Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1911-02-21

ng the work mainly to them. In others.
from reports I get, they are using the
convicts more for local roads than for
those which connect county with county.
AMEND THE LAW ~
IT think that the law regarding the
convicts should be amended so as to
require that at least a good percentage
of them in each county should be re-
quired to construct good roads leading
from the county site in one county to
those in adjoining counties. The several
counties would thus in a few years have
fine highways for general travel. If this
were done all over the state we would
have splendid public roads leading from
end to end and from side to side of the
state. This plan would obtain a splendid
road from Savannah to Augusta, from
Augusta TO Athens, from Athens to At
lanta. from Atlanta practically to Chat
tanooga, from Atlanta to Macon, from
Macon to Valdosta, Townsville and
cambridge, from Macon to Savannah.
from Savannah through Macon to Co
lumbus, and so l might multiply in
stances. The building of these great
highways could be coordinate with the
building of subordinate roads through
the counties If a portion of the con-
victs were required to work on the main
highways most of the counties would
work the other portion on the subor-
dinate roads.
If the Atlanta platform, adopted by the
Democratic party on June g. 1908 had
made no other recommendation, it's de-
mand that the convicts should be put
upon the public works would stand as a
monument to the common-sense of those
who framed it; and If the law should be
amended by the requirement 1 have in
Dictated within less than five years the
state of Georgia would lead all of her
sister states in the matter of good roads.
I'VE would have thousands of miles of
highways over which two-mule teams
could easily carry three tons each of
produce; and in automobiles, buggies or
wagons communication between .ocali-
ties throughout the state would be null
tiplied in the elements of rapidity, ease
and cheapness. This is no pipe dream
but it is an achievement quite in the
reach of the people OF Georgia.
PEOPLE WOULD LEAVE CITIES.
I'VE can scarcely conceive Of the num-
bers of advantages which such a sys-
tenn OF good roads would secure for our
people There would be to a considera-
BILE extent a back to the country migra-
ton. A family could live five miles
from town and have practically the ad-
vantages now enjoyed by family living
one mile from town. Schools would be
more accessible and so would churches.
The wall of partition which has for gen.
.erations held apart the country people
and city people would be broken down.
The country man could so easily get to
town that he and the town man could
become so intimate as to be real chums.
The city man and his family would in
thousands of cases become country peo-
pie.
There is in almost every human
heart a yearning for the soil. In other
words. you will scarcely find a man in
the city who does not wish that he had
a place out in the country, easily Access
sible, on which he could raise poultry
and pigs and keep fine cows or raise
blooded horses. He would like to have
acres white with cotton or Iuxuriant
with the waving blades of fodder and
the heavy ears of corn or with fields of
oats and wheat which in the breezes
simulate the rolling of the tide. The
lack of good roads, however, has con-
fined him to the city, and his dream, or
intense desire, has been impossible of
accomplishment The good roads will
put this Accomplishment in reach of
thousands and make US happier, a
healthier and, 1 feel sure, a better peo-
pie"