From Cumberland to the western extremity of Laurel Hill, by the route now travelled, the distance is sixty-six miles, and on a straight line about fifty-five; on this part of the route, the committee suppose the first and very considerable expenditures are specially necessary. From Laurel Hill to the Ohio river, by the usual route, is about seventy miles, and on a straight line fifty-four or five; the road is tolerable, though capable of amelioration.
To carry into effect the principles arising from the foregoing facts, the committee present herewith a bill for the consideration of the Senate. They suppose that to take the proper measures for carrying into effect the section of the law respecting a road or roads to the State of Ohio, is a duty imposed upon Congress by the law itself, and that a sense of duty will always be sufficient to insure the passage of the bill now offered to the Senate. To enlarge upon the highly important considerations of cementing the union of our citizens located on the Western waters with those of the Atlantic States, would be an indelicacy offered to the understandings of the body to whom this report is addressed, as it might seem to distrust them. But from the interesting nature of the subject, the committee are induced to ask the indulgence of a single observation: Politicians have generally agreed that rivers unite the interests and promote the friendship of those who inhabit their banks; while mountains, on the contrary, tend to the disunion and estrangement of those who are separated by their intervention. In the present case, to make the crooked ways straight, and the rough ways smooth will, in effect, remove the intervening mountains, and by facilitating the intercourse of our Western brethren with those on the Atlantic, substantially unite them in interest, which, the committee believe, is the most effectual cement of union applicable to the human race.
All which is most respectfully submitted.
[CHAPTER III.]
The Act of Congress Authorizing the Laying Out and Making of the Road.
An Act to Regulate the Laying Out and Making a Road from Cumberland, in the State of Maryland, to the State of Ohio.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the President of the United States be, and he is hereby authorized to appoint, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, three discreet and disinterested citizens of the United States, to lay out a road from Cumberland, or a point on the northern bank of the river Potomac, in the State of Maryland, between Cumberland and the place where the main road leading from Gwynn’s to Winchester, in Virginia, crosses the river, to the State of Ohio; whose duty it shall be, as soon as may be, after their appointment, to repair to Cumberland aforesaid, and view the ground, from the points on the river Potomac hereinbefore designated, to the river Ohio; and to lay out in such direction as they shall judge, under all circumstances the most proper, a road from thence to the river Ohio, to strike the same at the most convenient place, between a point on its eastern bank, opposite the northern boundary of Steubenville, in said State of Ohio, and the mouth of Grave creek, which empties into the said river a little below Wheeling, in Virginia.
Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That the aforesaid road shall be laid out four rods in width, and designated on each side by a plain and distinguishable mark on a tree, or by the erection of a stake or monument sufficiently conspicuous, in every quarter of a mile of the distance at least, where the road pursues a straight course so far or farther, and on each side, at every point where an angle occurs in its course.