The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-10-28

1 to as much in year as the trade oi
 Bessemer amounts to in a week.
 But the argument, such as 1t is on
 this line loses all It's force when we
 remember what seems to have been
 overlooked by the other side, that Bes-
 semer already has city court cover.
 ing substantially the same territory as
 VIII be found embraced in the new
 county, if Vne Is esta blished. It is
 true that the limits may be shifted
 somewhat, but the difference cannot
 pc important Whatever the trade from | Jurors and witnesses is from this ter-
 rltory already goes to Bessemer in
 der existing laws and will continue to
 go there even if this amendment Ig de | feated. ~. 70 Ue
 os If dod Bessemer. should become a city of
 SO'VvO or SO'O0O inhabitants, instead of
 having street car every f3rteen Toi,-
 tues between the two points we would
 nave one every five minutes, and the
 Fade which now goes to enrich our Hherchants would be increased three Iold. The idea that the people of Res
 sener would quit having commerciaI
 and other business dealings with tbe
 people of Birmingham simply hacanst,
 tne town grew in importance and had
 county government of it's own. is
 contradicted by all experience. Not
 ohiy would our merchants, our hotels
 our skilled physicians, our architects
 and business men generally get in-
 creased business from there as the
 town grew, but our wholesale mer
 chants would do the same The fact Is that the establishment of a new county would not affect the court uues-
 ton nor the trade question one iota except as Bessemer grew so would our business relations with 1t grow.
 The reason why the people of Bes. n nd huk Fv,T& a new county is not to get a court for they have 1t already. It is to get the convenience of having their public bus mess transacted at home, to have a court house with a Probate Judge. a | Clerk, Sheriff, a Tax Assessor and | Collector, County Treasurer and Su- l perintendent of Education right fin their own community where they could | go to their own court house and in | fifteen or twenty minutes transact bus | mess which would require them from | three to four hours to transact if they | had to come to Birmingham. It is | true that they can get to Birming- | ham in one hour and can get back in | an hour, and if they could get their | business attended to promptly 1t would | require another hour The same thing | might be done without any expense | and with a loss of not exceeding fif- teen minutes time if they had a court house or tnelF own.
 It Is next argued that imperial Jeff ferson Is a great advertisement for | and that if it is dismem- bered it is bound to alrect us in the | eyes of the world. Let us examine | this proposition for a moment. The | county of Fulton, Georgia. in which | Atlanta is located, has 1T4 square | miles, Yet the population of the city of Atlanta Is probably double the num- Der that could be found within the present corporate limits of Birming- ham. The county of Jefferson, Ken lucky. has only 37I square miles | bama; yet the city of Louisville, which | is located in Jefferson County, Ken lucky has four times the population 1 of Birmingham. The county of Sui | folk. Massachusetts. in which Boston | with nearly a million inhabitants is | located. has hfty-one square miles. | The county which contains the exact | territorial limits of St. Louis City, Mis- | souri. with over three quarters of a | million inhabitants, has sixty-one | square mles. The city of New York | extends over parts of five counties. | Kings County, In which Brooklyn is To- | cated. has seventy-seven square miles. | New York County ptuper has sixty | three square miles; Richmond County | has flfty-seVen square miles, and | Queens County has 129 square miles. | There are four million people within | the limits of Greater New York, and | the largest of the counties above nam | ed has only one-eighth the area of | Jefferson County, Alabama. When | Greater New York was established 1 there was no talk whatever of abolish 1 Ing the county government of the dif- !