The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1899-12-26
SHOULD STUDY GEOGRAPHY
Magazine Writer Thinks Congress
men Would Do Better if They
Gave More Attention to the Nature
of the Country and Less to Poll



and less politics, is the view of a writer
in Ainslee's for December. This is the
way the suggestion Is put:
The original thirteen states under
stood one another 'sFerrltoral idiosyn-
crases thoroughly, and framed a con-
stitution elastic enough to allow for
/ them. But the original thirteen have
been swelling until they are forty-five,
and will soon be forty-eight, and there
has been little or no further allowance
for further Standardization. Political
critics calls the river and harbor bill 4
great graft it is really but a dead
lock between geographical ambitions.
Congress has fallen into checker
game Of diversified interests and con-
tlicting demands, all growing out of
divergence of territory and distinctive
| ness Of pursuits and products, yet no
one seems to understand the complex
ity or the way out of it,"
The Ainslee writer advances this
view after a somewhat novel study of
the effect of topography upon the char
acter of people in different sections Of
! the United States. His article is in
part as follows:
when the Pennsylvania farmers
builded a shin and noated down the
Ohio river into the country which now
bears that rivers name they set the
| precedent for future westward migra -
| tion. Going in the easiest maHncr pos
sible to the easiest possible destination,
they obeyed the geological law of least
| resistance by which habitation has
since been made the thickest where it
| could become so with the minimum of
0'''I,, ..I,,, 10y ,
,ho ,,iI 9o,p .,,, n',,i,' ,eCeueu , ''",''
tho ,,,,,ao,,, ,'o'D 'Ga> is Oily
tbo isoIatia,, o,,, ~, s,,t,,, -, wy '.''
| found a state fifteen years subsequent
| ly, and when the emgrants who could
stand the overland trail no longer
camped by the Wayside in Kansas and,
IN the race of Indians and cyclones
began growing corn and wheat, an
other law was ohcycd and another
precedent established, namely, that the
character of peoples is determined by
the amount of combat with the natural
obStructions of progress.
These two laws COniunctively-tha
law of least resistance. and the law ot
! greatest conquest and cnduranco-havo
fixed upon the area Of the United state,
a population as varied as the topoc-
raDhy, a replica in almost every re-
spect of its physical features.
"Population climbs hills and crosses
rivers and pushes through the winds of
the nrairies only So ranidIy as il i,
. easier to do these things than il is tn
remain stationary, Community char.
I actpr evolves into the odvont,,rCus , od
the governmental or holds strrdiIv =,
the struggle with the present or Iirpare
in the Conplacenry Of battIns won oc-
cording as IFS cnyironnent nerr,ite va
uuires or nrohibite
Hal SECIIoNALlSN' REALLY
MEANS.
This is what 'SectiOnqlism' q,
which we have heard much in latter
day politics, really means. 1t is dcep.
| ly laid trait of the republic. Between
the sea level of the Atlantic and thc
ocean shores of the Pacific lie habitats
as differentiated, save for community
of language and patriotism. as the ar.
tarOnistic states of Europc. Between
Sault ste Marie and Baton Rouge lie
groups of people sectionaliZed by geo.
graphical domarcatiors as distinct as
those made by the AIIeghonies or tn
Mississippi, or the Rocky Nountoins
Nothing is likely 70 ohIiteratf tbas.
severances and narticularities Tbey
will increase in force and potencv =.
the sections grow Cldr-. thnv win nc
sumo a constantly moro active runctjnr
i'm the constructive nrncnssoe ~ tbr
American commonwealth
AT the apex of the continent ro,
exan,pIe. in Colorado ana tho odioir,
ing silver states north ond eoutb !,
an ebullicnce and vartureson,aneee =,
amazing IN the noonIa of Io,rar an
tudes as II Is nuissant o,nopp tho In.
habitants themselves who bovo NOM.
tains to conouor and rorofiod at,,,a,,
nherc to breathe II is no moro ont >,
rass away than ore tho Iof+,. -,
tains themselves nor win If nyor coos.
TO be an agent IN dietrrb roIiti|,
conventions or to supply enthusiasm
|" .rN pr"p'Rah"" OF MANY s'rts'
a. '"N ''N u l'' D","' dllu pN
~ " ln' nINiI7''r Urea
-,''.eS' - = e'Sl"IhS N,'i Hlah's me
81 "'" I''"Vla al ''nuS'rN as hat
-. 20 .i,'i7 an" l"l "'Si's no I'M
doi,,. ,nist nan '"o"e Vi cautious
,''' "'N "'',. I,' nv
a., ,io"'iu ,''e II, ,Iu vi '.,r GREAT LAKE
.l''pip'S 'he E,St Oh cox