The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-05-18
Governor Addresses Annual
 Convention of Bankers.
.REITERATEs HIS VIEW S
Compares Alabama's Railroad Made Rates" With the Law Made Ratess of Other States
 in the South.

teentn annual convention dl Lns 1lolel Hillnan yestreday morning made the fol-
 lowing address on the subject. The Rail-
 road Problem"
 Gentlemen of the Bankers Association of
 Alabama:
 am requested by your body to dis
 cuss the railroad problem, and as you
 are Alabama bankers and this is a state
 association. I shall discuss this problem
 from the states point of view
 i Transportation has always been regard
 ed as the true warp of wealth creation
 into and through which as filling is
 woven in the loom of progress the product
 of soil and factory the articles of con | sumption utility, everything that breaks
 the bonds of locality and makes possible
 realization on the scope of desire or att
 tainment. Without transportation we
 would never get new visions beyond the
 narrow enclosure of self, would simply 1 remain bound by a hide, as a COW, with
 out possibility of enlargement or ac-
 qurement. Transportation, like the Chris l tian religion, opens up vista for pro- l gross as limitless as the universe. Each
 successive progress is marked by new
 horizon of projectlve and prospective fur ther reach and what 1t can accomplish
 and what it will accomplish, no mind can
 measure or thought curtail.
 Cain, the first man who ever broke the
 home bounds, carried his Joins his total
 wealth Job, the first rich man of his-
 tory. having property in asses, camels and
 cattle, the property itself having value l In the fact of its being it's own transpor-
 tation the two former furnishing with
 their backs and strength additional
 wealth in their power of carrying further
 transportation and Abraham's ten camels
 loaded with the merchandise of Palestine,
 sent to Mesopetamia to barter for his
 kinsman'e daughter, further indicated the 1 earliest value of transportation, and the l first insight into exehangeable Values 1 whether of commodities or person. Co.,
 lumbus discovered in America that the 1 only mode of transportation was a-foot
 and the freight carriers were human be 1 ngs. Pizarro in his conquest of Peru, 1 DeSoto In his march through Florida, 1 Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi, and l Cortez, from Vera Cruz to the City of Mexico, transported the equipment and supplies of their armies by impressment of natives from village to village as they l progressed.
 In the first settlement of the states
 made as they were along the coast, com-
 munication and business was established 1 into and through the interior by means
 of pack horses brought from Europe, aft
 erwards, as business increased, by boats. l The Alabama, the Chattahoochee, the
 Coosa, Warrior, Torhbigbee and the Ten nessee were used Sf carry the freight of
 the interior to ApGAlachicola. Mobile and l New Orleans. This service was superior
 to the human carrier and the pack horse. 1 and developed commercial marts along l their banks and the interior produce was
 largely increased and the country made
 more prosperous
 The Railway Carriage.
 As prosperity advanced, carrying with
 it the full tide of production and de.
 mands for exchange of products with the
 outside world, the necessity arose for some means of transportation to sections of the country not touched by the water ways and a more expeditions mode of carriage than that of floating down cur
 rents and sailing around the coasts to some general mart. This demand brought I out the railway carriage
 The first railroad was built by a unity of effort of labor, and the subscription
 of citizens along the proposed line. Then came the demand. necessity and economy
 that railroads and transportation services be built owned and operated not by community of interest, but by stock companies, organized for that purpose. | To encourage this franchises were free | ly granted, subscriptions of rights of way
 and money were made by citizens from the sections of the country along the
 proposed routes, and cities and counties
 and the states also in their separate or l ganization freely subscribed money, land
 and securities to aid organized companies i in the building and equipment of new
 roads. These promotions and conditions 1 too easily available, brought about false 1 projections and extravagant, unbusiness-
 like methods and resulted in great waste l of money, confidence and credit, but
 nevertheless while leaving a heritage of l bad debt and bad odor, secured to the 1 state many important railroad lines,
 which lines by combination with other l and larger systems have resulted in great
 development of the state. An impartial
 observer and student of the economies | of the state can easily conclude that 1 the wealth of the state has been im-
 mensely increased and will continue to 1 increase from the establishment, opera 1 ton and consequent development of these l great carrier systems
 1 When you consider that little more than | a century ago, McGilvery, the great chief l of the Creeks, with headquarters located l where Wetumpka now stands, with trad 1 ing trails running eastward to Savannah, 1 used by the Americans, and southward l to Pensacola, used by the Spaniards, was l accustomed to barter at his door the 1 wealth of Alabama, exchanging for the
 merchandise brought by the Georgia and l Spanish traders on pacS-horses from Sa- vanar and Pensacola; when you consider 1 that he sent by this method, hickkory- 1 nut oil and furs in packs across the
 country to Savannah and Pensacola to be l transported in slow sailing vessels to the I marts of Europe, and when now from
 hundreds of points all over this state we load trains with cotton, lumber, iron l and other productions to be transported | to the doors of the purchasers in every | part of the United States and to ports l all along our eastern and southern | coasts, to be shipped to the inhabitants | of distant eountres when we consider | that train load of cloth manufa ctured | at our factories, carried in solid cars l to the ports of the Pacific, and from l there taken in immense steamers to the | cities of the Orient and exchanged for 1 the products of those countries and
 brought to our stations the added cost | of the two being less perhaps than that | freight cost carried by the pack-horses | team from McGilverys door; when we l consider the marvellous development along | these lines, and what has been done, l and what any student of economy can | foresee will be done, then we shall realize l what vast benefcaries to the state are | the public carrier and the public carrier | service.
 Two Great Interests.
 | There have been developed in the state l two great interests-the production or 1 shippers interest, and the transportation | or carriers interest. the economies and development of both depending largely l upon the success of each The immense l enlargement of the states production and | wealth could not have been accomplished l with corresponding enlargement of the | x.~...f kl.