St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1909-07-24
GOV. SANDERS ADDRESS
TO THE EDITORS AT
CONVICTION

In his address to the Editors at the
Covington convention recently Gov.
Sanders said:
Every ma and woman in this
world has a certain work to perform.
There is no duty greater and more
unpaid than that Of the publisher and
editor Of a newspaper.
when one makes a fortune in the
business, thousands make clearly
nothing beyond a bare living. / can
not impress TOO much or too strongly
upon you that you ought TO weigh
carefully the things. that you put IN
type. You ought to make up your
mind fully that the things you honest
" and conscientiously believe to be
true, and having made up your mind
Of that then publish them TO the
world no matter what the conse-
quences may be, nor whom they may
hurt, but in making up your mind let
your mind be a responsive mind, so
that you can cast aside what is
bad and take what is good. You
are the guardian Of the different
members Of the civilized communities
of the State of Louisiana.
Now my friends there are certain
things that are your duties, | believe,
| would like tc discuss with you, but
I am going to discuss but one Of
them.
There has in recent years been
inaugurated in the State Of Louisiana
the idea Of building good roads in
the State, so that one community
may be linked with another By per-
manent highways. That particular
thought has enlarged and in all of
this State we find people eager and
anxious for permanent highways
through their communities. Take
this one thought home with you, the
permanence of your public roads. If
you want to build a court house in
your parish, you figure on the cost Of
the building, then you calculate how
much money you can have to put in
to q building and you build it either
by leYying a special tax for that pur-
pose or by infractions on your reye-
nues for ten years. What would you
think Of your police juries if they de-
cided to build a courthouse in your
and said we will build it with
the next ten years. We would
put down the foundation the first
year, the walls the second year and
The partitions the third year and so
forth. The people as one would rise
up and say what kind Of 8 business
this. The money they have spent
in this building will be absolutely
and thrown away because
when the ten years will roll round
and the finishing touch put upon the
building they will have spent more
it was worth. When you go to
build a school, you first calculate
now much money you have and you
,uild the school house and you pay
or it as the years roll round. You
lon't build it BY piece-meal, but you
capitalize your funds and build it. If
vou build a bridge you do the same
hing.
Now you cannot build your public
.oads, by piece-meal any more than
,ou could build your courthouse or
ichoolhouse or bridge or anything
Use. You have to treat the public
'oads question just as you have
ireated the other important gues
ions that are arising. Every depart
nent of public improvement, public
men and representatives have grasped
he true conception Of how to work
md how to do public works, saving
he one thing, to build public roads.
If my friends Mr.. Marks from As
iumption will investigate he will find
hat his parish spends each year
$4,000 on public roads. They will
lever have permanent highways ii
he parish Of Assumption. For the
text ten years they will spend $751;
700 on the roads and instead of
pending it year by year to the end
hat when the ten years shall have
zen spent you shall have no better
Dads than you have now. Lay aside
$4,000 for ten years and raise $3.50
100. Put it in permanent highways