The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1905-06-24

Perhaps no class Of people, the farmer not
excepted, has greater interest In highway
improvement than those engaged in industrial
enterprise If the common roads Of the coun-
try were brought to . condition that would
enable farmers to market their products at all
seasons of the year, the cost of living in town
and city would be greatly lessened, and dis
content among laboring people and operatives
in industrial concerns would largely decrease
if it did not entirely disappear. Why and
how?
Present road conditions compel farmers to
rush their products to market as soon as har-
vested, when the roads are at their best, as by
waiting convenient time they may not get
there at all. If one farmer must do this his
neighbor must do likewise. This naturally
congests the market. forcing low prices to the
great detriment of the producer and without
benefit to the consumer, because the average
family in town or city buys only in small
quantity at one time, say days or weeks
supply. What is the result? The speculator,
finding prices low and knowing that in little
while the bad-roads season will be on, when
competing products will be kept away from
trade centers, buys up the surplus and stores
it away for the day which he knows is surely
coming when he can demand and receive his
own price for his holdings-the stuff for which
men toll which they are compelled to have.
And when the citizen in town, the mechanic
and operative of the shops and factories, is
forced in winter and spring to pay exorbitant
prices for those articles Of household necessity
which went begging for buyers at low prices
the preceding fall. he figures the increased cost
of living in comparison and grows restless and
discontinued and is easily led into strikes and
other labor disturbances. We all know what
usually follows. This, ofconrse. is not all that
enters into strike causes. but it contributes
full share.
1t ought to be perfectly plain to American
manufacturers that the continuous. orderly
operation Of industrial business depends on
measurably contented operatives; that men
are never contented when the cost of living is
above their earning capacity and that prices
Of food stuffs from the farm would be always
at decent living level to all concerned if we
had systematically improved highways over
which farmers could travel to market any day
IN Lue year. 1ueec ldfueIS WOulu lcoii1c DSt-
ter prices for their products than they do and
still be able to sell to all classes of consumers
at lower prices than is forced by spectators in
the bad-roads season. If this position is sound,
then the duty Of manufacturers seems to be to
lend their every influence to the support of the
Brownlow-L atimer bills which seek to bring
about systematic and scientific highway con-
struction and improvement in cooperation
with the states. Il is no less in their own in-
terest than that of the farmers, who are their
best patrons after all. And it is no less the
interest of all consumers Of farm products in
every town and city in the United States, and
of every railroad and other corporation en-
ploying labor of any kind, and of every rail-
road and building contractor and others hav-
ing men in their employ.
We are advised that Hon. w. p Brownlow,
member of Congress from Tennessee. is de-
sirous of hearing from manufacturers on this
question, and will appreciate any expression
of views thereon that may be sent to him at
Washington