Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page.

M SON’S WEE/< t y JEFFERSONIAN T THOMAS E. WATSON’S NEWSPAPER DEVOTED TO THE ADVOCACY OF THE JEFFERSONIAN THEORY OF GOVERNMENT Vol. 11. We Tlust ‘Dribe the Hightoaymen Ojf the 'Roads \W ;L 'ssS&sSS, IFISm l! ? J WramM llßi ilk tIbM 1 1 iM»m. ■ - ■-Xfe? lt-^^W|^M|r. ; —— — .\c 'T -_' ~ ~ DRAWN BY GORDON «Y1 FOR THK WBBKLT JBFFBRSONIAN. TZZE VALUE OF THE WATERWAY (The Louisville Herald.) There is an enormous railroad track way in the United States, consisting of 225,000 miles. This railway mile age extends into every state of the union. Yet it is totally inadequate to the handling of the country’s trans portation business. The people, there fore, look for relief to the waterways, so bountifully provided by nature. Os these waterways the Mississippi is, as the New Orleans Picayune points out, by far the most important. It com- Atlanta, Ga., Thursday, April 18, 1907. prises 20,000 miles of navigable main channel and tributaries. The Mississip pi system serves an immense extent of country. The region so served is blessed with unparalleled richness. Its development has been rapid and un exampled. The Mississippi is, indeed, the world’s most commanding river. Before the Mississippi valley had come into the possession of this re public the inhabitants of the United States east of the river were cut off from its free use, because its debouch- See Editorial on Page Nine. ment into the sea was through foreign soil. The Mississippi was, for the greater part of its course, an interna tional waterway, one-half in French, the other half in American, territory. Louisiana, belonging to France, was not, however, on one side merely of the river, but on both sides. The mouth of the river was, therefore, under French authority exclusively, and its free use denied the trade of the United States. This fact, more than any other, de- termined the American people to have an open river. Had this result not been achieved by a peaceful treaty the people of the western and south western states had certainly taken measures to capture New Orleans and the port of Louisiana east of the river. There were few comparatively who cared for the vast region west of the river, but the necessity of making the Mississippi an out-and-out Ameri can stream was so urgent that some* (Continued on page 12.) No. 13.