The Cairo bulletin., 1909-10-20
Deep WATERWAYS
SUBJECT or STIRRING ADDRESS
AT YoRkToN ANNIVERSARY
YESTERDAY.
Railroads Have Not Esen Able TO
Keep Up With Growing Popu
laton--Rivers Are
Needed.

Yorktown. Oct. f9.-Declaring that
while with good roads and improved
waterways in the United States the
revolutionary war could net have
lasted eight years, J. Hampton Moore
Of Philadelphia, president Of the At
lantic Deeper Waterways Association
in addressing large audience here
today showed tina, General Washing
ton had insisted that free and easy
commercial intercourse between the
Atlantic seabord and the amazing
territory to the eastward OF rs" was
the hest if not the only cement" that
could bina the colonial states upon
q permanent basis. Washington and
his compatriots, he pointed ont,
counted upon international trade to
assist in building up the colonies and
to populate and develop the vast ter,
ritory over which the grasp Of Eng
land had been released
! This important problem, therefore,
lrevivea in the puolic mind as it re.
Gently has been by the creation of
many associations and by a growing
interest in congress and amongst the
state legislatures, is not new Why
then. after the lapse Of more than
la hundred years. are the minds OF
the people again turned to the prob
lens which confronted their fore
fathers? The answer is clear Our
ancestors, charged with the Beri'nrs
task Of organizing a country which
had been woefully retarded by an
eight years war. were compelled to
depend upon the river or the canal
or the numbering roach for the trans,
portation Of themselves and their
commodities. They never knew OF
the railroad and its manifold advant-
ages, nor had the steamboat yet
come to aid the shipper or the mer-
chant
Citing the wonderful railroad de-
yelopment in tbs United States as q
reason for temporarily detracting
from the usefulness of the water
courses and diverting the attention
Of the people from them Mr.. Moore
insisted that today there was an
awakening not only along the At
lantic coast hut asong the Father of
the Waters" and on the Pacific slope
in behalf Of the same doctrine in
which Washington and our fore
fathers believed.
II Is. he said. "the cry of com
merce anil of labor. of capital and
industry. demanding again that the
waterways OF the United States. it's
harhors and approaches, be develop.
ed now, even as 1 asnington and his
compeers hoped for their develop
ment. It is not that the railroad is
failing to give the best it can afford
it is not that marvellous benefits.
uniting states ans: sections, oceans
lakes and grlfs, have not ensued
since the iron horse began its civil,
cation OF the wilderness; it is simply
that the populSs On of the country
has grown more rapidly in proper
tion than has the ability OF the rail |
road to comply with therequirements
road to comply with the requirements |
reasons we might also encourage tie
construction Of such military roads as
are proposed for the convenience off
the people Of YORKTOWN, by way Of
Williamsburg. to jamestown, Vir-
ginia, or from the capitol city which
bears the name OF Washington to
that historic battlefield of Gettysburg
where the work Of Washington at
Yorktown was crowned for per.
petuity by the immortal Abraham
Lincoln"