interest and principal would both be liquidated. It is but just and equitable that future generations should bear some of the burdens. There has been considerable agitation in our State in favor of working the State convicts on the public roads. This power, however, is denied the State by the expressed provisions of the present Constitution. Before any movement of this kind can be undertaken a constitutional amendment would be essential. We should not overlook the fact, however, that even if an amendment was adopted permitting the State to work its convicts upon the public roads, that an enormous outlay for the preparation of such a policy would be necessary. As I recall, the State of Georgia expended about a million dollars in the purchase of mules, and road-working machinery before the policy was ever undertaken. The State, therefore, if determined to work the convicts upon the public roads, would necessarily have to purchase movable prisons or vans, mules, teams and road-working machinery, which outlay alone would necessitate the expenditure of over a million dollars. The revenues which the State now receives from the State convicts would necessarily have to be supplemented by additional taxation. The question of sanitation, the establishment of camps, the cost of supervision would all have to be carefully considered. Therefore, if the people should alter the present Constitution so as to permit the working of State convicts upon the public roads, in my judgment, the first step that should be taken is to appoint a commission composed of men of experience and intelligence to give careful study and consideration of the cost and advantages that might accrue and submit their report to the Legislature for proper action. I am confident that after careful study, thought and consideration and without undue haste we can reach a proper conclusion on this important subject. A change so important and far reaching in the policy of the State must be wrought out after careful investigation, study and consideration of every phase and aspect of the subject and after all available material is compiled, and a report made upon which legislative action can be intelligently based.

Ladies and gentlemen: The high cost of living should impress us with the necessity of taking speedy action to advance our agricultural conditions. We are too much inclined to

boast of the increase of the population of our cities as an infallible test of our progress and prosperity, yet all history teaches that the progress and prosperity of any State must commence on the farm. Mr. Bryan uttered a great truth when he declared, “Burn down your.cities and leave our farms and your cities will spring up again as if by magic, but destroy our farms and the grass will grow in the streets of every city in the country." The constant and steadily increasing drift of population from the farm to the city instead of being an evidence of advancement is an unmistakable warning that our entire social structure needs reorganization.

The growth of urban at the expense of rural population is one of the most alarming tendencies of the day. We all desire to see a steady growth of population of our cities, but if that growth is at the expense of our agricultural progress instead of being a blesssing it becomes a curse. Our farmers are constantly complaining that it is difficult to keep their sons upon the farm. Many young men forsake the farm and are content to eke out a scanty subsistence in the city. Is it because wealth and fortune beckon to the young man just entering upon the journey of life? We know that in the turmoil and fierce competition now existing in the large cities of the land many who forsake the farm find poverty and want and bitter disappointment. They yield to the lure of the city and yet wealth and fortune lay at their doors on the farms that they desert. It is evident, therefore, that we cannot advance our agricultural interests and secure that agricultural development which the high cost of living and our increasing population so imperatively demands unless we can stop this constant flow of our population from the farm to the city. How, then, can we improve agricultural conditions? The answer to this question can alone be found by consideration of the causes which have retarded our agricultural deveolpment.

One of the chief obstacles in our efforts to encourage and increase rural population is found in the isolation, the loneliness and social disadvantages of rural as compared with city life. How can this disadvantage be overcome? While rural delivery and the use of the telephone have marked an important step in improving conditions in our rural communities, they alone are not sufficient to overcome the most serious impediment to the growth of our rural population. Every

thoughtful student of the conditions of rural life admits that the first and most fundamental step is to secure in every part of Alabama a system of improved highways, furnishing to the dweller upon the farm easy access to the County and State markets, increasing the attractiveness, overcoming the isolation and securing to the farmer those manifold advantages which good roads always furnish.

With a proper and adequate system of improved highways leading to every part of each county in the State and connecting with the main highways and trunk lines, which the State will, I trust, at no far distant date construct, not only will there be rapid and material advancement in farm lands, but the movement of "back to the farm" will find a responsive echo in the hearts and minds of our people. The farmer will not be content until he has the same advantages of schools, churches and libraries enjoyed by citizens of the larger cities. How can these advantages be secured? The answer is "Good Roads." The experience of other States has demonstrated. that one of the greatest economies resulting from improved highways is the opportunity it furnishes to lessen by concentration the cost of education, and to improve the tone and character of our rural schools and rural churches. With good roads the automobile omnibus, and other methods of transportation, distance will be annihilated and that concentration will result which will not only decrease expense but furnish better educational facilities.

Another important advantage which will follow the construction of good roads is the encouragement of village and community life in rural districts. The system of ante-bellum days made village life unnecessary. The large Southern plantation was a reproduction of feudal life, independent and selfsustaining. Within the boundaries of the large plantation were carpenters, masons, blacksmiths, wood-workers, mechanics, mills and all necessary machinery for the successful conduct of farming operations. The abolition of slavery completely revolutionized the economic conditions that formerly prevailed in the South, and I believe that the most important step to encourage our agricultural interests is through a system of good roads to encourage the construction of villages throughout our farming districts furnishing the same advantages which were formerly furnished by the ante-bellum plantation.

We all recognize that absentee landlordism has been one of the greatest obstacles to our agricultural growth, and I hope the day is not far distant when we can replace the large plantation with its thriftless and wasteful tendency with educated and intelligent white farmers who reside upon their land and personally direct their farming operations. The necessary result would be that we would substitute intelligence for ignorance, improved and scientific methods of farming for the crude and ignorant system which now prevails in many of the larger plantations of the State.

That State alone will make the greatest progress whose people own their own homes, whose farmers not only own but occupy the lands they cultivate.

The enormous wealth and prosperity of France is largely due to the fact that the great mass of her rural population own and occupy the lands they cultivate.

It has been truly said that notwithstanding our marvelous resources, our leadership in adventive skill, in manufacturing, in all the arts of peace, that the United States has the worst system of public roads of any civilized country on earth. The only reason that this country has made such marvelous progress is due to the fact that the locomotive was almost coincident with our industrial growth.

There are those who claim that the railroad obviates the necessity of good roads. That claim is unfounded. All of the products of this country must sooner or later pass over our dirt road. The construction, therefore, of railroads, only makes it more imperative that there should be good roads over which the products of the land could be hauled to the rail-' road. Experience has shown that construction of every railroad makes absolutely essential, if progress is to be attained, the building of necessary highways, which become the feeders for the railroad, and without which there can be no industrial development.

We must not cease our efforts until the State is traversed by great trunk highways and every county has a system of good roads connecting with the main highways of the State, until Alabama has as perfect and improved a system of good roads as any State in the Union. *** Until rural life is lifted from the mud and mire of the old mud road, until the home upon the farm is as attractive as a home in the city, until the

farmers can go every day of the year to the markets of his county and his children enjoy the same advantages of schools, churches and libraries possessed by the dwellers in our towns and cities.

If we wish to encourage the movement of back to the farm, make it a realization instead of a dream of orators and conventions, we must make it back over a good road.

The public highway is the only system of transportation. owned and operated by the people. In spite of the many mistakes which have been made, although in this great movement we have halted and stumbled, yet, we have made steady progress. We have begun to discover the mistakes we made in the past. We have realized that it is only by concentration of power and authority, the creation of a central board with full supremacy and control that the erection of roads that are permanent and durable can be accomplished.

Through your labors public sentiment has been crystallized, and the movement for good roads will not abate but will grow in strength and power until this necessary adjunct of civilization is possessed by the people of this commonwealth; until Alabama takes her place, first as she is in the roll of States, first in her splendid system of highway and cheap and rapid methods of communication among her people. The full realization of our dreams will bring happiness and cheer and comfort to our rural homes and will be a monument to the courage and enthusiasm, the indefatigable labors of this association, as enduring as the hills and mountains of our native State. Alabama is to be congratulated that she has in her midst a body of men who, forsaking their daily avocations have unselfishly consecrated the energies and abilities to this great movement, and whose labors and successful efforts entitle them to the thanks and gratitude of the patriotic and intelligent citizenship of this commonwealth.

In spite of unjust criticism, misrepresentation and slander, I am confident that the impartial judgment of the people of Alabama, when the passions of political contests have subsided, will do me justice and recognize that I have labored earnestly and faithfully in the great cause and have earned the confidence of the people for the progress during my administration by the creation of public sentiment and the increasing improvement of our highways.