LOCOMOTION BY EIVEK AND RAILWAY. 



ascertain that any city or county" has thus incurred a debt of 

 more than from 2 to 5 per cent, on the taxable property of its 

 citizens. The amount subscribed by cities and counties has 

 ranged from 50,000 to 400,000 dollars, where the taxables would 

 rise as high as from 4,000,000 to 16,000,000 dollars. 



"8. These municipal debts thus created have been secured by 

 all the guarantees that the State legislatures could throw around 

 them. The cities and counties have been required to levy and 

 collect, in case of necessity, taxes (as any and all other municipal 

 taxes are) from their own citizens, sufficient to pay the interest, 

 and provide a balance as a sinking fund to pay off the debt, when 

 it should finally become due. In no instance has any western 

 city or county hitherto neglected to do this, nor is it likely that 

 any ever will. 



"9. The bonds thus issued to railroad companies by cities and 

 counties are guaranteed by the roads, and then sold in the market. 

 They have all the legal force of a lien on all the property of those 

 cities or counties, real and personal, and, if the proper authorities 

 do not provide for the payment of the interest and principal, a 

 mandamus, or an ordinary suit at law, can be issued, by which all 

 the real and personal property of the citizens of those cities and 

 counties can be attached and sold. Many years since the city of 

 Bridgeport, in Connecticut, gave her bonds to a railway company 

 for 100,000 dollars. For some reason the payment of these bonds 

 was delayed. A holder brought a suit against the city in the 

 State Court, and the Supreme Court decided on appeal that the 

 individual property, real and personal, of each citizen, was liable for 

 the debt of the city, and could be sold on execution of the decree. 



"10. The operation of these laws and of this system of sub- 

 scription to roads has been uniformly, I believe, beneficent. I 

 cannot learn that there is a completed road in Ohio, for instance, 

 that has paid less than from 10 to 14 per cent. ; and, as in a great 

 majority of instances, the cities and counties that gave their bonds 

 have been enabled, either by converting them at their will into 

 stock or otherwise, to sell them, and often at a large premium, 

 thus realising large profits for thus lendisg their credit. The city 

 of Cleveland, in Ohio, subscribed 400,000 dollars to two or three 

 roads, and she is now selling that stock at a premium of from 24 

 to 27 dollars advance. Her taxable property since 1849 has risen 

 from 3,000,000 to 7,000,000 dollars, while the population as well 

 as taxable property has increased in almost the same ratio in those 

 cities and those counties throughout the west where railroads have 

 been built." 



15. It would be extremely interesting, were it practicable, to 

 obtain even an approximate estimate of the actual commerce in 

 60 



