VIRGINIA GOOD ROADS CONVENTION.

The Virginia Good Roads Convention met in the hall of the Chamber of Commerce, and was called to order at 10.45 a. m. by the chairman, Hon. H. W. Anderson, of Roanoke, Va.

The proceedings were opened with prayer by Rev. George H. Ray, D. D. The chairman then read the call for the meeting, which was signed as follows:

Young Men's Business League of Roanoke, Va., by H. W. Anderson, chairman committee on roads.

The Richmond Chamber of Commerce, by John M. Taylor, chairman committee on streets, roads, and parks.

The Virginia State Agricultural and Mechanical Society, by H. W. Wood, president.

The Association of Engineers of Virginia, by Charles S. Churchill, president.

Virginia State Farmers' Alliance, by B. L. Winston, president. Staunton Chamber of Commerce, by Isaac Witz, president. Virginia Division, League of American Wheelmen, by A. A. O'Neill, chief consul.

President of the Virginia State Board of Agriculture, S. Wellford Corbin.

Mr. ANDERSON. This question has been before the people of Virginia for a number of years, but there has never been any definite action taken until this time. In 1893, the Association of Engineers of Virginia appointed a committee, composed of five members, to draft a bill to be presented to the last session of the legislature. That committee, after a very careful consideration of the question and after much studyto which I can bear personal testimony-prepared a bill, which has since been indorsed by the association. That bill was introduced into the legislature by Mr. Wood, and a committee of the association was sent to the city of Richmond to urge its passage; but it being late in the session, no action was taken further than to refer it to a committee to report at the next session. During the past few months the organizations having the matter in hand decided to issue the call for this convention. We are now here to consider the question of improving the roads in Virginia, and it is hoped that the result of the deliberations of this body will be a marked improvement in the next few years in the public roads of our State, and that a permanent organization

may be formed here for taking hold of the matter in the future. It is now my pleasure to introduce Judge George L. Christian, president of the Richmond Chamber of Commerce.

ADDRESS OF JUDGE GEORGE L. CHRISTIAN.

GENTLEMEN OF THE CONVENTION: When I received, a day or two since, the invitation to deliver a short address of welcome, on the opening of this Convention—while I appreciated very highly the honor thus intended to be conferred-I would certainly have felt it my duty to decline it, owing to the pressure of other engagements but for the great interest I have felt in this movement from its inception. As I said in our Chamber of Commerce when this movement was first brought to its attention by the committee of the Young Men's Business League of Roanoke, I do regard this as one of the most important movements for the material development of the State that has been inaugurated within its limits. I know this language sounds very strong, but I am perfectly candid when I say that I don't believe I have exaggerated one particle in the form in which I have stated the proposition.

In an address delivered before the National League for Good Roads in Chicago, just two years ago, one of the speakers made this startling statement: "In the State of Illinois the money lost by bad roads, to farmers alone, is estimated on good authority at $16,000,000 per annum. This, of course, is not the whole tax, since the people in towns bear their full share in loss of trade and increased cost of living, but it will be a safe basis of calculation; and at this rate, the total loss for the United States would approximate $300,000,000 per annum. The average earnings of capital in this country may be taken as about 3 per cent, at which rate this $300,000,000 is the interest on $10,000,000,000, or one-sixth of the entire wealth of the country."

Of course, gentlemen, it is impossible for anyone to say that the foregoing, almost incalculable, estimate is accurate. But I don't think anyone will hesitate to affirm that the loss sustained by the country by reason of bad roads is enormous, and almost fabulous. If this can be affirmed with reference to the country generally, is it necessary to say to you, representative men of Virginia, that it is especially and most lamentably true of Virginia? It is said that the civilization of a people can be measured by the condition of its roads. This may be true of some people, but, thank God, old Virginia is a monumental exception to this rule. I believe it is almost universally conceded that we have in this grand old Commonwealth as true, as brave, as intelligent, as patriotic, and as good people in every way as can be found on this green earth, and certainly that is what I think of them; but I am obliged to acknowledge that our roads are as bad as I think our people are good. Indeed, I believe I have heard almost everything in Virginia praised except her roads. Her men have been acknowledged to be the first in the field, in the forum, and in the councils of the nation; her women (God bless them) the fairest, the gentlest, and the queenliest in the world; her soil and climate everything that could be desired; her mountains and her valleys, her rivers and her harbors, the very perfection of nature's handiwork, combining with the rest of her natural gifts to make her an empire within herself. The things she really needs most is good roads. I therefore hail this Convention as a most important movement, especially at this time; and, therefore, on behalf of the Chamber of Commerce of Richmond, I not only welcome you to this historic and beautiful city, but to this, our chamber's new home, where I hope that your deliberations will not only be pleasant, but wise and conducive to the best interests of the old mother State, for the upbuilding of whose material and moral interests this building was erected, and to advance which this chamber has at all times directed its best efforts.

I said I regarded the assembling of this Convention as most opportune and auspicious. On yesterday there adjourned from within these walls a convention called and held for the promotion of immigration to this State and the South. Could there

be a more fitting companion of that movement than this you are here to inaugurate to-day? Ask any real estate dealer in this city or elsewhere how many sales of farms he has failed to make because of the bad and inaccessible roads leading to them, and I am content that these answers shall be the measure of the importance of your work.

A State or a county can make no better investment than to spend money in improving its highways. I have seen the statement that one county in New Jersey spent $300,000 in improving its highways, and in three years the lands all over the county increased in value 5, 25, 50, 100, and in some instances as much as 300, per cent. Yes, if I were asked, What is the best thing that can be done to induce immigration and to enhance and make salable the lands in Virginia to-day, I would answer without the slightest hesitation, Make these lands accessible to the centers of population and to the railroads by good county roads. Not only are bad roads an obstacle to the advancement of every community where they exist by keeping the people from that religious, social, and intellectual intercourse by which they would be elevated and enlightened, but, as I have said before, the loss sustained in money is simply incalculable. With good roads the farmer could market his crops whenever the market was best and it suited him best to do the hauling. With bad roads he is at the mercy of the buyer, because when he can haul (when the roads are good) everyone else can do the same, and so the market is glutted, and the buyer reaps the benefit of this condition of things. With good roads twice as much can be carried at a load, and in this way, too, the saving to teams in labor and in time would be simply

enormous.

But again, good roads make good lands. Suppose there was a splendid highway going by your farm, along which all your neighbors and friends passed and repassed daily. Do you believe you would let that place remain in the same dilapidated condition you would if it was off in the woods and only accessible by cow paths, or by such county roads as I have driven over so often in Virginia, when my neck, or some other member, was constantly in danger? Of course you would not. It is only necessary to visit the suburbs of this city and see the splendid improvement in the way of good roads and good farms which our enterprising and big-headed and bighearted citizen, Maj. Ginter, has accomplished there, to see how contagious is this development. Yes, everyone in that section is improving his property, and the contagion is spreading and will continue to spread, I hope and believe; and while all can't be Maj. Ginters, all can do something, and nothing will contribute more to induce that something than the improvement of our county roads.

In his Old Virginia Gentleman, Dr. Bagby describes the approach to Mr. Piedmont's house in a way which will be recognized as a true picture of the Virginia country road by every native of this old historic State. He says: "Pleasant it was to trot through these forests on a hot summer's day, knowing what was to come at the journey's end; pleasant, too, to bowl along under the arching bows, albeit the ruts were terrible in places; and there were two or three immemorial holes made by the butts of saw logs that made every vehicle, but chiefly the bug-back carriage, lurch and careen like a ship in a heavy sea. But these were useful holes. They educated the young negro driver, and compelled the old one to keep his wrinkled, mealy hand in. They toned, or rather tuned, up the nerves of the young ladies, and gave them excuse for uttering the prettiest shrieks; whereat the long-legged cousin leaning to the left at an angle of 90 degrees, with his abominable red head forever inside the carriage window, would display his horsemanship in the most nimble, overaffectionate, and unpleasing manner (unpleasing to the young gentleman from the city, who has not a cousin, didn't want to be a cousin, and wasn't a bit proud of riding, but had some decency and really a very high regard for the sensibilities of the most refined ladies in the whole State of Virginia). Many were the short but fervent prayers ejaculated by the old ladies in consequence of these same holes, which came to be the provocatives of late piety, and on that account were never

molested. And they were prized beyond measure by the freckled-faced 10-yearold brother, who, standing up behind and hanging back by the carriage straps, yelled with delight every time the bug-back went way down, and wished from the very bottom of his horrid boy's heart that the blamed old thing would bust all to flinders and plump the whole caboodle smack into the middle of the mud puddle."

It is a great mistake to suppose that only the country people suffer by bad roads. Indeed, the welfare of the cities is so linked with, and dependent on, the prosperity of the country that whatever injures one injures the other, and vice versa. The denizen of the city or country who fails to recognize this as a patent fact is simply an ass. Yes, my friends from the country, the cities suffer from bad roads just as the country does, and feeling this to be true, it was meet that the "Magic City" of your State should have inaugurated this movement, which was so heartily seconded by the chief commercial organization of your metropolis.

Not only all the civilization of the past, but the best of that of the present, attests the importance of good roads, as well in the influence and power of a people as in their material development. What would Rome have been three centuries before the Christian era, when she dominated the then known world, without her Appian Way and "all the roads" which led to that once imperial and so-called Eternal City? England has to-day what is called its local government board, the president of which is a member of the British cabinet, which is specially charged with the maintenance and construction of the highways of the kingdom; and hardly anything has been done more to extend the power and influence of that great people, "whose drumbeat greets the rising sun around the world," than her splendid highways. What these highways have done for London and the other cities of England is equally true of Paris, of Berlin, of St. Petersburg, of Vienna, of Constantinople, and of cities the world over.

In Virginia, by a late decision of our court of appeals, we have no general road law at all now, and I don't think the amendment proposed to the constitution will meet the needs of the case. This amendment only provides that the "general assembly may impose upon every male inhabitant of the State between the ages of 16 and 60 years the duty of working, not exceeding two days in any one year, upon the public roads and highways therein, subject, however, to such exemptions from said duty as may be from time to time prescribed by law."

This Convention ought not to adjourn without either formulating some law and some system of operating under it (or appointing a committee who will do so), so that the general assembly can have this law before it at the beginning of its next session. Frame such a statute, if possible, as will meet the public needs at this time; get a public sentiment aroused in favor of the measure, and you will find no difficulty in getting the legislation. Nothing controls legislation like votes, and every man, woman, and child in the State is interested in, and ought to be in favor of, good roads. The main thing, then, is to frame the good law. This, I am sorry to say, I can't tell you how to do, because I don't know enough about the practical working of the systems in other places and have had no time to inform myself about them since I received the invitation to address you, as I have been engaged about other matters nearly all the time. Some of the proposed plans contemplate national aid and a grand national system. On principle, I should not be inclined to favor this; but it would be beyond my province to attempt to advise this Convention as to its line of policy or what its plan of operations should be.

I only beg leave to make the suggestion that in the present financial condition of our people we must not undertake more than we can with safety accomplish. We need not undertake to rival telford or macadam, except in certain localities where we can afford such roads as they built and they are needed. All that we need for general use in our State, in my opinion, is good dirt roads, properly drained, graveled, and rolled. These can be made at comparatively small cost, and would pay for themselves the first year after they are made.