Tibbits of Rensselaer, and ex-Governor Martin Van Buren, made strong speeches in favor of it. Mr. Van Buren on that occasion discussed the various provisions of the bill and among other things said: "Lay out of view all the accidental resources, and the revenue from the canal, and in completing the work you will only entail upon the State a debt, the interest of which will amount to but about $300,000. . . . The tax would not amount to more than one mill on the dollar, unless the report of commissioners is a tissue of fraud or misrepresentation, this tax will be sufficient, and more than sufficient, to complete the canal." Mr. Van Buren contended that the duties upon salt, and the auction duties, were a certain source of revenue, and that these two sources of revenue would be abundant, and more than abundant, forever to discharge the interest of the debt to be created. "Ought we," he asked, "under such circumstances, to reject this bill? No, sir; for one I am willing to go to the length contemplated by the bill. The canal is to promote the interest and character of the State in a thousand ways." He considered it "the most important vote" he ever gave in his life-"but the project, if executed, would raise the State to the highest possible pitch of fame and grandeur." When he took his seat he was warmly congratulated by Mr. Clinton upon his exertions "in the most flattering terms." On the final passage of the bill and amendments in the Senate, on April 15, 1817, five or six senators from the Southern district voted against its final passage, and one senator from that district is not recorded. After the passage of the bill in the Senate, it was returned to the Assembly, where some of the Senate amendments were concurred in and others rejected; and on April 15, 1817, it was sent to the Council of Revision and became on that day chapter 262 of the Laws of 1817. The solid opposition of the Southern district in the Senate, including the counties now comprising greater New York, as well as the opposition from the same counties in the Assembly, was annoying to Mr. Clinton who frequently commented upon that opposition from a territory to be most largely benefited, and may perhaps be a surprise to New Yorkers of to-day who are now among the strongest and most potential advocates of canal construction. IX. THE CONSTRUCTION PERIOD. By an act passed on April 12, 1820, entitled "An act concerning the Erie and Champlain Canals," the commissioners of the canal fund were authorized to borrow on the credit of the State, money sufficient to pay the damages sustained by the Western Inland Lock Navigation Company. On June 24, 1820, the Commissioners to estimate the damage sustained by the Western Inland Lock Navigation Company made their report to the Supreme Court awarding damages to the stockholders of that Company, whose holdings of stock aggregated $140,000, in the sum of $91,616, and for the use of the People of the State, proprietors of stock amounting to $92,000, the sum of $60,204.80. These awards were approved by the Justices of the Supreme Court on August 11, 1820, and the amount going to individual stockholders paid on October 2, 1820.1 Still on January 12, 1821, the Comptroller reported to the Legislature that the amount paid to extinguish the rights of the Western Inland Lock Navigation Company was $152,718.52.2 This latter sum may have included interest on shares owned by the People of the State. For the purpose of raising revenue to pay the cost of such works the act further provided for the imposition of a duty or tax of twelve and a half cents per bushel upon salt manufactured in the county of Onondaga and the Western District of the State, a tax of one dollar upon each steamboat passenger for each and every trip or voyage such passenger might be conveyed upon the Hudson river on board of any steamboat over one hundred miles; and half that sum for any distance less than one hundred miles and over thirty miles; that the proceeds of all lotteries, which should 1. I "Laws of the State of New York in relation to the Erie and Champlain canals . . ." [Albany, 1825], 502-506. be drawn in this State, after the sums theretofore granted upon them, should be paid; all the net proceeds from the Western Inland Lock Navigation Company and of said canals, including all grants and donations made for the purpose of making such canals; and all the duties upon sales at auction, after deducting certain appropriations therefrom made annually for certain enumerated, charitable purposes, should be applied to the canal fund. It also provided that the commissioners should raise the sum of $250,000 by causing to be assessed and levied in such manner as the commissioners might determine and direct said sum, upon the lands and real estate lying along the route of said canals and within twenty-five miles of them, apportioning such tax on the land adjacent to the canals in such proportion for each as the commissioners should determine, with power to enforce the collection thereof; the assessment to be made on such lands according to the benefit conferred, subject, however, to rules and regulations to be approved by the Chancellor and judges of the Supreme Court. This provision, however, was suspended by the terms of section 5 of an act entitled "An Act concerning the Great Western and Northern canals" passed on April 7, 1819, until the further order of the Legislature. A somewhat similar assessment on lands assumed to be benefited was recommended in the report of the Committee on Canals, appointed by Governor Theodore Roosevelt in 1899, in which they say: . . . while the canals have benefited the entire State, and every part of it, yet in those counties lying remote from the water routes the benefit has been less evident than in those adjacent to these routes. It has, therefore, seemed to us that it would be equitable that the expenses of completing the enlargement of the water routes should be borne by those counties through which these waters pass, instead of being paid by the entire State, as has been usually the custom hitherto."1 At that time I was chairman of the Canal Committee of the Assembly, and considered such proposed assessment to defray the cost of canal enlargement to be in violation of 1. See Report of Committee on Canals of New York, 1900, pp. 32, 33. the provisions of Section 4 of Article VII. of the Constitution. Accordingly I submitted the matter to the AttorneyGeneral for his opinion and he so decided.1 No such constitutional provision, however, limited the powers of the Legislature in 1817 and it proceeded to make such provision for raising revenues as appeared expedient to the Legislature and people of that day. The fiscal problems involved were quite as serious as the engineering problems. It required more foresight at that time, when the State, for the most part, was unsettled, its revenues uncertain and its resources unknown, to finance such a vast undertaking and more courage to carry it to execution than are now required to finance and build new barge canals. The framers of the Canal Law of 1817, however, "Builded better than they knew" as may be seen from the results of the operation of the fiscal provisions of that statute. On March 30, 1820, the steamboat tax imposed by the act of April 15, 1817, was suspended, and in lieu thereof a tax of $5,000 was imposed upon the North River Steamboat Company. By the latter act the sum of $25,000 was appropriated for the improvement of the Oswego river, under the direction of the Canal Commissioners.2 There was derived from the steamboat passenger tax to the time of its abolition in 1823 the aggregate sum of $73,509.99; from the auction tax or vendue duty to 1836, when it was discontinued, the aggregate sum of $3,592,039.05; and from the duty or tax on salt to 1836, when it ceased to be so applied, the aggregate sum of $2,055,458.06. From these three sources were realized $5,721,007.88, whereas the aggregate cost of the original Erie, Champlain and Oswego canals was only $8,630,237. The proceeds of lotteries were absorbed in appropriations amounting to $715,543, theretofore made to academies, colleges and other institutions, or for other purposes, so that nothing was realized from that source before I. See Report of the Attorney General for 1900, pp. 145-172. 2. lotteries were prohibited by Sec. II of Article 7 of the Constitution of 1821. In a report presented to the Legislature under date of January 31, 1818, the Canal Commissioners gave an account of their transactions after the enactment of the canal law of 1817. The first work decided upon was the construction of that portion of the canal from Rome to Utica, as that summit "would command, at all times, an inexhaustible supply of water, embracing the Oriskany creek, the Mohawk river, Wood creek, and the more numerous and copious streams west of Wood creek, which cross the line of the canal, and discharge themselves into Oneida lake. . . .”1 The first contract was dated June 27, 1817, and the work was commenced at Rome, the site of Ft. Stanwix, which had played an important part in the commercial history of the territory, on the 4th day of July, 1817. The people of the village arranged to celebrate Independence Day and the commencement of the excavation for the Erie Canal with proper ceremonies. They assembled at sunrise and were addressed by Judge Joshua Hathaway, president of the village, who introduced Col. Samuel Young, one of the canal commissioners, who spoke as follows: "Fellow-citizens: We have assembled to commence the excavation of the Erie canal. The work when accomplished will connect our western inland seas with the Atlantic ocean. It will diffuse the benefits of internal navigation over a surface of vast extent, blessed with a salubrious climate and luxuriant soil, embracing a tract of country capable of sustaining more human beings than were ever accommodated by any work of the kind. "By this great highway, unborn millions will easily transport their surplus productions to the shores of the Atlantic, procure their supplies, and hold a useful and profitable intercourse with all the maritime nations of the earth. "The expense and labor of this great undertaking, bear no proportion to its utility. Nature has kindly afforded every facility; we have all the moral and physical means within our reach and control. Let us then proceed to the work, animated by the prospect of its speedy accomplishment, and cheered with the anticipated benedictions of a grateful posterity." |