The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1911-07-11
AN UNUSUAL PROTEST AGAINST
GOOD ROADS MOVEMENT

AN UNUSUAL PROTEST AGAINST
GOOD ROADS MOVEMENT
Editor Pensacola Journal.
The good roads question is one of
the most fertile of all written about at
the present time; and it is q significant
fact that 1t became supremacy import
ant with the coming of the automobiles
and 1t is another significant fact that
the merchants, bankers and county of
hcers of many of our counties had no
concern whether there were any roads
over most of the territory of their sew
eral counties until this good roads"
agitation was well developed. And it
is another significant fact that these
men with automobiles are now using a
large amount of would-be sympathy
with the poor farmer who can only
maui one or two bales of cotton on q
tWo-horse wagon, when he could haul
four to six bales if we had all hard
roads The harder proposition with
nine-tenths of the cotton growers Of
West Florida is to get the cotton to
haul. and if this mania for bonding
and building roads through the centers
! leading through our several counties
goes much further the small farmer
viii have no roads at all
jackson county has nearly two thou
sand miles of section lines. that is to
run road north and south and east
and west on all sides of each section of
land, and less than this-Or it's equive-
lant-would not fully settle up the
county and do equal justice to all citi-
zens. There is now only about seven
hundred miles of roads in the county
and much of this is lately laid out, and
/ but little opened up or worked. And
there are large areas with no public
roads. Thus there is today only about
n c INV dc cd
to settle up this county, and the bond
ing of the country for three hundred
/ thousand dollars, with it's bridges and
machinery. is supposed to be sufficient
/ to make hard roads" of the amount
now laid out; but with the usual reclI-
lessness, incompetence, and graft, it
! Will all be expended on less than half
OF the roads now laid out. and the
| homesteader and backwOods man can
| woods it, for the next thirty years.
! The old recipe for cooking a ham is
| first to catch him. And the first and
| great decideratum in this case is to
| get roads; roads of some kind poor
roads are a long ways better than no
roads at all, and speaking for Jackson
| county there is need for the laying out
of one thousand miles of public roads
| before the vacant lands can be settled
up or before the large number Of poor
hOmesteaders can even hope to travel
on the proposed highways"
There is one way by which some
thing like equal justice can be done to
| all property owners in all parts of the
counties and that is to pass law or
| adopt a rule by which all the property
abutting on said hard roads should pay
one-half the cost of such road and the
county, from its road tax, pay the other
| half and give the said farmer the first
! chance to work out his half, under the
same competent overseer for the COun
! tY. This plan will neCessitate no fixed
! class or cost of road. The great ma
! tional highways so much talked of
can be made first class if the abutting
| land owners and their automobile
| friends IN our towns and cities, put up
their half. We on the edges are willing
for the general tax to put up the other
| half. And then with roads located
| through all the unsettled lands with
| turpentine operators on the odd sec
| lions and homesteaderS on even sec
lions. Let them at least have straight
roads and work enough to remove
stumps, and build bridges, and a
chance to spend what they do snend,
of tax, or work. when t will be of per
manent value and the homesteads and
! turpentine tracts will soon become
valuable and sought after by settlers.
A greater absurdity was never writ
| ten or spoken than to say that great
automobile national highway and a big
! bonded indebtedness will bring settlers
| to fill up all our vacant lands.
The reason all the great western
! states were settled so rapidly was be-
cause the law made each section line
the legitimate place for a public road
and no man could prevent it being
| turned out and fenced out when the
public called for it; and more, the law
made each four sections a school dis
| trict-or nine school districts TO each
! congressional township-and thus every
! man could have a road to each eighty
acres of land and the certainty Of a
school house within a mile and a half
! at most. This has been no secret and
still we talk about wanting immigra-
! ton. but we have copied nothing from
! the success of the great west.
| The writer can afford an automobile
as well perhaps as half Of those who
now own and operate them in this
| county. and has paid. and will pay, at
least equal to the average Of Jackson
| county taxpayers, and am a strong ad-
vocate of good roads. but as before
! stated in this article. does insist that a
big bonded indebtedness shall not be
put on the county to build great auto
mobile highways over less than one
fifth of the roads and thus make it alb
| solutely certain that no more roads can
be laid out or opened up during the
life Of said bonded Indebtedness.
The great automobile manufa Cturers
and their agents are at the bottom Of
this craze for hard roads and the
farmers are slowly but surely being led
up to one Of the greatest monopolies OF
our section.
Yours for the masses.
JOHN THOS. PORTER
| Grand Ridge, June 80. 1911.