The central record. (Lancaster, Ky.) 18??-current, 1913-04-25
President Bible OF Kentucky Manufacturers
Association Tells Seine Deplorable
But Undeniable Truths.

At a meeting of the Kentucky
Manufacturers Association held at the
Henry Watterson Hotel in Louisville
last week, President John Franklin
Bible of Hopkinsville KY. who presided,
in his address to the assembled delegates
presented some truths in regard to the
conditions prevailing in the state, which
are undeniable and very much to be
deplored, and are great draw back to
the commercial growth of the state.
We reproduce Mr.. Bibles remarks
below, which should put every Kentucky
business man to thinking over the
matter.
lover 600, 900 Kentuckians live in
other States. Our most enterprising
young men go where they find greater
progress. 1t is but natural that they
would do this. These young men be-
come leaders wherever they locate.
They possess the natural spirit of en-
terprise, and their enthusiasm is
quickly developed.
We must start some great things in
Kentucky. We are without single
electric interurban railway of moment,
while the States to the north of US are
simply net works of these electric
roads. Where on all the earth is there
a more ideal country for electric
roads than Central Kentucky, with its
cities SO close together?
No public utility company ever gave
to the people more than the people de-
manded. Transportation companies do
not voluntarily lower rates. Nearly ev-
cry single life saving device now in use
by the transportation companies was
installed only when compelled to do so
by law.
The question of equitable transpor-
tation is the greatest question confront
ing Kentucky and the entire South to-
dav. Capital cannot be induced to To-
cate anywhere in inland Kentucky until
there is readjustment of freight rates.
There is no use to shut our eyes to this
fact. 1t is indisputable. There is not
so much as the shadow of a doubt
about the absolute truth of this state
ment.
''HooKS PUT INTO U.s."
If the Business Mems Association of
Hopkinsville should offer any one of
the larger concerns of the North a fac
tory free and a million dollars bonus
besides, none of these concerns would
even consider it because our freight
rates are absolutely prohibitory on any
article where the freight is question
for consideration. The hooks are put
into us "a comm and goin'." We
pay rs per cents per ton for hauling
coal ten to twenty miles, while coal is
hauled for 200 to 300 miles in other
States for less rate What is true OF
Hopkinsville is true universally of the
inland cities of Kentucky. Capita
seeks location of least resistance. This
is a well-known fact to everyone who
knows anything at all about industrial
conditions.
Kentucky must be put on a compe
tive basis with other States in the mat
ter of both passenger and freight trans
portation rates. 1t is ridiculous to say
that freight can be hauled cheaper
north of the Ohio river than it car
south of the river. Such claims are sc
ludicrous that they are not even laugh
able. With rates from 40 to 50per cent
lower in the States north of us We
connot expect capital to come in for in
vestment.
DEVELOPMENT IMPOSSIBLE.
Every student of transportation
companies knows that it costs ever
more to maintain track, terminal ant
rolling stock in the North than it doe:
in the South, land if the volume Of
business is greater in the North, thi.
fact is due to the high rates pre-
vailing in the South, which have
made development impossible. The
farms are not all on the river, and il
order that the country may properly
develop, the inland farmer must have
an equal rate with his Northern
neighbor. This will stimulate agri
cultural development, and when these
lower rates are granted to the farmer
it will naturally follow that they will
be granted to the manufacturers, anC
then, and not until then, will you see
Kentucky and the South bound for
ward like weed, in the river bot
tom in the warm. rainy springtime.
Paradoxical as it may seem. the
transportation companies are not only
doing the people, but themselves, q
greater injustice in not voluntarily
making these reductions. / want t.
see the people have friendly feeling
for the transportation companies, bul
so long as the transportation compa
MES ignore the rights of the people