Another item which helps to explain the buoyant feeling of Louisville is that its population increased over 10,000 from 1886 to 1887, reaching, according to the best estimate, 177,000 people. I should have said also that no city in the Union is better served by street railways, which are so multiplied and arranged as to “correspondences” that for one fare nearly every inhabitant can ride within at least two blocks of his residence. In these cars, as in the railway cars of the State, there is the same absence of discrimination against color that prevails in Louisiana and in Arkansas. And it is an observation hopeful, at least to the writer, of the good time at hand when all party lines shall be drawn upon the broadest national issues, that there seems to be in Kentucky no social distinction between Democrats and Republicans.
XIII.—MEMPHIS AND LITTLE ROCK.
The State of Tennessee gets its diversity of climate and productions from the irregularity of its surface, not from its range over degrees of latitude, like Illinois; for it is a narrow State, with an average breadth of only a hundred and ten miles, while it is about four hundred miles in length, from the mountains in the east—the highest land east of the Rocky Mountains—to the alluvial bottom of the Mississippi in the west. In this range is every variety of mineral and agricultural wealth, with some of the noblest scenery and the fairest farming-land in the Union, and all the good varieties of a temperate climate.
In the extreme south-west corner lies Memphis, differing as entirely in character from Knoxville and Nashville as the bottom-lands of the Mississippi differ from the valleys of the Great Smoky Mountains. It is the natural centre of the finest cotton-producing district in the world, the county of Shelby, of which it is legally known as the Taxing District, yielding more cotton than any other county in the Union except that of Washington in Mississippi. It is almost as much aloof politically from east and middle Tennessee as it is geographically. A homogeneous State might be constructed by taking west Tennessee, all of Mississippi above Vicksburg and Jackson, and a slice off Arkansas, with Memphis for its capital. But the redistricting would be a good thing neither for the States named nor for Memphis, for the more variety within convenient limits a State can have, the better, and Memphis could not wish a better or more distinguished destiny than to become the commercial metropolis of a State of such great possibilities and varied industries as Tennessee. Her political influence might be more decisive in the homogeneous State outlined, but it will be abundant for all reasonable ambition in its inevitable commercial importance. And besides, the western part of the State needs the moral tonic of the more elevated regions.
The city has a frontage of about four miles on the Mississippi River, but is high above it on the Chickasaw Bluffs, with an uneven surface and a rolling country back of it, the whole capable of perfect drainage. Its site is the best on the river for a great city from St. Louis to the Gulf; this advantage is emphasized by the concentration of railways at this point, and the great bridge, which is now on the eve of construction, to the Arkansas shore, no doubt fixes its destiny as the inland metropolis of the South-west. Memphis was the child of the Mississippi, and this powerful, wayward stream is still its fostering mother, notwithstanding the decay of river commerce brought about by the railways; for the river still asserts its power as a regulator of rates of transportation. I do not mean to say that the freighting on it in towed barges is not still enormous, but if it did not carry a pound to the markets of the world it is still the friend of all the inner continental regions, which says to the railroads, beyond a certain rate of charges you shall not go. With this advantage of situation, the natural receiver of the products of an inexhaustible agricultural region (one has only to take a trip by rail through the Yazoo Valley to be convinced of that), and an equally good point for distribution of supplies, it is inevitable that Memphis should grow with an accelerating impulse.
The city has had a singular and instructive history, and that she has survived so many vicissitudes and calamities, and entered upon an extraordinary career of prosperity, is sufficient evidence of the territorial necessity of a large city just at this point on the river. The student of social science will find in its history a striking illustration of the relation of sound sanitary and business conditions to order and morality. Before the war, and for some time after it, Memphis was a place for trade in one staple, where fortunes were quickly made and lost, where no attention was paid to sanitary laws. The cloud of impending pestilence always hung over it, the yellow-fever was always a possibility, and a devastating epidemic of it must inevitably be reckoned with every few years. It seems to be a law of social life that an epidemic, or the probability of it, engenders a recklessness of life and a low condition of morals and public order. Memphis existed, so to speak, on the edge of a volcano, and it cannot be denied that it had a reputation for violence and disorder. While little or nothing was done to make the city clean and habitable, or to beautify it, law was weak in its mobile, excitable population, and differences of opinion were settled by the revolver. In spite of these disadvantages, the profits of trade were so great there that its population of twenty thousand at the close of the war had doubled by 1878. In that year the yellow-fever came as an epidemic, and so increased in 1879 as nearly to depopulate the city; its population was reduced from nearly forty thousand to about fourteen thousand, two-thirds of which were negroes; its commerce was absolutely cut off, its manufactures were suspended, it was bankrupt. There is nothing more unfortunate for a State or a city than loss of financial credit. Memphis struggled in vain with its enormous debt, unable to pay it, unable to compromise it.
Under these circumstances the city resorted to a novel expedient. It surrendered its charter to the State, and ceased to exist as a municipality. The leaders of this movement gave two reasons for it, the wish not to repudiate the city debt, but to gain breathing-time, and that municipal government in this country is a failure. The Legislature erected the former Memphis into The Taxing District of Shelby County, and provided a government for it. This government consists of a Legislative Council of eight members, made up of the Board of Fire and Police Commissioners, consisting of three, and the Board of Public Works, consisting of five. These are all elected by popular vote to serve a term of four years, but the elections are held every two years, so that the council always contains members who have had experience. The Board of Fire and Police Commissioners elects a President, who is the executive officer of the Taxing District, and has the power and duties of a mayor; he has a salary of $2000, inclusive of his fees as police magistrate, and the other members of his board have salaries of $500. The members of the Board of Public Works serve without compensation. No man can be eligible to either board who has not been a resident of the district for five years. In addition there is a Board of Health, appointed by the council. This government has the ordinary powers of a city government, defined carefully in the Act, but it cannot run the city in debt, and it cannot appropriate the taxes collected except for the specific purpose named by the State Legislature, which specific appropriations are voted annually by the Legislature on the recommendation of the council. Thus the government of the city is committed to eight men, and the execution of its laws to one man, the President of the Taxing District, who has extraordinary power. The final success of this scheme will be watched with a great deal of interest by other cities. On the surface it can be seen that it depends upon securing a non-partisan council, and an honest, conscientious President of the Taxing District—that is to say, upon the choice by popular vote of the best eight men to rule the city. Up to this time, with only slight hitches, it has worked exceedingly well, as will appear in a consideration of the condition of the city. The slight hitch mentioned was that the President was accused of using temporarily the sum appropriated for one city purpose for another.
The Supreme Court of the United States decided that Memphis had not evaded its obligations by a change of name and form of government. The result was a settlement with the creditors at fifty cents on the dollar; and then the city gathered itself together for a courageous effort and a new era of prosperity. The turning-point in its career was the adoption of a system of drainage and sewerage which transformed it immediately into a fairly healthful city. With its uneven surface and abundance of water at hand, it was well adapted to the Waring system, which works to the satisfaction of all concerned, and since its introduction the inhabitants are relieved from apprehension of the return of a yellow-fever epidemic. Population and business returned with this sense of security, and there has been a change in the social atmosphere as well. In 1880 it had a population of less than 34,000; it can now truthfully claim between 75,000 and 80,000; and the business activity, the building both of fine business blocks and handsome private residences, are proportioned to the increase in inhabitants. In 1879-80 the receipt of cotton was 409,809 bales, valued at $23,752,529; in 1886-87, 603,277 bales, valued at $30,099,510. The estimate of the Board of Trade for 1888, judging from the first months of the year, is 700,000 bales. I notice in the comparative statement of leading articles of commerce and consumption an exceedingly large increase in 1887 over 1886. The banking capital in 1887 was $3,300,000—an increase of $1,560,000 over 1886. The clearings were $101,177,377 in 1877, against $82,642,192 in 1880.