Sequachee Valley news. (Sequachee [Sequatchie], Tenn.) 1896-1952, 1915-05-06
ARGUES FOR
CONVICT LABOR
ON ROADS

Should the South have a Highway
is widely discussed topic today. If
il is to have it. how should IL comet
Should it come by way of Louisville
and Nashville, from Cincinnati,
thence to McMinnville, Tracy City,
Signal Heights to Chattanooga Or
should it come through eastern Ken
tucky down the Cumberland' Which
way is the most profitable to the
South, to our State and to its people,
has not been decided.
To be sure, there are better roads by
way of Nashville, and would be less
expense to have it come that way, but
does Middle Tennessee need any more
or better roadsF Nashville is central
ly located in the best farming section
of the state with one river, numerous
railroads and as many pixies, all of
which are used for transportation.
What purpose would the Highway
serve Middle Tennessee other than tue
branches m ntioned above' Here lies
East Tennessee with all her natural
resources, with all her virgin timber,
with all her untitled soil. In these
we have practically all that is neces-
sAry for the sustenance of life. Then
why is it not better to have an outlet,
(which we have not, not one single
pike In this great scope of country or
nor one single navigable river, to the
marketsf
How is the Cumberland plateau to
ever become accessableH With roads
and good ones, too. Then question
naturally arises, how are we to pay
for such roads. and the same question
is being debated all over the South to-
day + it right that we should bond
each county through which it should
pass! If so, should it be let on con-
tract2 Or would it be best fol the
Legislature to make an appropriation
ana the road be built by the slater
There seems to me wiser plan
still Only short time past investi-
cation of our State Prison at Nash
Vile revealed tia startling fact that
better than half of its inmates were
the victims of "The White Mans
Plague" How iphuman it is to put
force him'to closely associate himself
with cousumptive. Possibly his
term is only long enough to 30 weaken
his system that he, as many others
have done, fall it's within
Isn't 1t more human, more profitable
and more as Christ would have it be
that all able bodied men be put on
the public highway SO that they may
build roads for the state. which Is
done by additional tax on the people,
and that the prisoners may not COM
pete with free labor, and that all this
would promote good health and better
men.
What is greater moral punishment
to prisoner than to work In the open
where everyone passing can see him.
Look, If you please, at Hamilton
county Show me the county which
has better roads than she. How did
she build them. Instead of having
Der prisoners lie up in Jail at her ex-
pense, which pleases the average Grim
iLal, she put them to work on her
roads, and the results is plainly seen.
Show me one single county in the
state which has issued bonds and these
at an enormous interest for the build
ing of pixies, and today has credita-
bic highway. You only have to look
scarcely to see where hundreds of
thousands Of dollars have been spent
with the excuse of building pike.
We will enum crate only few victims
of such an excuse, beginning with
Marion. s quatchis, Bledsoe, White,
Cumberland, Putnam, Van Buren,
and Warren The result of this has
been to discourage the people with
bonding themselves. The money 10
gone. What became OF it, Was there
q lack Of funds2 Only last year Cum
berland County spent $50 600 for pixies
and they..have not one foot of pike in
the county, today.
Where the roads were touched in a
faint effort to build pike, they are
wholly impossible in rainy weather
In winter
Now what we, the East Tennesseans.
need are roads and that is what we |
have to have If we ever progress, and
the sooner the better, but it is a gross
Injustice to ourselves and to our child
rem and their children to levy a tax
for years to come on ourselves and
them, and to see our young manhood
lie in the jails over the country, in
svery county in the state, and benefit
az none; neither does it help them.
Iail is as good as some people want, il
here is no work to 1t.
So not onlv let us have the Dixie
but let us have many high
vaVs