494 
Annual Report of the 
phetic speech delivered on the occasion by that revolutionary pat¬ 
riot, Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, and also to the fact that within 
a period of less than fifty years over sixty-six thousand miles have 
been built and put in operation in the United States, and that all 
this has been the work of private enterprise and nearly all of pri¬ 
vate capital. We have also alluded to the fact that the Govern¬ 
ment has built no railroads, but that it did once construct a great 
macadamized turnpike over nine hundred miles in length, the 
building of which gave rise to a great national political contro¬ 
versy as to the constitutional right of the Government to engage 
in works of internal improvement. It was finally settled, as was 
then supposed, that it had no such constitutional right; but recent¬ 
ly that question has been revived, and again it is contended that 
such power exists, and it is invoked to exercise it in the interest of 
u cheap transportation," by building a great double-track steel rail¬ 
road from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River. It is claimed 
that this would cheapen and regulate the price of railway trans¬ 
portation everywhere. This magnificent Government scheme is 
proposed by its friends as a panacea for all evil. 
Without reference to the question of constitutional power, which 
we do not believe the Government possesses, we believe it would 
multiply ten thousand fold the evils complained of. It would dead¬ 
en and destroy private enterprise everywhere, and thus force the 
Government finally to assume the ownership and full control of all 
the railroads and the whole carrying-trade of our country, in which 
event every railroad manager, every railroad employee, would be¬ 
come a Government officer, and the whole carrying-trade become at 
once and forever a part of the politics of our people, and it would, 
we are sure, become a many times multiplied source of vice, cor¬ 
ruption, and oppression, and become a great overshadowing Govern¬ 
ment monoply, to be managed and used for all time by politicians 
to promote their fortunes, perpetuate their power, and oppress the 
people. 
Cheap transportation must come in good time; but it will never 
come through the interference of Government, or as the result of 
hostile legislation and embittered controversy between the different 
industrial and commercial interests. It must be the result of pri¬ 
vate enterprise, stimulated and encouraged by a liberal and gener¬ 
ous confidence. 
