394 THE GROUNDSWELL. 



replace the old-fashioned turnpike or highway and its 

 wagons, and even the natural and artificial water ways of 

 the country to an extent that makes them even now, and yet 

 more, prospectively, the great thoroughfares of the country. 

 Now, if our county, town, or other municipal authorities, 

 when a road was to be established, were in the habit of 

 giving over to some person, or persons, not public officers, 

 the privilege of building such road, with the right to con 

 demn the land of persons through whose farms the road 

 passed, and of remunerating himself by putting up turnpike 

 gates and charging whatever toll he pleased of travelers, 

 they would be doing what many of our legislatures have 

 been doing for years with railways, and would be taken to 

 task as not protecting the public interest. It would be 

 claimed that public travel and trade were such a public ne 

 cessity that they should be blocked just as little as practi 

 cable by hig 1 es; and hence, that the man who would 

 build and keep the turnpike in order for the lowest toll, 

 or perhaps the public authorities themselves, should take 

 charge of the road. 



HIGHWAYS OF TRANSPORTATION SHOULD BE GOVERNED 

 BY THE PUBLIC AUTHORITIES. 



This brings me to my second proposition which is 

 this : That the highways of our transportation and travel 

 should so far be controlled by the public authorities as to 

 furnish transportation of persons and property at the lowest 

 rate practicable. This is readily seen and admitted when 

 we talk of the wagon roads from our farms to the nearest 

 market; it is not less true of the longer railroads to the 

 more distant market. Cheap transportation makes cheap 

 food, not only in Illinois, but in Georgia and Massachusetts. 



