
are told of the roads which were
built in prehistoric times by the In
cas- of Peru, when the Carthaginian
roads are described to them, and
those noble highways which radlat-
ed from ancient Rome are men,
toned. they listen as though a
fairy tale were being told, and
when they hear of the great high
ways in France, England Switzer-
land and Germany, they listen with
the same incredulity with which
they receive the yarns which sal
lors and other travellers are priv.
legged to bring from beyond the
seas.
They have never had better
roads than those which exist to-day
nor did their fathers nor grandfath-
ers. Conservative men that they
are, they feel that what was good
enough in the olden times is good
enough to-day; therefore, with a
kind of contempt which is misera-
bly, pltiful, they "wallow in the
mire of their ways, paying excess
sive tolls, enduring, IN word,
grinding taxation, generation after
generation, without approaching
the burden which rests upon them -
1t has been suggested that the
American roads be placed under a
system of government supervision
and be divided somewhat as the
French roads are:
First-National roads. These to
be built and maintained by the
general government and be located
with reference to military and pos
tai requirements.
Second-State roads. These to
be built and maintained by the
several states and connect the va
rious localities of the states and be
planned with reference to the ma
tional roads.
Thlrd-County or neighboring
roads. These to be built and
maintained by counties and town
ships aud be located with reference
to the national roads.
Those who advocate this idea say
that If our common roads were i'm
proved by some such plans as this
we should soon have them in charge
of competent and educated engi-
neers. The national roads would
probably be IN charge of army en-
gineers; the state roads in charge
of engineers graduated from the
agricultural and mechanical schools