RIVERS AND HARBORS TUESDAY, MAY 6, 1930 UNITED STATES SENATE, The committee met, pursuant to adjournment, at 10 o'clock a. m., Hon. Hiram W. Johnson presiding. Present: Senators Johnson (chairman), Jones, McNary, Gould, Nye, Vandenberg, Deneen, Ransdell, Simmons, Stephens, Harris, Copeland, and Brock. The CHAIRMAN. The committee will now be in order. We are met this morning for the purpose of hearing citizens from the upper Mississippi concerning the items in the river and harbor bill in which they are interested, and we are ready to hear any of those present who desire to be heard. Senator Shipstead, you appear in their behalf? STATEMENT OF HON. THOMAS D. SCHALL, A SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF MINNESOTA Senator SCHALL. The only objection to my amendment to the present rivers and harbors bill seems to be because of the amount of money to complete the 9-foot channel to Minenapolis, which is estimated at $98,000,000. This amount of money need not be authorized now. I suggest that definite authorization be made of the 9-foot channel to Minenapolis with the authorization of appropriation in this bill of $15,000,000. This authorization, with this small appropriation would definitely decide that the 9-foot channel is a reality and not a campaign promise. The President promised my people that this 9-foot channel would be completed in five years. Minneapolis has spent over a million dollars in terminals and wants to put more into these terminals. If definite authorization with an appropriation were made, these improvements could be carried on all along the river. It is vital that this present rivers and harbors bill include my amendment. If it is not done, two, three, or even five years may elapse before such action is taken. The years glide by swiftly. The demands for increased transportation facilities grow with each passing year. No longer is waterway legislation to be rated pork barrel or sectional; in our rapidly changing economic situation, waterways are a national asset. The problem of transportation touches every one of our citizens in every part of the country. Cheaper transportation would solve one harassing angle of our farm difficulty. The 9-foot channel is. immediate farm relief and to the millions of people of the Northwest it spells economic salvation. It is only just that the 9-foot channel should be given to the Northwest. Eastern industry and eastern capital have too long kept us in tow. The construction of the 9-foot channel will liberate us. It will foster necessary industry here. It We of the Northwest have been a landlocked interior, for all of our mighty Lake frontage and enormous river system. It is we who have suffered most from the Panama Canal; the other sections reaped the advantage in cheap transportation of intercoastal trade products. With the deepening of the channel, we can share in these benefits. It would mean that 2,000-ton barges carrying 40 carloads of material would link us with the ocean ports of the world. would make us independent of the East and would permit us to have industries which now practically are excluded by prohibitive transportation rates. It would save 14 or 15 cents a bushel on wheat alone, and other farm products in proportion. It would return even on a $98,000,000 investment, which I do not believe it will cost, 20 per cent. It is a sound investment. As vital as this project is to the Northwest's welfare we must demand that we get it, and the relief it will provide from discriminatory rate before we consent to large expenditures being made to build the Nicaragua Canal. It will mean security and future prosperity to us to be on a waterway which can transport grain to the markets of the world from our very doorstep and in return supply us with our freight needs. Opposition will be unthinkable when each and all realize the benefits. The preliminary report of the Chief of Engineers recognizes the necessity of this work. President Hoover is committed to it. At one sweep the western and northwestern products would be moved 1,500 miles nearer their markets, and the discrepancy between western and eastern industry would be removed. The growing rift between the East and the West due to the clash and cleavage of trade interests will heal, which never can be until the East has vision enough to see that this should be done and turn in and help. Provisions must be made for this appropriation. There need be no set policy laid down. It is said the completed project will cost. $98,000,000. Even if we can secure but fifteen million a year, we should make the beginning-get started. There would be a return of $30,000,000 savings to our people in freight rates. Where can you get a better return on an investment? The Mississippi deepening is an integral part of the Ohio project, the Missouri project, and the Great Lakes project. The Chief of Engineers in his report on the bill says: The upper Mississippi Valley is a great inland domain, as large as the European nations of Germany, France, Italy, and Great Britain combined. This area annually produces over a billion bushels of grain and exports nearly 100,000,000 bushels, almost entirely through one market. In this monopolization the grain producer has had little choice but to sell at one price to the one market. There exists no actual competition between the great grain markets of Minneapolis and Duluth, for the transportation rates of overland rail routes compared to rates on the Lakes prevent such competition. Without this competition the full benefits of low transportation costs on the Lakes are not re flected in an increased return to the producer. Originally the expansion was a westward one, a transcontinental one, with the result that transportation facilities in a north and south direction are limited to branch and spur lines and a very few trunk lines. The Missouri and Mississippi Rivers pursue ́a north and south course through most of this territory, but they are not at present in a condition to handle bulk products cheaply. In the rapidity of its expansion the country could not pause to modernize them. Now the cheaper transportation is being sought by a combination of rail lines and improved rivers. Rail lines in this region are conveniently situated to act as feeders to an improved trunk water route if such is provided. The construction of the Panama Canal reduced the cost of transportation from coast to coast. The intercoastal water rate now is less than the rate by rail from the central United States to any seaport. This virtual increase of the distance from the farm to seaports is further aggravated by the recent rapid increase in rail rates. Should the Mississippi be developed to the proportions of a trunk stream throughout, it would tend to equalize the competition between our inland States and the agricultural regions of other countries more advantageously located near the oceans. I hope the committee will see its way clear to put in the bill my amendment to give us a definite authorization that the Northwest may know what to plan on and what to do. If the committee believe that the Treasury is unable to stand authorization of the entire amount of money to complete this job, then give us a small appropriation of $15,000,000 or even $10,000,000 that we may know that we haven't been hoaxed and that large investments made upon promises are not thrown away. STATEMENT OF HON. HENRIK SHIPSTEAD, SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF MINNESOTA Senator SHIPSTEAD. Mr. Chairman, in order to save the time of the committee, I am not going to make any statement, because there are men here from the upper Mississippi Valley who are experts and who have valuable information to impart, and who will be able to cover the subject fully. So, I am not going to ask the committee to indulge me for the purpose of making an extended statement. Colonel Lambert, of St. Paul, is chairman of the Upper Mississippi and St. Croix River Improvement Commission of Minnestota, is at the head of the delegation here present, and I am going to ask him to introduce the witnesses to the committee. Mr. Lachlan Macleay is here as well. He is secretary of the Mississippi Valley Association and the chairman of the Mississippi Shippers' Association, and they will get together and handle these witnesses for the two organizations. That will save the time of the committee, and I am sure they will arrange to distribute the time in such a manner that your time will not be wasted; and I am sure the committee will give that consideration to their statements to which the delegation is entitled. Mr. LAMBERT. Mr. Chairman, I would like to call on Mr. Lachlan Macleay for a statement. Mr. Macleay is secretary of the Mississippi Shippers' Association. The CHAIRMAN. May I say to you, Colonel, and the other witnesses before we begin our proceeding, that the committee has set aside this morning until the bell rings for 12 o'clock for the purpose of affording you the opportunity of presenting your views upon the disputed matters in the bill in which you are interested. We would be very glad to have you select the witnesses as you see fit, parcel the time as you desire, but we must conclude, I am sorry to say, because of the limitations of time upon us, with the hearing upon the matter this morning. Now, in order that the record may show the fact, will you state your name, residence, and occupation? STATEMENT OF LACHLAN MACLEAY, SECRETARY MISSISSIPPI VALLEY ASSOCIATION, ST. LOUIS, MO. Mr. MACLEAY. The Mississippi Valley Association is a voluntary organization not formed for profit. It represents approximately 400 chambers of commerce, boards of trade, industrial and agricultural organizations in the Mississippi Valley, of 25 States between the Canadian border and the Gulf of Mexico, the Allegheny Mountains, and the Rocky Mountains. The predominant purpose of the Mississippi Valley Association is to get our great inland system of waterways to work, to secure cheap transportation for the interior of our country, especially through a combination of rail and river systems and combinations of rail and water rates. The present tendency of rail rates to us appears to be high. We see the railroads constantly going before the Interstate Commerce Commission seeking high adjustments, and we are 800 miles from the seaboard. We have to meet the competition of industry and agriculture located very much closer to the seaboard from Europe and from the east and west coasts of our own country. We see in this great inland-waterway system, the Mississippi Valley waterway system, our only possible recourse, the only possible opportunity we have for lower-cost transportation, which is absolutely vital to our economic welfare. We look upon the Mississippi River as one great transportation system, that is, the Mississippi, Ohio, Missouri, upper Mississippi, and the Illinois-all of these rivers make one great transportation system. There are approximately 7,000 miles of main trunk line channels that serve the heaviest tonnage-producing area of the United States. We are on record time and time again, through the action of our annual meetings, through the action of our organization, in meetings of its board of directors, meetings of its membership, as being in favor of standard-gage channels throughout this great interior-waterway system. Prior to 1920 these rivers were being improved, apparently to us, in disconnected segments. There were many projects and there were many different depths, many different types of locks where locks and dams were used. When we say "standard-gage channels," we mean 9-foot channels based on the present development of the Ohio, which we believe to be the most economic that our experience has developed. We want to see standard locks, we want to see standard terminals throughout this great inland-waterway system, so that transportation can move from one end of it to the other without interference and without transferring cargo along the way. I want to introduce in the record a copy of the resolutions adopted by the Mississippi Valley Association in 1929, in which the special reference to standard channels is made. It will take just a moment to read three lines. [Reading:] The system should be standardized on a basis of a channel depth not less than 9 feet, and locks, bridges, terminals, and floating equipment should be harmonized with this view in mind and should conform to an adopted standard. That is from our resolution adopted. There is one other line, with your permission. The main lines north and south on the Mississippi River from Minneapolis to New Orleans and connecting waterways, and east and west from the upper reaches of the Ohio and its tributaries, such as the Ohio and Lake Erie Canal and the Great Kanawha and the Tennessee and Cumberland, up the Missouri to Sioux City and to a point as far north as a satisfactory channel can be secured, the intracoastal canal from New Orleans to Corpus Christi, Tex., and Alabama-Coosa, the Arkansas River, and Red River are vital points and main arteries of this system that should be improved with the least possible delay. I offer that for the record. That is the action of our convention held in St. Louis last November, at which there were 600 in attend ance. Senator SIMMONS. Do you mean by "standards" that the water shall be only 9 feet or that it shall afford a depth sufficient to float a boat drawing 9 feet? Mr. MACLEAY. It should have a minimum depth of 9 feet. Mr. MACLEAY. That is the depth of the Ohio River system, the project depth, water depth of 9 feet, which will permit the use of a barge drawing 8 feet. That is the present economic standard that has been developed, apparently, in the Mississippi Valley, and which our people believe, so far as our experience has taught us, is the best for this particular system. Senator SIMMONS. That is the standard depth of the Mississippi? Mr. MACLEAY. That is the standard project depth. It has not been secured in all places. Senator SIMMONS. And of the Ohio? Mr. MACLEAY. And of the Ohio; that is the project there. Senator VANDENBERG. I notice that in these resolutions which you have inserted in the record you say that the diversion of water from the Great Lakes is essential. How much diversion? Mr. MACLEAY. That is a matter which, in our opinion, will have to be left to the Board of Army engineers. We are not engineers, Senator, and all we know is that the engineers inform us that there must be a certain diversion. Senator VANDENBERG. What do they inform you? Mr. MACLEAY. Various figures. We have had figures given us of 1.000 cubic second-feet up to 7,500. We are not attempting to state the amount. Senator VANDENBERG. A thousand cubic second-feet would be the lowest diversion. Mr. MACLEAY. Yes, sir; and 7,500 to 8,000 has been the highest that has been given. We have not any idea where in that range of figures the proper amount can be found; that is entirely up to the Board of Army Engineers or any engineers directed by Congress to study this problem. |