CHAPTER XXXVII.

STATE INTERNAL IMPROVEMENT SYSTEM.

In his message to the legislature at the special session begun December 7, 1835, Gov. Duncan said: "When we look abroad and see the extensive lines of inter-communication penetrating almost every section of our sister States-when we see the canalboat and the locomotive bearing, with seeming triumph, the rich productions of the interior to the rivers, lakes and ocean, almost annihilating time, burthen and space, what patriot bosom does not beat high with a laudable ambition to give to Illinois her full share of those advantages which are adorning her sister States, and which a magnificent Providence seems to invite by the wonderful adaptation of our whole country to such improvements." Pennsylvania and other States were at the time engaged in extensive works of internal improvement. The legislature responded to the ardent words of the governor in a liberal manner, by chartering a great number of railroads, almost checkering the map of the State, and pledging its faith for $500,000 of the canal loan; but further than this they did not go; the supreme folly of the period being left for their successors to enact. After the adjournment, when the people contemplated the project of a vast system of internal improvements, as portrayed by His Excellency, they were fired with an inordinate desire to have it speedily in successful operation.

They were already inoculated with the fever of speculation, then rife throughout the west. Chicago, a mere trading post in 1830, had in a few years grown into a city of several thousand inhabitants. This remarkable city had now started upon her wonderful career of improvement, unsurpassed by individual effort in the annals of the world, steadily maintained to this day; and at present, after her terrible visitation by the fire fiend, also unsurpassed in the annals of the world for the magnitude of its destructiveness, since the days of Sodom and Gomorrah, she bids fair to eclipse all her former rapidity of growth. The story of speedy fortunes made in Chicago, which excited wonder and adventure 36 years ago, is still fraught with marvels. Early reports of the rapid advance of property in Chicago, spread to the east. Every vessel came crowded with immigrants, bringing their money, enterprise and industry to the enchanted spot of sudden opulence. They have not been disappointed. The rapid development of the town inspired emulation. Throughout the State; towns, and additions were plotted with the hope of profiting by the influx of emigrants. In some cases maps of splendidly situated towns would be taken to Chicago, to attract the attention of the

emigrant, and auction sales of lots would be made far from the place of location. Others were sent east. It was said at the time that the staple articles of Illinois export were town plots, and that there was danger of crowding the State with towns to the exclusion of land for agriculture. During the year 1836, lands to the amount of $5,000,000 were entered in Illinois. From this it was not unreasonably deduced that an extraordinary tide of emigration would speedily set into this State. Even the sober judgment of careful business men and staid farmers fluctuated, and they became fired with the idea of leaping into sudden fortune. The genius of speculation overspread the State with her golden wings, casting dazzling beams of bright promise across the paths of our people, beyond which it was difficult to see. They invested to the utmost of their credit, which at that time of bank expansion, was almost unlimited. To prevent their extensive purchases from becoming a drug upon their hands, and to further invite immigration and place the prosperity of the State upon a firm basis, by developing its resources-bringing its interior within the range of markets; settling it up; building up its towns and cities; having the muscle to wring from its vigorous soil the products of wealth, and enhance the price of property, was a great, a grand disideratum. All this could be accomplished, it was ingeniously argued, and doubtless demonstrated to many, by a general system of internal improvements, based on the faith and credit of the State. A new legislature was to be elected in August of that year, 1836. The dazzling scheme was now vigorously agitated. The press espoused the project. Public meetings were held all over the State, and resolutions, as the expressions of the people in favor of the scheme, were adopted. The subject was kept alive. The great natural surface advantages of the State for the building of railroads were dilated upon; the State which already possessed every element of greatness-extent of territory, richi ness of soil, variety of climate, almost bounded by navigable waters-lacked only these improvements to reach and develope its vast and inaccessible interior. Its broad and fertile prairies lay ready prepared, awaiting only population and the hand of industry to respond with abundant products, to freight these avenues of commerce connecting them with the markets of the world. That these views were in the main correct has by this time, with our 7000 miles of completed railroads, been demonstrated; but that the State should carry forward the herculean project was most vissionary, and proved most disastrous.

The legislature elected August 1836, was supplemented by an internal improvement convention, composed of many of the ablest men of the State, which was to meet at the seat of government simultaneously with the legislature. It is probable that the more zealous advocates of the project entertained doubts regarding the stamina of the honorable members of the legislature, when the vast project should be fully brought forward for action. The convention devised a general system of internal improvements, the leading characteristics of which was "that it should be commensurate with the wants of the people." It was an irresponsible body, determined to succeed in its one object, regardless of cousequences. The wildest reasoning was indulged. Every theory

*Ford's History.

that the teeming brain of man could suggest was brought into requisition to further the success of the scheme. Possibilities were argued into probabilities, and the latter into infalibilities. Doubts regarding the advantages of the system were scouted; the resources of the State magnified a hundred fold, and the ultimate ability of the works to meet all their liabilities without detriment to the State, predicted with a positiveness as if inspired by the gift of prophecy. Governor Duncan in his message reiterated his recommendation to establish a general and uniform system of internal improvements, in which the State might take a third or half interest to hasten the works to completion, which would secure to her a lasting and abundant revenue, to be applied upon the principles of the plan proposed, "until the whole country shall be intersected by canals and railroads, and our beautiful prairies enlivened by thousands of steam engines, drawing after them lengthened trains, freighted with the abundant productions of our fertile soil." The production of the convention was confided to the hands of Edward Smith, of Wabash, chairman of the committee on internal improvements in the legislature, who, after the introduction of a set of resolutions covering the same ground, on the 9th of January, 1837, made a report on the memorial and the governor's message relating to the same subject, which it may safely be asserted is one of the most assuring, expectant, and hopeful papers to be found among the archives of Illinois. It occupies some 12 pages, and is replete with specious reasoning. The committee argued that public expectation, both at home and abroad, would be greatly disappointed if some system of internal improvement was not adopted at the present session; that the internal trade of a country was the greatest lever of its prosperity; that it was the legislator's duty, by his example, to calm the apprehension of the timorous and meet the attacks of calculating opposers of measures which would multiply the population and wealth of the State; that the surface of the State was peculiarly adapted to the construction of railroads, and that the practicability of removing obstructions to the navigation of our rivers could not be doubted; that a general system of internal improvements was then within the policy and means of the State, demanded by the people as expressed by their highly talented delegates, lately assembled in convention, and also looked forward to by the people abroad who had purchased lands here with a view to settlement, and whose expectations ought not to be disappointed by over cautious legislation, which would divert emigration to other States; that the cost of building railroads, from the uniformity of the country, and by analogy with similar works in other States, could be calculated with the utmost precision without previous surveys, ($8,000 per mile being the estimate); than an internal improvement fund should be constituted of all moneys arising from loans, sale of stocks, tolls, rents of land and hydraulic powers, interest on stocks, sale of State lands entered for the works, a portion of the deposits received from the national treasury, and portions of the annual land tax; that with the expiration of the government exemption in five years time, there would be 12,000,000 acres of land to tax; that by the disbursements of large sums of money, means would speedily be placed in the hands of the people to enable them to purchase their homes;

that the railroads as fast as completed both ways from the crossings of rivers and important towns, would yield the interests on their costs; that in the advance of the routes of improvements the State should enter lands to re-sell at an enhanced price; that a board of fund commissioners should be elected, to consist of such eminent financiers as to reflect great credit upon the State, and thus add to its financial resources; and that with these active resources at command no great financial skill was required of future legislatures to provide the ways and means to carry to completion the public works without burthening the people with taxation. The works recommended, together with the estimated costs, were as follows:

1st. Improvement-of the Great Wabash river

Illinois river

2d.

$100,000

100,000

100,000

50,000

50,000

100,000

3,500,000

1,600,000

1,850,000

$7,450.000

A bill covering these provisions was submitted by the committee, who concluded:

"The maxim is well understood by political economists, that the wealth of a country does not consist so much in the abundance of its coffers as in the number and general prosperity of its citizens. In the present situation of the country, the products of the interior by reason of their remoteness from market, are left upon the hands of the producer, or sold barely at the price of the labor necessary to raise and prepare them for sale. But if the contemplated system should be carried into effect, these fertile and healthy districts which now languish for the want of ready markets for their productions, would find a demand at home for them during the progress of the works, and after their completion would have the advantage of a cheap transit to a choice of markets on the various navigable streams. These would inevitably tend to build towns and cities along the routes and at the terminal points of the respective railroads."

The legislature, in adopting "An act to establish and maintain a general system of internal improvement," approved February 27, 1837, not only came fully up to the requirements of the convention, as reported by the committee, but went over two million and a quarter beyond-$10,230,000, as follows: Toward the im provement of the Great Wabash, $100,000; the Illinois river, $100,000; Rock river, $100,000; Kaskaskia, $50,000; Little Wabash, $50,000; Great Western Mail Route from Vincennes to St. Louis, $250,000, as follows: on the Purgatory swamp, opposite Vincennes, $30,000, Little Wabash river bottoms, $15,000. on the American bottom opposite St. Louis, $30,000, the balance on bridges and repairs; for the Central railroad from Cairo to the Illinois and Michigan canal and railroads from Alton to Mt. Carmel (Southern cross-road) and Alton to Shawneetown, $1,600,000; Northern cross-railroad from Quincy to Indiana State line (present T. W. & W.), $1,800,000; a branch of the Central from Hillsboro' via Shelbyville and Charleston to Terre Haute, $650,000; from Peoria via McComb and Carthage to Warsaw, $700,000; from

Alton to Hillsboro, and the Central railroad, $600,000; from Belleville via Lebanon to intersect the Southern cross-railroad, $150,000; from Bloomington to Mackinaw in Tazewill county, thence a branch to Pekin, $350,000; and finally, of the first moneys obtained, $200,000 were to be distributed among those counties through which no roads or improvements were projected. A board of fund commissioners was provided to consist of three members, who should "be practical and experienced financiers," "who were to contract for and negotiate all loans authorized by the legislature on the faith and credit of the State for objects of internal improvements on the best and most favorable terms," sign and execute bonds or certificates of stocks, receive, manage, deposit and apply all moneys arising from said loans; make quarterly reports, &c.,.and keep a complete record of all their fiscal transactions. The commissioners chosen at this session by joint vote of both houses, were: Charles Oakley, M. M. Rawlings, and Thomas Mather. Their trust was enormous, and while they handled millions of the people's money, a bond was exacted of only $50,000. They were allowed a secretary and a per diem compensation of $5. For the purpose of promoting and uniting the various branches of improvement, a board of "Commissioners of Public Works" was created, consisting of seven members, one from each judicial district, to be elected biennially by joint vote of the General Assembly, and to continue in office for two years. An oath of office and a bond of twenty thousand dollars was required of each; no commissioner was permitted to retain in his hands more than $20,000 at any one time. Both commissioners and engineers were required to take an oath to keep secret, for the benefit of the State, all information they might receive relating to lands or choice town sites, that other persons might not enter or purchase them to the detriment of the State. A violation of this provision was to be deemed a misdemeanor, punishable by fine not exceeding $5,000 and incapacity of holding office. The commissioners were authorized to locate, superintend, and construct all the public works for the State, except the canal. They were to organize and meet semi-annually at the seat of government, at which times the general outlines of the operations were to be determined; examine and audit the expenditures of moneys on the works; make estimates of probable costs; serve authenticated copies on the fund commissioners, and make out a report of their proceedings for the governor to lay before the legislature. Certain duties or divisions of the work might be assigned among themselves; they were to cause examinations and surveys of rivers to be made, and generally to let the works to the lowest bidders, for which due notice was to be published and sealed proposals received; contracts were to provide for forfeiture in case of non-compliance, abandonment, &c., by contractors; no sub-letting was permitted."

Any vacant lands lying within 5 miles of any probable routes of the works were to be entered for the State. The railroads were to be built on the most direct and eligible routes between their specified termini. Individuals or private companies might connect any railroads or branches with the State works. Finally the board of public works were empowered to adopt and enforce all