Page:Historic highways of America (Volume 10).djvu/85

Rh through Ohio. This was, undoubtedly, mostly passenger traffic, which was very heavy at this time.

But the dawning of a new era in transportation had already been heralded in the national hall of legislation. In 1832 the House Committee on Roads and Canals had discussed in their report the question of the relative cost of various means of intercommunication, including railways. Each report of the committee for the next five years mentioned the same subject, until, in 1836, the matter of substituting a railway for the Cumberland Road between Columbus and the Mississippi was very seriously considered.

In that year a House Bill (No. 64) came back from the Senate amended in two particulars, one authorizing that the appropriations made for Illinois should be confined to grading and bridging only, and should not be construed as implying that Congress had pledged itself to macadamize the road.