INLAND NAVIGATION

The Congress in its last session authorized the general improvements necessary to provide the Mississippi waterway system with better transportation.  Stabilization of the levels of the Great Lakes and their opening to the sea by an effective shipway remain to be considered.  Since the last session the Board of Engineers of the War Department has made a report on the proposal for a canal through the State of New York, and the Joint Board of Engineers, representing Canada and the United States, has finished a report on the St. Lawrence River.  Both of these boards conclude that the St. Lawrence project is cheaper, affords a more expeditious method of placing western products in European markets, and will cost less to operate.  The State Department has requested the Canadian Government to negotiate treaties necessary to provide for this improvement.  It will also be necessary to secure an agreement with Canada to put in works necessary to prevent fluctuation in the levels of the Great Lakes.

Legislation is desirable for the construction of a dam at Boulder Canyon on the Colorado River, primarily as a method of flood control and irrigation.  A secondary result would be a considerable power development and a source of domestic water supply for southern California.  Flood control is clearly a national problem, and water supply is a Government problem, but every other possibility should be exhausted before the Federal Government becomes engaged in the power business.  The States which are interested ought to reach mutual agreement.  This project is in reality their work.  If they wish the Federal Government to undertake it, they should not hesitate to make the necessary concessions to each other.  This subject is fully discussed in the annual report of the Secretary of the Interior.  The Columbia River Basin project is being studied and will be one to be considered at some future time.

The Inland Waterways Corporation is proving successful and especially beneficial to agriculture.  A survey is being made to determine its future needs.  It has never been contemplated that if inland rivers were opened to navigation it would then be necessary for the Federal Government to provide the navigation.  Such a request is very nearly the equivalent of a declaration that their navigation is not profitable, that the commodities which they are to carry can be taken at a cheaper rate by some other method, in which case the hundreds of millions of dollars proposed to be expended for opening rivers to navigation would be not only wasted, but would entail further constant expenditures to carry the commodities of private persons for less than cost.