“In March, 1806, Congress determined to apply this two per cent. fund to the object for which it was destined, and passed ‘an act to regulate the laying out and making of a road from Cumberland, in the State of Maryland, to the State of Ohio.’ Under the provisions of this act, before the President could proceed to cut a single tree upon the route of the road, it was made necessary to obtain the consent of the States through which it passed. The Federal Government asked Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia for permission to make it, and each of them granted this privilege in the same manner that they would have done to a private individual, or to a corporation created by their own laws. Congress, at that day, asserted no other right than a mere power to appropriate the money of their constituents to the construction of this road, after the consent of these States should be obtained. The idea of a sovereign power in this government to make the road, and to exercise jurisdiction over it, for the purpose of keeping it in repair, does not, then, appear to have ever entered the imagination of the warmest advocate for Federal power. The federalism of that day would have shrunk with horror from such a spectre. There is a circumstance worthy of remark in the act of the Legislature of Pennsylvania, which was passed in April, 1807, authorizing the President of the United States to open this road. It grants this power upon condition that the road should pass through Uniontown and Washington, if practicable. The grant was accepted upon this condition, and the road was constructed. Its length is one hundred and thirty miles, and its construction and repairs have cost the United States one million seven hundred and sixty-six thousand one hundred and sixty-six dollars and thirty-eight cents; whilst the two per cent. fund which we had bound ourselves to apply to this purpose, amounted, on the 30th of June, 1822, the date of the last official statement within my knowledge, only to the sum of one hundred and eighty-seven thousand seven hundred and eighty-six dollars and thirty-one cents, less than one-ninth of the cost of the road. This road has cost the United States more than thirteen thousand five hundred dollars per mile. This extravagant expenditure shows conclusively that it is much more politic for us to enlist individual interest in the cause of Internal Improvement, by subscribing stock, than to become ourselves sole proprietors. Any government, unless under extraordinary circumstances, will pay one-third more for constructing a road or canal, than would be expended by individuals in accomplishing the same object.