The record-union., 1897-04-21

At the Good Roads Congress recently
held at Albany, n. Y, General Roy
Stone of the Bureau of Road Inquiry
of the United States Department of
Agriculture said to the congress in the
course of an able address, large part
of which was addressed to wheelmen:
Your effort then should be to keep
the farmers with you, or, if possible,
put them in the lead and yourselves in
their support. 1 am very glad TO know
that such a combination of effort is be-
ing now successfully made in several
quarters of the United States. Only
a few months ago Mr.. Potter, on be-
half of the wheelmen, and Mr. Harri-
son and myself, on behalf Of the De-
partment of Agriculture, met the repre-
sentatives of the New York State
Grange in a most agreeable and salts
factory conference upon the subject,
and wherever have reported the re-
suit of this conference it has been re-
ceived with enthusiasm, both by the
farmers and by the wheelmen.
In your discussion with the farmers
and their representatives you can bring
to bear this powerful argument: That
il is time to do away with the cruel in
justice which places upon them and
upon the small fraction of the property
in the State which they hold the entire
burden of building highways for the
whole people. In the State of New
York this burden is borne by one
fourteenth of the property of the State,
and every measure which the wheel
men are advocating is in the direction
of actually lifting this burden off the
farmers shoulders. instead of gaddling
a heavier one upon them. In your ar
gument with the men of the cities and
towns, you can show that of the bur
den of the bad road tax, which is in
finitely greater than the tax for road
building and repair, not less, in fact,
by a concensus of many estimates.
than S600, 600 annually, the cities
and towns are bearing their full share:
that, in fact. it would be impossible
for the farmers to bear this burden,
since it would promptly bankrupt the
whole farming community, and that
they throw it over upon their custom
ers, so far as possible, by increasing
the price Of their commodities. If you
can impress these facts upon the peo-
pie of the cities and towns, and make
them anxious to unload their share of
the bad roads tax and help do justice
to the farmers by relieving them of an
unjust road building tax, you ought to
and must. by this means, establish the
most fraternal relations with the
farmers organizations of the country.
And when the, wheelmen's league and
all the farmers associations shall pull
together tremendously in this direction,
working only for justice and the public
welfare, there is no limit to the power
they may exercise and the good they
may accomplish. Prosperity TO the
whole country viii date from the hour
when that beneficial combination is
established.
There is something of the roseate in
this conclusion, but great deal more
of cold and well-balanced truth. We in
California know it to be true that the
greatest encouragement Of good-road
promotion is the unfortunate misunder-
standing that keeps the farming and
the town populations apart. regarding
highway construction and mainten-
ance. II is unQuestionably true, as
General Stone says. that the farmers
put the greater burden of good road
building upon themselves, when it
ought to be shared by the people of
cities and towns. and that the greater
evils Of bad roads are visited upon the
people of cities and towns.
There is no more absurd economic
heresy than this, that farming com
munities own the roads and alone
should build, control and maintain
them, and that cities and towns have
no immediate concern in country roads
and should confine themselves to care
of streets only. Until this false idea is
dissipated, we will not reach a level OF
practical accomplishment of much mo-
ment in California regarding road
work.
J, ,,N1