Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1912-10-04
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 4, 1919.
WILSON ON GOOD ROADS
Democratic Presidential Candidate Has
Sound Ideas on Subject.

Sound Ideas on Subject.
Atlantic City, Sept. 30.-Governor
Woodrow Wilson was greeted with
cheers by public officials and other
delegates from practically every state
in the Union this afternoon when he
told the American Road congress that
it is one of the foremost obligations Of
the national government to maintain
road system to meet every require
ment.
The governor arrived here shortly
after l o'clock and had luncheon at
the Marlboro Bleinheim with Logan
Waller Page, director of the United
States Office of public roads, and other
officials of the road congress. Governor
Wilson said:
THE road is intended to be an open
artery, free for any released energy
to flow in, and so the highway Is, OF
necessity, a public instrumentality. 1t
cannot. from any point Of view, be re-
garded as a private instrumentality,
and as I look forward to the future OF
the United States / see that we must
do what we have been very backward
in doing as compared with other ma
tions; we must more and more engage
the government in providing the gen.
eral facilities of the common life.
There is no breach in that Of any
of our older understandings of the
function of government. We nave
never doubted that the government
had the right to maintain highways.
We have never doubted that the gov
ernment had the right to supply these
facilities, which private endeavor has
never been expected to supply.
'I tell you very frankly that my in
terest in good roads Is not merely an
interest in the pleasure of riding In
automobiles, 1t is not merely an In
terest in the very much more impor-
tant matter of affording the farmers
Of this country and the residents In
villages the means of ready access 10
such neighboring markets as they
need for their economic beneht, put II
Is also the interest in weaving as COM
plicated and elaborate net or nelgn-
borhood and state and national opin-
ion together as it Is possible to weave.
''It Is of the most fundamental i'm
portance that the United States should
think in big pieces, should think to-
gether, should think ultimately as a
whole, and 1 feel, in my enthusiasm
for good roads, something OF the OLD
opposition that there always has been
in me to any kind of sectional feeling
to any kind of class feeling.
"I believe 1t is the proper study
of the statesman to bind communities
together and open their intercourse SO
that il will flow with absolute freedom
and facility. No one argument ought
TO be omitted; every class has Its argu-
ment for good roads, and putting them
all together they form an irresistible
mass of arguments, but the result OF
the whole reasoning to my mind, is
simply this, the people Of the United
States has up to this time simply let
the energies Of the people drlft IL mas
thrown the reins on our necks and
said, Now, here is continent or un-
exampled richness: do what you
please with it. We will try TO see
that you don't break each otner
heads. We will try to see that you are
restrained until you get so powerful
that we can't restrain you. We Will
try to see that you do justice until
YOU so combine with one another that
Justice Is impossible, but we are not
going to lend the aid of the govern
ment to the actual task Of develop
ment'
'That has been the general attitude
of the government up to this time.
1t cannot be the attitude any longer
There are things of this sort, Tor ex-
ample: You take not merely the mat
ter of good roads and the carrying
of goods to market, but what goods
there are to be carried to market, the
production, the agricultural production
per acre in the United States does not
favorably compare with the production
per acre in the older countries OF the
world, and the margins are approach
ing one another.
1--WE used to lead the world, and our
grain exports were our chief exports,
but the exports of grain are going
down and down and down because the
other margin is coming up, the mar
gin of domestic demand, and the popu-
lation is increasing faster than the
product. so that a great deal or our
commercial history Is about TO De
altered by the circumstances OF agrl-
cultural production, and I believe that
II is the proper function of the gov
ernment to see to 1t that by the ex-
tension of all the varied modern
knowledge about agricultural process
and about the characteristics or dl1-
ferent soils ought to be extended, so
carried everywhere to the farmer as
to build up by the aid Of the govern
ment this thing that feeds us ana
ought 10 continue to feed the world
and whenever you speak or tnat'
whenever you increase what the
United States Is doing, you must I'M
mediately increase the facilities OF the
limited States for handling what II mas
made after it has made 1t. You can
not nationally increase the prosperity
of this country without increasing the
go 90 o;I;tias of this cOuntry."