The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-06-24

content to put up with tha inconveni- 1 cree it is nobody elses business; but | there is another reason for advocating change that is of far wider applica-
 tion. That is to enable us to get cen- sus statistics that really mean some tEing. For example, Jefferson county is
 pretty sharply differentiated into plateau or mountain lands and valley lands The former have many mines and very lit tie agriculture, while the latter, though small in extent contain the bulk of the cities and farms Statistics for the coun-
 ty, giving the density of population, per- ce1.tage of negroes, foreigners, iliterates, etc, and various agricultural data, there fore do not give us anything like a true picture of either region. Tn the case of Jefferson the valleys are so narrow that we can hardly expect to have the coLLty lines adjusted to them; but there arc several large counties in the southern part of the state, such as Sumter. Ma rengo Clarke and Monroe, that could very easily be divided on geographical lines into distinct regions. At present there is no county that lies wholly with
 in the black belt, so that we can get nc exact statistics sor that fertile region. Unfortunately the state constitution now forbids the creation of any county less than 5c0 square miles in extent, and |, tt at limits the opportunities for making homogeneous counties, and can hardly
 be changed in time for the next census: but if the limit should be lowered to 300 square miles at some future time, our smallest counties would still be three times as large as some in Georgia
 The arguments advanced 10 or F years ago for a separate county for Bessemer, and this year for one for Birmingham, need not be repeated here, but I will sug- QRSt a few n1acaS in other of ba state where new counties would be very helpful to geOgra phers and statisticians as well as to residents. Not all of them co uld be created simultaneously, for some would overlap or otherwise interfere with each other, but if we could get even one or two of them this year it would be a step in the right direction.
 One of the best new county proposi- dCns, if it were not for the constitutional area limit, would take in the black belt portion of Pickens county G. G., the cor ner beyond the Tombigbee river), and the northern part of Sumter with Geiger as county seat. That would leave Pick ems more compact and homogeneous and give us a typical new black belt county.
 Maplesvle is remote from it's county seat and equally important. new coun- ty around it, formed from parts of four or five existing counties, would give us a convenient unit in the central pine belt ana leave CnlltOn ana Dallas Tn Detter shape for the map-makers.
 Either Demopols or Uniontown ought to have a county of it's own, lying wholly in the black belt and cutting off the awkward panhandle of Perry; but it might be impracticable to accommodate
 both of these places at the same time. The northern third of Clarke county, with slice of Marengo and perhaps a little of Wilcox, would make very homogeneous red hill county with Thom- a~vile as county seat and leave the rest of Clarke in a more convenient shape.
 Eufaula certainly deserves a county ! of it's own, which could easily be pro- video hy taking the northern and eastern portions of Barbour and little of Rus sell and perhaps Henry, leaving the red hills mostly in the remainder of Bar bour.
 Monroe county is very diversified and inconvenie1,tly shaped and the boundary between it and Ccnecuh is irregular and hard 70 measure, being merely an old road. Perhaps a rectangular county could be made from the northern half. of it. and the northern corner of Conecuh, and a rart of Conecuh annexed to the re- mainde- to satisfy the constitution and do away with the federal road as boun- dary.
 The country around Citronelle has lit- tie iE common with the shipping, hshtrR and trucking interests around Mobile and southward along the bay, and there Is room for nice new piney woods county in southern Washington and northern Mobile county. Baldwin county is large enough for two and should be divided by an east-and- west line about half way between Bay Mirette and Foley, leaving the maritime interests all in the southern part. Slorala slculd have county of It's own. taking in the southern half of Gov ington and perhaps a little of Geneva. At the same time the northern boundary of Go, ington might be rectifed by taking off some prongs of Crenshaw.
 For names for the proposed new coun- ties there is multitude to select from. We have no county yet named for Jeff Davis, the late Senator Pettus. or J. L. NJ. Curry, whose statue represents Ala
 bama in the national Hall of Fame There are also plenty of good Indian names available, such as Noxubee, Tom bigbe, Tallahatta, Sowikee, Chattahoo- ckee, Escatawpa For the southern part the Spanish Perddo are available and be appropriate in some cases too, such as Liberty, Centennial, Mountain, Prairie and Yellow river With so many names
 to choose from we can easily follow Georgias example in not naming new counties for their county seats or for living men. Respectfully.
 R. M HARPER.
 University. Ala. June 2l. 1919