1862. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



69 



hours, all seasons, all latitudes, to fill the earth 

 with joy, pure as the Great Heart from which it 

 had its birth? — The Independent. 



THE RIGHTS OF THE FARMER. 



AVhat gives our country strength in this day of 

 her peril, and Avhat holds in check the nations who 

 desire to procure cotton from the South, is the 

 abundance of our farm products, by Avhich we sup- 

 ply not only ourselves at home and our armies in 

 the field, but have a vast surplus which England 

 and France need and must have. They can do 

 better without our cotton than they can without 

 our corn, and so we have some security that they 

 will not at present interfere in our family disci- 

 pline of the refractory states. 



Manufactures are important, and to be cher- 

 ished at all times, but there is a market where we 

 can supply ourselves with clothing and arms, even, 

 if unable to manufacture all we need, while there is 

 no country in the world from which we could ob- 

 tain bread enough to sustain our army for a 

 single month. 



The legislation of Massachusetts has been al- 

 ways partial to manufactures ; and the rights of 

 the farmer and the interests of agriculture have 

 often been sacrificed or put aside at the demand 

 of the factory companies, not because of any 

 wrongful intention, but because the manufacturers 

 are wealthy, and united in their movements, and 

 the farmers, individually, are scattered, so that 

 they have no concert of action. 



FLOWAGE. 



The best lands of the State have been convert- 

 ed into mill-ponds, under the Mill Act, or Flowage 

 Act, and it is even now lawful for any mill-owner 

 to raise his dam without notice, and overflow as 

 much land as he pleases. The only remedy of the 

 land-owner is by petitioning the courts for re- 

 dress. This is a disgrace to the Commonwealth, 

 and should be changed forthwith, so that no dam 

 shall be raised until after the land-owners have had 

 notice and the court have by a judgment author- 

 ized the flowage. We admit that private property 

 should be taken M"hen the public good requires it, 

 but let it be done as in the case of land taken for 

 highways after the land-owners have been fairly 

 heard and paid. We rejoice to see that our pa- 

 triotic Governor has, in his recent message, called 

 attention to this subject, and trust the members of 

 the Legislature will give heed to his words of wis- 

 dom, which we quote. 



The subject of flowing our low lands and mead- 

 ows under the operation of the ^'Mill Act," has al- 

 so engaged the attention of the Board of Agricul- 

 ture. Rights already acquired thereunder are not 

 subject to disturbance by its modification or repeal, 

 but in the belief that the act has long outlived its 



usefulness, I respectfully recommend its consider- 

 ation to the Legislature. 



The tendency of thrift, economy and sound pol- 

 icy is toward general and systematic drainage, not 

 toward the drowning of the most valuable lands. 

 Rude and poor liirming is the usual lot of pion- 

 eers. It was true of those of New England. They 

 gradually moved down from the more barren hill- 

 tops to the meadows and richer lands, where cap- 

 ital and labor, wisely expended, are at first abso- 

 lutely needed, but where the ultimate return is 

 large and ample. 



In this connection I desire also to call the atten- 

 tion of the Legislature to a measure of justice and 

 public utility which will restore to cultivation many 

 acres of the richest and most productive lands in 

 the State. There are in nearly every section of 

 the Commonwealth, ancient mill privileges under 

 which the right exists, and has existed since the 

 first settlement of the country, to flow back upon 

 the lands adjacent to the streams which supply 

 them. Many of these privileges are neglected, 

 and have been unused for years, but still the dams 

 remain, rendering all attempts to redeem for culti- 

 vation the lands above, of no avail. There should 

 certainly be some limit to the period when exclu- 

 sive rights, originally conferred upon individuals 

 for the common good, and which, under the 

 changed circiunstances of the present time, serve 

 only as instrumentalities of oppression, and to re- 

 tard the development of enterprise in the cultiva- 

 tion of the soil, should again revert to those pro- 

 prietors of lands by whom they were originally 

 yielded. Whether provision should not be made 

 by statute limitation as to the time when all such 

 unused and neglected mill-privileges should be- 

 come invalid, is worthy of your consideration. 



We know how these wise suggestions of Gov. 

 Andrew will be met. The farmers will be told 

 that the mills are now making clothing for the ar- 

 my, and their water-power must not be disturbed. 

 Our answer is, food is as important as clothing, 

 and it can only grow on our own soil, while mills 

 can run by steam as well a s by water, and so we 

 may increase our food and not diminish our manu- 

 factures. 



THE SUDBURY MEADOWS. 



The Governor calls attention to this subject, 

 and we trust the rights of agriculture are not to 

 be further sacrificed by any new schemes of the 

 miU-owners on the Concord River. 



By an Act of 1860, an act of strict though tardy 

 justice, a board of commissioners were authorized 

 to remove thirty-three inches of the dam at Biller- 

 ica. This act has been declared by the Supreme 

 Court to be constitutional. Under its operations, 

 the commissioners removed the flash-boards from 

 the dam. At the General Court in 1861, the mill- 

 owners demanded a new examination, insisting that 

 the dam formed no obstruction to the water. The 

 meadow-owners opposed this as a useless expense 

 and delay, but a law was passed to stay the opera- 

 tion of the act of 1860, one year, and a new board 

 of scientific commissioners was appointed to re- 

 port as to the extent of the flowage and the effect 



