water communication between the Great Lakes and the Hudson river. That committee made its report in 1874, and suggested "the enlargement and improvement, with the concurrence of the State of New York, of one or more of the three water-routes from the Lakes to New York City, namely: The Erie canal from Buffalo to Albany; the Oneida Lake canal from Oswego to Albany; or the Champlain canal from Lake Champlain to deep water on the Hudson river, including such connection as may be effected between Lake Champlain and the Saint Lawrence river with the coöperation of the British Provinces, at an estimated cost of $12,000,000."1

Applications other than the foregoing were made by the State of New York to the Federal Government at various times for Federal aid in the construction of its canal system from the Great Lakes to the seaboard, but all without avail. Canal advocates familiar with this history were strongly opposed to the Pavey resolution which had been reported favorably by the Judiciary Committee of the Senate and advanced to the order of third reading. Meetings were held in the city of New York and elsewhere in the State, at which public sentiment found expression in speech and resolution, as it did through the press, in strong opposition to the Pavey resolution. At one of these midday meetings held under the auspices of the Merchants' Association of New York, at No. 346 Broadway, March 26, 1898, representing 160 different lines of trade and industry and several hundred business firms in the city and State of New York, William F. King, President of the Merchants' Association, Senator Jacob A. Cantor, of New York, and myself, then a member of Assembly, spoke at length against transferring the control of the canal system of the State to the Federal Government and in favor of a passage of the seven million dollar appropriation bill, known as the Cantor-Hill bill, which preserved to the State its canal properties esti

1. See U. S. Senate reports on transportation routes to the seaboard, 43d Cong. 1st sess., vol. 3, An outline of other surveys made by the United States between 1895 and 1900 may be found in the report of Edward A. Bond, N. Y. State Engineer and Surveyor in 1901, pp. 670, 976, 978.

mated to exceed a hundred million dollars in value, and which was then considered a sufficient additional appropriation to complete the improvement already undertaken.

Resolutions poured into the Legislature from various parts of the State of the following tenor: "The Pavey resolution either gives away the canals or deprives them of all support for several years; the Cantor-Hill resolution submits to the people whether they will keep and improve the canals at a cost of seven million dollars." The protests were so strong that when the Pavey resolution came on for final action in the Senate on March 29th, it received but 16 affirmative votes and there were 32 votes against it, eight senators who voted on the preceding Friday to advance the resolution having changed to the negative on its final passage.

All prior appeals to the Federal Government for appropriations in aid of the construction, maintenance or operation of a canal system in this State having met with failure, the Pavey resolution was interpreted as another effort to delay if not wholly defeat further canal improvement in this State.

XX. NEW YORK'S DECLINE OF COMMERCE, AND ITS

REMEDY.

In his annual message to the Legislature of 1898, Governor Frank S. Black said:

"No man can contemplate the past history of New York without feelings of pride. Surrounded at the beginning, like her sister commonwealths, with conditions which seemed almost without hope, she has in a few years attained dimensions of an empire. This transformation has been wrought through the unexampled gifts of nature and the industry and skill of the citizens, protected by a wise and just government. If these reflections inspire pride only, without determination, their main value is lost. An inspiration that produces no results is no better than an agreeable recollection. There must be some practical test to the effect of former achievements upon our present energy. This test will be found in the manner in which the people of this State deal with the subject of their commerce in its present situation. That situation is not as it ought to be; easily the best in the country, it is not so much the best as it has been and can

be made. The commerce of New York is not increasing as rapidly as that of other ports. . . . It is said that the commerce tributary to New York has been checked and discouraged by a too narrow policy prevailing there with reference to terminal facilities. In order that this subject may be treated with that consideration and care which its magnitude demands, I recommend that a commission be created to examine into the commerce of New York, the cause of its decline and the means of its revival, and report conclusions."

Governor Black on this and other occasions, manifested a deep interest in the commercial development of the State and city of New York, and in his annual messages took occasion to urge the prosecution of canal improvement under the nine million dollar act, and was disappointed that the appropriation was inadequate to complete the work, which had been authorized.

In accordance with his recommendation, the Legislature of 1898, enacted Chapter 644 of the Laws of that year, authorizing the appointment of a commission to investigate into the causes of the decline of the commerce of New York. The Governor appointed as members of that commission exMayor Charles A. Shieren of Brooklyn, Andrew H. Green, C. C. Shayne, Hugh Kelley and Alexander R. Smith. The life of the commission was extended another year by Chapter 494 of the Laws of 1899. The commission was well constituted and made an exhaustive investigation into the various questions relating to the commerce of the port and State of New York, and its report, filling two large volumes, was submitted by Governor Theodore Roosevelt to the Legislature on January 25, 1900. Ex-Mayor Shieren had long been identified with the commercial interests of New York, and Alexander R. Smith had written extensively and was a recognized authority on all commercial questions. Their report summarizes a few of the principal canal measures and transportation over the canals of the State for the purpose of showing the effect of the interior water-borne tonnage upon the commerce of New York. In the report of this commission may be found the conclusion reached by the Inter-state Commerce Commission in the case of the

New York Produce Exchange vs. the Grand Trunk Railway, involving railroad discrimination against New York, wherein they say: "The great supremacy of New York in the past has been measurably due to its canals. If it would hold that supremacy in the future, it must give attention to that same waterway. . . If the canal were to be restored today to the same position in its carrying trade that it has occupied in the 20 years past, the commerce of the port of New York could not suffer." The commerce commission attributed the decline of New York's commerce to various causes and made several recommendations, among which were the abolition of differential agreements, the adequate improvement of the Erie canal, and the creation of proper terminal facilities in New York and Buffalo.

It was during the legislative session of 1898 that bills were proposed authorizing the appointment of the Canal Investigating Commission, which consisted of Hon. George Clinton, Franklin Edson, Smith M. Weed, Edwin R. James, Frank Brainard, A. Foster Higgins and William McEchron. The discussion that arose over the passage of those bills in the Senate and Assembly was not only spirited, but assumed political aspects that tended to divide canal advocates along lines which had theretofore and thereafter largely been obliterated whenever canal measures were under consideration.

There were those who asserted that the powers of the commission were so restricted that a thorough investigation could not be made into the alleged frauds committed under the nine million dollar referendum measure, and that the bills authorizing the appointment of the commission were purposely so framed as to make it impossible for the commissioners to go forward in a thorough manner.

To the various objections raised to the bill answer was made by Speaker S. Frederick Nixon and others, in effect that ample powers were conferred upon the commissioners to conduct a thorough and exhaustive investigation into all work done under the referendum measure of 1895, and that

I. Students of transportation problems in this State will find the report of the N. Y. Commerce Commission a valuable medium of information from authentic sources.

there were parliamentary precedents for the form of the bill under consideration. In the course of the debate on this measure in the Assembly on January 26, 1898, the Speaker, the Hon. S. Frederick Nixon, said:

"I trust that I may be pardoned for reviewing to some extent the history of the canal legislation during the past three or four years. Some of the older members of this House will recall when in 1894, there was introduced in the lower branch of the Legislature a bill providing for the submission to the people of a proposition for the expenditure of twelve millions of dollars, upon the canals of this State, which was defeated. Shortly after the adjournment of the Legislature there convened in this House the Constitutional Convention of 1894. The canal proposition was presented at that time. In the discussion upon this proposition requests were made of the various public officials to give to the Constitutional Convention estimates as to the cost of this work. . . . The Superintendent of Public Works who at that time had the assistance of Mr. Martin Schenck, who was formerly State Engineer and Surveyor, and who assisted him in compiling the data, reported that no reliable information existed either in his department or that of the State Engineer and Surveyor, through which anything like a close approximation might be made. From such data as was available he estimated the cost of carrying out the Seymour plan, which contemplated the deepening of the prism one foot and raising the banks one foot, so as to secure two additional feet of water, at between nine and ten millions of dollars; and the additional cost of the substitution of vertical for sloping walls, at $40,000 per mile, besides the cost of engineering, as there were 250 miles of such walls on each side to be reconstructed, the aggregate cost for that was estimated at ten millions of dollars. . . . The State Engineer reported that there was not sufficient data in his office from which to make an estimate that could be relied upon, and after going over the figures of his predecessor, he reported to the Superintendent of Public Works that it would involve an expenditure of between eleven and twelve millions of dollars. . . . This proposition was submitted to the people, and the constitutional amendment carried at the next election. The Legislature in 1895, pursuant to the Constitutional amendment, submitted to the voters of this State an act which provided for the appropriation of nine millions of dollars to carry on such canal improvement; and I desire to say in this connection that the question of the form of the improvement and the appropriations neces