| THE STATE IN THE MARYLAND ECONOMY, 1776-1807 127
to be slow, inefficient, and expensive. What opposition there
was to private toll roads came from those who objected to a
governmental function being given to a private organization,
or those who objected to paying tolls for the use of " pub-
lic roads," or those who had had land-taken for road beds or
had been left out by the route chosen .11711
But during the 'nineties the ever greater foreign demand
for American foodstuffs-many cumbersome to transport-ne-
cessitated better roads to the West. The preamble to the incor-
poration of the Reisterstown - turnpike acknowledged this as
the reason for the act;
the great quantity of heavy articles which are daily transported be-
tween the city of Baltimore and the western counties of . . . Mary-
land and Pennsylvania, requires an amendment of the highways
which can only be effected by artificial beds of stone and gravel
. . . [to] be undertaken by an association of citizens, if proper en-
couragement be given by the legislature.i7T
The merchants of the eastern cities used the corporate road
company as a new instrument in the struggle for control of
western trade."" Baltimore became the hub of the principal
turnpike routes of the state.
It was only liberal concessions by state legislatures to turn-
pike companies which made turnpiking as attractive an invest-
ment as shipping or banking. Among those concessions gener-
ally given by most states were privileges in perpetuity or for a
period of years, monopoly of route, building on already cleared
road-beds, the power of eminent domain, fines for persons by-
passing toll gates or damaging company property, and liberal
time limits, with extentions, for beginning and completing the
roads I'9 Few states, except Pennsylvania, subscribed to turn-
pike stock as a means of direct aid to the companies. Not un-
til 1808 did Maryland subscribe to any turnpike stock ;e0
'°° Ibid., II, 216, 310, Joseph A. Durrenberger, Turnpikes: A Study of the
Toll
Road Movement in the Middle Atlantic States and Maryland, (Valdosta, Ga.,
1931) p. 81.
177 Md. Sess, 1797 c. 70.
178 Durrenberger, p. 46.
179Ibid., pp. 76-81.
's°Ibid., pp. 55, 98. In that year Maryland subscribed to $10,000 worth of
stock of the Frederick Turnpike and $5,000 worth of stock of the York Turn-
pike and in 1809 made an additional subscription.
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