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General BROWN. I want to get it in my hands so I can examine it critically.

Senator VANDENBERG. Is that ordinarily the engineering procedure to get the facts afterwards?

General BROWN. Oh, no. We are not getting the facts; the facts on which our recommendation for action is based we have already got.

Senator VANDENBERG. Those facts include serious adverse reports by your own department?

General BROWN. No; that is not true. The facts are what they are. As to adverse finding of the officers in my department, they can stand on them for what they are worth. But I can take them as I see fit.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Dempsey, of the House committee, has asked that he might be accorded the privilege of about 20 minutes in behalf of this particular item. If there is no objection and no further questions to be asked the General, we will accord Mr. Dempsey the right of such presentation as he desires. If you will proceed, Mr. Dempsey STATEMENT OF HON. S. WALLACE DEMPSEY, REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK

Representative DEMPSEY. The first natural question, it seems to me with regard to this project is this: Who are supporting it and who are opposing it? We first go away out into the country, into the wheat district, and we find that the Missouri River Association appeared through its secretary and advocated the taking over of this canal on this basis: That we raised 800,000,000 bushels of wheat in this country, in 1928, and that is a fair average; that we export 200,000,000 bushels, and that we consume a large part, over 80 per cent, of the remaining 600,000,000 in the territory that will be served by this canal. In other words, he said all that wheat was sold east of the east Indiana line and north of the Ohio and north of the Potomac and in the territory served by the Erie Canal; and he said for that reason the Missouri River Association, with the great farming country which it embraces, was very earnestly in favor of this project.

Next we come

Senator VANDENBERG. May I interrupt as you proceed?

Representative DEMPSEY. Yes; interrupt me at any point you

want.

Senator VANDENBERG. How much wheat or wheat flour is now carried on the Erie Canal?

Representative DEMPSEY. The wheat and wheat flour is carried there in very large quantities-in 1928 there was carried 1,200,000 tons of grain-but the Senator knows perfectly that we are not talking about the Erie Canal as of to-day. It is carried at 6 cents a bushel-it is carried at $2 a ton, which is at a very low rate. But he knows with the improvement we will carry it so as to beat any transportation facility to the eastward.

Senator VANDENBERG. I am not purely in your statement of fact. Representative DEMPSEY. That is statement of fact.

Senator VANDENBERG. You say that large quantities of wheat and wheat flour are now carried on the canal.

111747-30-PT 1-6

Representative DEMPSEY. I can not give you exact figures, but I can say there are 3,000,000 tons of traffic carried, and that is an increase of 117 per cent in the last two years.

Senator VANDENBERG. I understand there was not a barrel of flour moved over the canal in the years 1924, 1925, 1926, or 1927. Representative DEMPSEY. You are talking about flour; I am talking about flour and wheat. I asked you

Senator VANDENBERG. I am talking about flour.

about flour.

Representative DEMPSEY. You asked about wheat. I can not tell you about flour.

Senator VANDENBERG. How much wheat did you carry?

Representative DEMPSEY. There were 1,200,000 carried in 1928. Senator VANDENBERG. All right.

Representative DEMPSEY. And I do say that a man who makes such a statement as Mr. Miller, the secretary of the Missouri association, does that is his business and nothing else is in at least as advantageous a position as any of us, either the committee here in the Senate or in the House, to vouchsafe an opinion as to what the canal would carry in the future for the benefit of the Missouri River States.

Senator SIMMONS. Mr. Dempsey, is that wheat or flour, one or the other? Representative DEMPSEY. Yes.

Senator SIMMONS. It had to go to these eastern cities, did it not? Representative DEMPSEY. Yes.

Senator SIMMONS. If it did not go by water, it went by rail; and if it went by rail it had to pay a higher than the water rate?

Representative DEMPSEY. Considerably higher than the water rate; for instance, in talking about the worth of the Erie Canal, a great business body met in New York within the last two weeks, and they said that the savings of the Erie Canal-that the savings which had been made possible by the fact that rail rates were lower than if the canal were not there were $54,000,000 a year. That is the statement of a responsible body; that without its carrying a ton of freight, just by the difference in freight rates, made necessary because the canal was there, the saving which accrues by reason of the existence of the Erie Canal, is $52,000,000 yearly.

Senator SIMMONS. Just one question. Suppose it went by water now, what would be the size of the boat as it left the Missouri River? Representative DEMPSEY. To-day?

Senator SIMMONS. Yes; what would it be, a barge or what?

Representative DEMPSEY. It would be a barge, and of course it would have to be 9-foot barge, and it would carry probably 1,200 tons, and with the increased capacity to 13 feet 6 inches it would carry 3,000 tons.

Senator SIMMONS. If it went over water until it reached the Erie Canal and when it got to the Erie Canal it had to pay the rates charged by the State of New York?

Representative DEMPSEY. That is right.

Senator SIMMONS. What you want is the right to load your wheat in a barge at the Missouri River and deliver it in New York by the same line?

Representative DEMPSEY. Yes.

Senator SIMMONS. And by a standard rate of freight?

Representative DEMPSEY. That is exactly it, by a through bill of

ading.

Senator VANDENBERG. Before you leave this point, I want to read you what Colonel Green of your own State has said:

That it has not been proved to my satisfaction that depressed rail rates saved $50,000,000 annually.

Are you familiar with that?

Representative DEMPSEY. I did not say that everyone in the State of New York agreed with that conclusion, but I did say that a responsible body which has investigated the subject made that statement, and I did not say that they had taken the proof to Colonel Green. That may not have been done. I suppose they are perfectly willing to prove it to Colonel Green at any time he wants to come to them.

Now, let us come to the second supporter of this project. It is the Mississippi Valley Association. I think every man here knows what it is, and I am going to send each member of this committee a copy of the April bulletin of the Mississippi Valley Association containing two long articles advocating this improvement, the taking over of these canals.

The next is the Lake Carriers' Association, carrying freight from Duluth down through Ohio and Michigan to the seaboard, and they have written a long and very earnest letter, and I am going to put that in the files, supporting this movement.

Senator VANDENBERG. They have always opposed the St. Lawrence waterway, have they not?

Representative DEMPSEY. I do not know as to that. I do not see any reason why they should. There is no reason why they should. Nor can I see that there is the slightest connection between their action at the present time and their action, if they have taken action, with regard to the St. Lawrence waterway, which I do not know.

Let us take the next body. The next body is the Merchant Marine Association, which at their last annual conference here last week adopted unanimously a resolution indorsing this project.

Let us take the next one. We come now to the Michigan Manufacturer and Financial Record, issued in Detroit on the 26th day of April, and their leading editorial is headed "A Mistaken Friendship"; and in it they advocate in the strongest terms possible this project, and say it is "a mistaken friendship" and a great mistake to oppose the taking over of these canals.

Next we come to an article from the Grand Rapids (Mich.) Herald, of Tuesday, April 8, 1930, a paper, as I understand it, of which the Senator from Michigan was formerly a part owner, which advocates this canal if it is not proposed to block or hinder the St. Lawrence Canal-that all in all it is a strong article and apparently it is a leading editorial, and I am filing all these for the record-advocating the adoption of this project.

Senator VANDENBERG. That is pretty big talk.

Representative DEMPSEY. Oh, no; let us submit it to the committee and let them be judge. I say it is a strong article in favor of the project.

Senator VANDENBERG. I say it is not.

Representative DEMPSEY. And I submit it to the judgment of the committee for them to determine.

The CHAIRMAN. Pardon me. Let me suggest that the reporter insert the various exhibits submitted by Congressman Dempsey immediately after the conclusion of his statement.

Representative DEMPSEY. I am now furnishing for the reporter the article from the Michigan Manufacturer and Financial Record, and I am furnishing also the article in the Grand Rapids (Mich.) Herald. I will later furnish the others: The statement of Mr. Miller, secretary of the Missouri River Association, the articles in the Mississippi Association's bulletin, and the letter from the Lake Carriers' Association, as well as the resolution of the merchant marine annual conference-all of them to-day or to-morrow.

I just start out with those as preliminary to show what the situation is.

Now, what, if any, is the opposition to this measure? It is an apprehension that it would interfere with some other waterway.

Senator VANDENBERG. Mr. Dempsey, pardon me just a moment, if you please. I do not think that the presumption should be permitted to stand that these Michigan exhibits are precisely what he has indicated them to be.

Representative DEMPSEY. They stand for themselves, Senator. I am not asking the committee to take my characterization.

Senator VANDENBERG. Just a minute. You have given a characterization.

Representative DEMPSEY. It is my honest characterization, and I believe that the committee will agree unanimously, with the possible exception of the Senator from Michigan, with me in my interpretation. Senator VANDENBERG. I want to read just one sentence.

Representative DEMPSEY. That would not be fair, would it, Senator, to read one sentence only?

Senator VANDENBERG. You have undertaken to say what it means. I read the following sentence:

We fear that the Senator's opposition will be ineffective, because the senatorial old boys who are interested in the purchase of the New York canal by the Federal Government are rather smart folks who may tell the junior Senator that he can't have any money for Monroe Harbor, or the Detroit River, or Saginaw River, or Ludington and Muskegon Harbors, or the development of the Grand River as a waterway if he gets too fussy about the purchase of the old Erie Canal.

[Laughter.]

Senator COPELAND. What does he say about sulphur on the Mississippi and the opposition of the Senator from Michigan to the completion of the canal?

Senator VANDENBERG. I understand that, and I intend to be the

same.

Representative DEMPSEY. Let us come to what the real opposition is to this project. It consists of an apprehension, apparently that these canals may interfere with some other waterway, and therefore the adoption of a necessary link in our complete waterway system is opposed. These opponents say, "We not only want this other project"-and nobody is saying to them that they shall not have it; the thing is not even under consideration. There is no such thing stated or in the air. But they say, "Because we want some other

project which we can not attain to-day, we are going to oppose a project which should be adopted to-day.'

I say that is a mistaken policy. I say you can apply that anywhere you want to in the country, and it should not have the sanction of either legislative body-that the project should be adopted if adopted on its merits, and should not be opposed because of some fear or apprehension with regard to another project.

Let us consider a few things about the Erie Canal.

Senator VANDENBERG. Pardon me, before you leave your last premise: Is it not a fact, however, that the Erie Canal project has the objection that the all-American route to the sea has always been in direct competition with the St. Lawrence project?

Representative DEMPSEY. Well, I would say this, in answer to the Senator, that that is partly true and partly is not true.

Senator VANDENBERG. It all has been true as far as your prior position is concerned, is it not?

Representative DEMPSEY. I am going to give you the details as to that. The Senator has called attention to the fact that there have been several adverse reports as to the all-American route as compared to the St. Lawrence route, which is true; and then the natural and logical sequence follows. Apparently there is nothing going to be done with the deep-water route; if anything is to be done, it is to be done with the St. Lawrence. But we have these canals, which are the best canals on the face of the globe, cost more money and have more important terminals, are of vaster importance to the commerce of the country than any other canals in the country. New York does not make a business of improving canals any more than any other State. If you get a State appropriation for an improvement it is once in a long period of years, and then you squeeze and wring out by hard effort enough to maintain the canal from year

to year.

We are supposed to have 12 navigable feet in the canals, while the total depth is 10 feet 6 inches, leaving the navigable depth about 9 feet. With an increased depth so that we have a navigable depth of 12 feet we can increase the load of the barges from 1,200 tons to 2,500 or 3,000 tons, and there will be a corresponding increase in the rate on Mississippi and Missouri Belt wheat, which is the important commodity in the interior of the country. We can load automobiles in Detroit and carry them in full vessel loads to New York, New England, and the South at a cheaper rate than you can any other way to-day.

Senator VANDENBERG. Let us get the basic question.

Representative DEMPSEY. What is the basic question?

Senator VANDENBERG. The basic question is whether there is any competition between the St. Lawrence route and the all-American route, using the Erie Canal as a basis.

Representative DEMPSEY. Well, I should say that the two routes are for quite distinct purposes. Our domestic trade is 85 per cent of our total commerce. The St. Lawrence route is so situated as not to serve our domestic commerce until you get really west of Buffalo. All of our vast territory from Buffalo east is cut off. So it does not share in the domestic commerce. It is fitted to serve our foreign commerce, and particularly our grain trade. The Erie Canal, on the contrary, as is found by this much maligned but very excellent report,

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