Rensselaer Republican, Volume 25, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 February 1893 — That Sand and Soil Road Remedy Again. [ARTICLE]

That Sand and Soil Road Remedy Again.

James G. Blaine died at Washington, last Friday morning. In his death the country loses its greatest statesman of the present era, and the most universally popular and admired politician in its whole history. He was a great statesman, a great politician, Jhut more than all, he was a great patriot.

It has been a good many weeks since an issue of The Republican has gone to press that it did not contain from 10 to 200 lines on the road question. We propose to keep up the agitation; and if the people of Jasper county do not become aroused to the necessity of building better roads it will not be our fault.

The democrats of Delphi and surrounding township petitioned to have their post-office contest settled by an election, but the Journal says that Congressmanelect Hammond refused very decisively to permit the matter to be settled in that way, and that he will have no post-office elections in his district.

Neighbor McEwen, of the Sentinel seems to be a very formidable candidate for the post-office after al], judging by the way the other candidates and their friends are jumping onto him. It is now McEwen against the field, whatever shape affairs may assume later. The weapon his opponents are using against our old Jacksonian contemporary is the claim that he is the man the Republicans want to see appointed. This is far from, being an original method of fighting an opposing aspirant to an office, but it is an effective one when skillfully worked. The Indianapolis Journal of last Friday makes the following mention of the able state senator from this district: Senator Gilman is from the Benton, Jasper and Newton district, the northern portions of which are very low and wet. Senator Gilman’s bills all concern drainage, and are of the legislation most necessary to the district from which he comes. This Senator has made no attempt at oratory of the spread-eagle kind, but has steadily pushed every bill for his district which he has introduced, and will accomplish mo* o

for his counties than were he of the exquisite Magee stamp. Senator Gilman has always been a hard-working and successful legislator, and having fully “learned the ropes” by experience, he is doing more effective work this session than ever before. There is no name that appears more often than his in connection with the introduction and pushing through of meritorious and practical laws. Nor are his efforts all confined to drainage bills, as the Journal erroniously states, for his bills cover a wide range of subjects.

By the new Judicial appointment, as reported by the committee on judiciary, White, Benton and Jasper will form a new district. That is all right. There is not too much work in the three counties mentioned for one judge. —Monticello Democrat. The Democrat appears to think that it has made an invincible argument in favor of the circuit court gerrymander bill, as far at least as it applies to this proposed new circuit, when it says “There is not too much work in the three counties mentioned for one j udge.” The proposed new circuit is Jasper, Newton and White, instead of Benton, Jasper and White, and we should be glad to have the Democrat explain what good purpose will be served by taking Benton county from the circuit with Jasper and Newton, merely to replace it with White. Very likely the Democrat is right in saying there will not be too much work for one judge, for there is no good reason to suppose that White will bring more court work into the circuit than Benton takes out. But where is the gain? The true answer is:z: One Republican judge is legislated out of office, with about 10 more in other parts of the state. Hence the Democratic reformers’ admiration of the meas-

Last week we noted the fact that Mortimer Nye, in his official capacity of Lieutenant Governor, had solemnly ruled, and without a dissenting voice from any Democratic senator, that a vote in favor of a conference report was not a vote on the final passage of a bill. |ln this decision Mr. Nye went exactly contrary to what he pretended to believe during the campaign, and in effect, declared himself to be a dishonorable falsifier, to say the least. To this decision of Mr. Nye’s we may also add that of his direct superior in office, Governor Matthews himself. A short time since, while discussing the legality of certain changes he, in his former capacity of secretary of state, made in the fee and salary bill, after it had passed both houses of the Legislature, the Governor was asked directly, if a vote in favor of a conference report, was a vote for the final passage of a bill. His answer was no, most positively given. Here we have the positive decision of both those eminent Demthe Governor and the Lieutenant Governor, that what themselves and other Democrats, including those who run the alleged People’s Party organ in this county, claimed during the campaign on this point, was false and intentionally false, and made merely for political effect.

One of the most disgraceful and outrageous events that ever occured in this state, took place at Lafayette last Thursday night, when a gang of lawless rioters broke into the Lafayette Opera House and broke up a large meeting which had gathered to hear one Geo. Rudolph, an ex-Catholic priest, give a lecture on his reasons for leaving that church. The intention of the mob was to murder Mr. Rudolph, and he was (struck (by two bullets, but not greatly injured by either. Not the least disgraceful feature of the affair was the contemptible conduct of the Lafayette police, who utterly refused to make any attempt to disperse the rioters or to protect the people, many of them women and children, whose lives were endan-

gered by their acts. The Tippecandb county grand jury has been called to investigate the riot and it is most earnestly to be hoped that it will make thorough work, and not desist until every leader of the mob has been brought to justice.—And in this hope every good citizen will agree, irrespective of religion or political opinions. The rights of free speech, free press and free conscience are the very foundation stones of Liberty and Progress, and every attack upon those rights should meet with the sternest retribution.

The Remington Press, the Goodland Herald and the Oxford Tribune are three of the very very papers which are joining with the populistic papers in a demand that public printing be let to the lowest bidder. This zeal for reform has never operated, however, to prevent those papers from publishing all the public printing they could get, and charging full legal prices for it. In the case of the Press, for instance, we know that when it published for the first time the sample ballot for the Remington town election, it filed a bill considerably larger in proportion than The Republican ever charged for similar publications, either for town or county. In regard to the Oxford Tribune, we call to mind the fact that several years ago, Carr demanded and received from the Commissioners of Benton county the order to publish the notice in a gravel road case, and that too after another Benton county paper had offered to do the work for MOO; but Carr “padded” the notice out, making it occupy more than twice the necessary space, and charged and was paid, the sum of $947.00. A greater sum, by the way, than The Republican has ever been paid for public print ing in any three consecutive years, since the present publisher has been connected with it. •

But this “lowest bidder” principle admits of a wider application than merely to the matter, of public printing. If it is not rignt for the publishers of political papers to do the public printing and to charge the rates fixed by law therefor, when some other paper would do it cheaper, why is it right for these same or some other publishers to be given public appointments and to draw the compensation the law allows, when some other person would do the work equally as well for less money? Take the post-offices for instances. Why not let them to the lowest responsible bidder? The same arguments that favor letting public advertising to the lowest bidder would apply equally as well to any public service, including the selling and cancelling of postage stamps. Bro. Kitt held the Goodland post-office under Cleveland; Bro. Carr holds the Oxford office, under Harrison, and Mr. Major wants the Remington place, under Cleveland’s second term.

We have never heard it intimated that the two first named gendid not draw every cent the law allowed them as post-mas-ters, nor that they ever demanded that the offices should be let to the lowest bidder. As for that real old Simon pure, Jacob Townsend reformer with a big R, the Remington Press man, who wants the Remington post-office as a reward for running People’s Party matter on the insides of his professed non-partisan paper, we have never heard that even he is asking for the post-office on the grounds that he is the lowest bidder, and if he intends to accept less compensation than the law allows when he gets the office, he has not made the fact public in his newspaper.

Consistency is a rare virtue, and especially with “reformers” who have an axe to grind! Next week we shall touch upon this subject again, and give our esteemed brother of the Goodland Herald some of the valid reasons he asks for why it might not be advisable to give the public printing to the lowest bidder.

Several weeks ago we republished an article on road making by an Illinois man, in the Western Hural. ■ The leading idea of the writer was that, as sand makes good roads In_wet weather, and that dirt does in dry, that a judicious mixture of the two would make a good road in all seasons. The proposition looks well in theory and the writer claims...that it works well in practice. For our own part, we are the more inclined to think that the man’s idea is a good one because we have known of localities where the roads were good the year around, and in those localities there is lots of sand in the soil and lots of soil in the sand. The writer above refered to, claimed that the sand and soil mixture actually made a better road than gravel or rock, because it would pack solid and not sink into the sand below, and disappear, as gravel and rock are prone to do, unless laid on very thick. Be that as it may, however, we are at least firmly convinced that there are many pieces of roadinJariper county, which it would not now be practicable to improve with gravel or rock, but which might be, with comparatively little expense, un-der-drained with tile and then treated to a good coating of sand. Or, if the road was in sand, treated with a coating of dirt.

We invited our readers, if any of them knew of instances of roads treated in the manner described to let us know the result. We now repeat the invitation, and extend it by saying that if you know nothing about the matter from actual experience, let us know what your opinion is. Our idea of the method of applying the sand and dirt mixture remedy to our bad roads is this: If the bad piece of road is sand then cover it in the Spring, (never in the fall) with, say, three inches of dirt. Smooth down well and you will then have a good road until the fall rains come, and then the sand will work up into the dirt and that will make the road all right until dry weather comes again, and then the close of soil might be repeated, until a permanent cure is effected. > In the case of a dirt road, the sand should be hauled on in the fall (never in the spring) and also to the depth of about three inches on the first application. This amount would greatly improve the road during wet weather, and would work well into the dirt beneath. The next fall, the second two or three inches should be applied.

We are confident that if the above suggestions should be carefully carried out that a great deal of road work that is now wasted every spring, and worse than wasted every fall, the result would be a great and permanent improvement, in many cases where now the roads are desperately bad during many months every year. - The point of applying only a few inches of the sand or soil at a time, is important. Too much of either would not readily work down and intermingle with what was beneath it—and in mixing and mingling of the two substances is the very essence of the benefits of the method.

Austin and Hopkins have perfected arrangements by which they can make you farm loans at 6 per cent, and these loans can be paid off at any time and stop interest. We have the money on hands and make hese loans without delay. We can give you more money at less expense than any firm in town.