The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1921-11-25

to any other school, l am in favor
of deciding each of these schools to
the county in which it is located,
with our best wishes and Gods bless
ing, and take the money that we are
contributing to them and take each
child in Obion County through the
twelfth grade. What do you say to
this? The present or new State
school law is strictly Republican
measure. This law was gotten up by
Gov. Taylor and State Supt. Brown,
a first-class Republican gentleman
appointed by Gov. Taylor. There are
some parts of this law like and some
l don't like. AS a member of your
Legislature, l neither voted for it nor
opposed it, but l do think the people
of Tennessee ought to give 1t fair
trial. If it's a good law keep it, and
If not, this being a Democratic
State, re-elect Democrat Governor
next time, and then proceed to make
a school law that viii be satisfactory
and just to all the children i'll Ten
nessee.
The next thing l wish to call your
attention to is the road law for
Obion County. Only three systems
of road laws have yet been tried in
Tennessee. The first was enacted at
the close of the Civil war. That sys-
tenn was for the County Court to OPP
point an overseer for each road, who
would go out and warn in all the
hands on the road to work for five
days at some particular time when
the overseer had nothing else to do.
They would meet, talk, tell yarns and
whittlc for five days, put brush in
a few mud holes and all go home.
The second system was district
commissioner for each civil district.
This law was in effect until the first
of April, this year. The new law was
patterned after the Federal road
law and the State highway law of
Tennessee. The reason l mention
this law in particular is from the fact
that there are few political dema-
gogues in Obion County who know
nothing about a road nor care moth
ing about one, but are COINS around
over the county trying to make
speeches at public gatherings to
raise an issue of some kind to try to
get elected to the Legislature, and
the school law and the road law be-
ing the only new things in Obion
County, neither of which they know
anything about, they have selected
them as their subject. The first
thing l wish to remind you of is
who got up this road law. 1t was
largely written by your County
Judge, who was elected by the peo-
pie of Obion County, and by myself,
who was elected by the same people
to represent them in the Legislature
An up-to-date road law was theAmain
issue After this law was blocked
out it was submitted to the different
business organizations of the county,
who suggested and made some
changes. Then the October term Of
tire County Court of 1920 appointed
a committee of Squire McNoill, of
Number Four, Cunningham, Vt Num-
Der Six and others, who went over
this law and revised it again. Then
the County Court of January, this
year, who were assisted and advised
by many farmers over the county,
made the changes in this law, and
sent it to Nashville to your Senator
and myself recommending its pas
sage and we passed it. Forty-odd
counties in the State now have this
law, and l think it's the best road
law we havo yet had. The old law
had sixteen district commissioners
and five county commissioners. This
one has only five commissioners in
all, and but one supervisor Right
here let me say that his salary is not