The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1909-05-21
THE NATIONAL ROAD
CONGRESS.

The National Good Roads Con-
gress, which assembled Tuesday at
Mccoy Hall in Baltimore, for four
days session, discussed a subject whit b
is now largely occupying public at
tention in all parts of the country.
From 1928, for more than fifty year )
leaving out the years of the Civil
War, the enterprise and capital Of
the country were spent in the co1struc
tion of railroads. The demand for rail
roads having been largely supplied,
the public attention is now revert
Ing TO subject of wagon roads which
have been so long neglected. At the
beginning of the nineteenth century
the Philadelphia and Lancaster
turnpikes and Wilderness turnpikes,
leading from the Shenandoah Valley
to Kentucky, were the only stone
roads in the United States Then
the admission of Ohio into the Union
demanded a road to reach the State
from the Atlantic Seaboard. The
general Government undertook to
build such road from Cumberland
to the Ohio river, the proposition
to pay for it with a percentage of
public lands sold in Ohio. This
great highway was finally extended
westward 800 miles to Vandalia, and
then President Jackson's Maryville
road veto and the growth of the
railroads put step to roads by the
Federal Government. From that
time down to 1889 the only good
roads made in the United States were
the toll raods, made by turnpike
companies.
In 1889 New Jersey undertook
the improvement of its roads through
the agency of the State government
Other States have followed, until
now the movement for the construct.
ion Of State roads has become gener-
al
In the Sixtieth Congress Senator
Bankhead, of Alabama, offered an
amendment to the Postoffice Appro.
priation bill, authorizing the expend-
iture of 100000 for the improve
ment of rural delivery routes. In
support of that proposition the Sena-
tor made a strong speech, in the
course of which he gave some in
teresting statistics and estimates.
In one recent year the corn of the
country which was marketed weigh
ed 100000 tons It required over
14,l56,00O wagons loads, weighing
1900 pounds, to carry the corn to
the railroad or market, hauled an
average distance of IA miles. The
cost Of hauling is estimated at $685.
830,698. If the roads over which
this COIN was hauled had been good
the cost Of hauling would have been
only 10 cents per ton per mile, in
stead of the farmers $i2,7O9,OOO on
that one item. 1t would perhaps be
more accurate to say that bad roads
cost the farmers that sum. They
also cost the farmers, according to
Senator Bankhead's figures, $40, 1885,.
05S more to haul their wheat crop 10
1909 than it would have cost over
good roads. And the sum of S..
076,000 could have been saved by
good aoads in marketing the cotton
crop.
For the United States to engage
in roadmaking in the States has been
considered by some an invasion OF
the exclusive prerogatives of the
State. But the Improvement of the
highways by the United States was
advocated by Madison, Monroe and
Calhoun. In 1917 Mr.. Calhoun, in
speech in the Senate, said:
''When we come to consider how
intimately the strength and politi.
cal prosperity of the Republic are
connected with this subject, we find
the most urgent reasons why we
should apply our resources to them
Good Roads and canals judiciouely
laid out are the proper remedy. Let
US, then, bind the Republic together
with serfect system of roads and
canals" Since that speech was made
the Republic has been securely
bound together by a system of
railroads. But here is the voice of
the apostle Of States rights advocat-
ing building of wagon roads by the
Federal Observation-Disclosures
Sun.