The Tupelo journal., 1908-05-08

Australia and New Zealand, countries newer than our
own, less %populous, and with nothing like our aggre-
gate wealth. The fact that the rest of the world has
good roads while We have bad ones is significant; it
shows that the plan we have been pursuing has not
been successful. In three hundred years less than
eight per cent of the highways Of our country have
been permanently improved and at ths rate we are go.
ing it would require nearly four thousand years to
complete the job. So as roadbuilders the people of
the United States have been a failure.
This is all the more surprising when we consider
that they are conspicuously successful in every other
line of human endeavor. Millions upon millions Of
dollars have been wasted in every state in the union
upon the public roads by illtimed or misdirected ef-
fort and with really very little to show for the ex-
penditure. 1t is only within the last ten or fifteen
years that any real progress has been made along the
line of permanently improving the conditions.
The trouble is We have been endeavoring to un-
tangle the snarl by pulling the wrong string. Without
any reason for doing so, the farmers of the country, from
Maine to California, from the very first assumed that
the country roads belonged to them and it was their
business to improve them, and this misconception held
sway for nearly 300 years.
A few years ago a man in New Jersey made a dis
covery. 1t was that the highways are public property,
as much so as the state house. This raised the ques-
ton: Why if the highways are public property, should
not the public take care of it's own; why should not the
state and all property therein contribute to building
the roads?" Everybody is interested in them, every
body is affected through the markets by the road con-
ditions; they are benefited by good roads and injured
by bad ones. The new thought spread throughout the
state and finally New Jersey led the way to better con-
ditions by passing a law by which the state should con-
tribute onethird the money required to improve the
roads. Other states followed, increasing the proper
ton to o1ss-half and in one case, Massachusetts,, to
threefourths.
In many cases of the New England states farm
property is only a very small portion Of the total taxable
property, in some cases not ten per cent, and when the
cost of road improvement was distributed over all prop
erty of the state, the burden was hardly felt, and yet
immense sums were raised for road purposes. Best
Of all, the roads were built under proper supervision,
instead of leaving it to the inexperienced hands Of the
local path master.
way to aid and appropriated $4,000 to start the work.
The plan grew in favor so rapidly that within five years
the state by an overwhelming vote passed a constitu-
tional amendment providing for an issue of $50, O00, 900
in bonds to help build the highways. What a record!
In five years from fifty thousand to fifty millions! The
tax necessary to pay the interest on this enormous
sum and then finally pay off the bonds will hardly be
felt by the property owners of the Empire state owing
to their immense list Of taxable property.
Ohio, after 40 years of building roads by the old
plan of local taxation and bond issues, in which the
farmer had to pay practically the whole bill, has
passed a state aid law which will enable it to build
three miles of improved roads where it has been build
ing one, without any increase. whatever in taxation
upon farm property.
Virginia is the first southern state to join the
state aid column for good roads. Kentucky is alive to
the situation and is taking steps to change it's consti-
tuition in order to be in a position to spread the road tax
over all the property in the state.
In certain parts of the country, notably in the Mis-
sissippi valley, there is an entire misconception as to
what the state aid plan of road building means. Some