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Gerrit Smith Broadside and Pamphlet Collection

Niagara ship canal : letter from Gerrit Smith to Auditor Benton.

Smith, Gerrit, 1797-1874.

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Call number: Smith 535

NIAGARA SHIP CANAL.

LETTER, FROM GERRIT SMITH TO AUDITOR BENTON.

PETERBORO February 20th 1866.

Honorable N. S. DENTON,

DEAR SIR,

Your last "Annual Financial Report," like its predecessors, shows your honest and unwearied concern for the financial interests of the State.

I notice what you say in it of the proposed Niagara Ship Canal. I am neither a military man, nor possessed of military knowledge: and, therefore, it would be immodest in me to gainsay your conclusion that there is no "military necessity" for the Canal. Whether, however, there is or is not such necessity is to be decided by the wisdom of Congress: - and, hence, neither before nor after the decision, should there be any attempt by appeals to her pride or interest, or in any other wise, to commit a State against the building of the Canal for military uses.

And so, too, by reason of my ignorance in such matters I cannot affirm that the Canal will cost less than the sum you would take it to cost - $9,000,000. But whether the Government should be deterred from embarking, or aiding, in the work by any however high estimates of its cost (,this far-highest of all included) is another point for Congress to decide.

You refer to the fact, and, very evidently, in a way to alarm the owners of real-estate on the various proposed routes for the Canal, that there will be an "entering upon and taking possession of lands and waters;" and also, as evidently in a way to arouse State jealousy, you refer to the fact that Government will "exercise the right of eminent domain, and peradventure against the will of the Legislature." There must, of course, be such an "entering upon and taking possession," be the Canal built by Government or by individuals, for commercial or military purposes, or for both. But I take it for granted that what is needed for the adopted route will be fairly and fully paid for before "taking Possession ." And, as to "the right of eminent domain" - not only does the Constitution grant it in such cases; but it would belong to Government, even were it not granted by the Constitution. Government could not be Government, certainly not a National Government, if it had not this right any claim of any State, even the "Empire State," to the contrary notwithstanding.

Commercial knowledge too, as well as military, I lack. Hence it better becomes those, who are conversant with commercial affairs, than it does me, to affirm that the interests of commerce require the building of the Niagara Ship Canal. Nevertheless, taking you for authority, I should affirm it with the utmost positiveness. Your view of the immense volume of business to be done upon that Canal brings you to the conclusion that it should not be built. But entire confidence in the soundness of this view would bring me unhesitatingly to the opposite conclusion. If, as you say, the Erie Canal "will not pay tolls enough to pay the expense of superintendence and repairing after the Niagara Ship Canal is in operation," then why should not every one, who believes you, feel emboldened to declare that the Niagara Ship Canal ought, with all possible speed, to be hurried into "operation ?" What a rich blessing in reserve for tens of millions of people is this Canal, according to your view of the vast use it will be put to! - and how can you find it in your heart to postpone their enjoyment of it ! If, as you hold, it will be so attractive to commerce, as to leave little for the Erie Canal - so little, indeed, that the Erie Canal will, henceforth, be a burden instead of a blessing, a bill of expense instead of a source of income then how can you justify yourself in opposing the construction of it! If you are right in your estimate of the boundless business which this Canal would do, and of the very little it would leave for the Erie Canal to do, then, why, in the name of consistency, are you not moving heaven and earth to get the Niagara Ship Canal adopted and opened, and the Erie Canal abandoned and filled up? How marvellously inconsistent are you! No [other] man exerts so much influence against the building of the Canal-and yet, as we have seen, in the few words quoted from your Report, no other man makes the building of it so important to human welfare. I admit that you do not, in terms, confess this importance. But that is not necessary to justify my assertion. For this importance is an authorized and unavoidable deduction from the illimitable business, which you assign to the projected Canal.

But you will say that your office is to care for the income of our canals; to promote its increase, and guard against its diminution. Admitted. Nevertheless, you are not to feel yourself obliged to do this in ways, that defy the claims of justice and religion. The State, whose faithful servant you are, has no right to command your services in such guilty ways; and, if it does, you are under no obligation to obey. How unjust to rob our toiling fellow-men of a part of the value of their hard-earned products by denying to those products a cheap transit, and confining them to a dear one! And how irreligious (,since the true religion consists simply in following nature,) is your making the income of the Erie Canal - a Canal that, by your own virtual admission, drags commerce into a most unnatural route - your reason and argument against building the Niagara Ship Canal - a Canal, which, by the like admission, attracts commerce to a pre-eminently natural route, and the building of which is as obvious a dictate of nature as ever was known! But you will be like to meet me at this point with the declaration that in such departments as commerce, political economy and statesmanship, absolute justice and the true religion are allowed no place. I am aware they are not, - but should they not be ? I am aware that gain and advantage are there made the one object; and that if it is prosecuted with barely enough to show of justice and religion to give it an air of decency, the public demand is satisfied. I am aware, too, that whoever asks more than this makes himself a public laughing-stock for his greenness and lack of worldly wisdom. Nevertheless I must continue to believe that our world will remain an unhappy one so long as the claims of absolute justice and of the true religion are disallowed in these wide provinces of important human affairs "and intense human interests; - so long, in other words, as selfishness, instead of benevolence, is the prompter of are policies, which obtain in these provinces. It is, simply, because our Government stops short of the claims of uncompromising justice, and disowns, in its plans for the consolidation and new life of the nation, the one [o]nly true religion - the religion of equal rights - it is simply because of this that our nation is to-day in greater [p]eril than it was in the darkest day of the Rebellion. The nation must again fall to pieces, and, but too proba-

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bly, forever, if, after all the warnings the she has in the last five years and all the touching appeals new made to her impartiality and gratitute, she can still refuse to let justice and religion have their part in moulding her policies and directing her course.

A State or Nation, no more than an individual, can afford to outrage justice and reject religion. Admit that the Rebel States would have made more gain out of Slavery, had they succeeded in separating themselves from the nation and in making sure their internal despotism by walling out from it the world's intercourse and influence - still the increased gain would have been immeasurably overbalanced by the loss in vital morality attending it. Be it so that New Jersey makes money by refusing the right to cross her territory, save where she pleases, Nevertheless, the gain falls very far short of the loss she suffers from her violation of the rights of her - sister States; from setting at naught the claims of righteousness and patriotism; and from snapping asunder the - bonds of brotherhood. Be it so, too, that the State of New York, by meanly patterning after this selfishness of New Jersey, and compelling the produce from, and the merchandize to, the Western States to pass over her soil on the dearest route, when, by all the claims of a common humanity and a common country, the cheapest should not be withheld - be it so first, in this wise, she would, annually, wring millions from those States - nevertheless, the vain, would be very little compared with what she would lose by the weakening of her sense of justice; - by the intensifying of her selfishness; and by the shrivelling of her patriotism. Infinitely more important is it for New York to be drawing her sister States to her by justice and kindness than to be repelling them by measures dictated by greed of gain. Infinitely more to her interest is it that the "Empire State" have her Empire in the gratitude and love of her sister States to her superior wealth and numbers. By the way, the scores of States and Territories which compose our Nation are not to be held together by the policy of making all the money they call out of each other; but, on the contrary, by that generous and affectionate interest in each other, which shall habitually prompt them to benefit and bless each other. In this wise, the shall become and remain one people. But the selfish and unpatriotic spirit manifested in New Jersey oil the subject of rail-roads and in this State with regard to the Niagara Ship Canal - a spirit essentially like that which carried the Southern States away from us - needs only to be more widely diffused, longer indulged, and therefore more intense, to result in another breaking rip of the nation.

But let it not be inferred from what I have said, that I believe States and Territories, which are just, can be other than rich. As a general rule in the case of individuals, material wealth or, at least, enough of it, goes along with moral wealth. In the case of States and Nations the rule is well-nigh, if not, indeed, quite universal. The "promise" of the Scriptures to "godliness" is not more to be relied on than is the fact of all ages, that the people, who are governed by justice and benevolence will, unless laboring under peculiarly great geographical or other physical disadvantages, abound in the comforts of life, not to say in its luxuries also. The State of New York will be as rich as she is just - and that is to be rich enough - and certainly as rich as she deserves to be.

You will, however, say that not only the State of New York, but all the States East of it and some of the States South of it, will suffer loss from the building of the Niagara Ship Canal. For you will argue that they will lose much of their trade with the West, because she will, by means of this Canal, carry oil a direct trade with Europe through the St. Lawrence. Should, however, this change in trade take place, what would be the loss resulting from it on the one hand compared with the gain resulting from it on the other ! The gain of the Western States, from their taking this uninterrupted route, would be proved by the simple fact of their taking it. And the gain would be great because it would be in the greater prices of what they sell and the lower prices of what they buy. On the other hand, the losing States would lose but in the diminished business of some of their market towns and lines of transportation. The gain would be to every family and every interest in the West; whilst the loss would be to but a small portion of the people and interests of the East. The right of our Western brethren to the nearest and best markets is emphasized by their remoteness and by the bulkiness of their staples. But you will say that the gain, resulting from this revolution in trade would be to Europe also. I hope it would. Very joyful is it to every mall, who feels his "country to be the world and his countrymen mankind", to have the people of other lands as well as of his own benefitted by their mutual commerce.

Just here, let me say that the laws of commerce decide unerringly whither it should, and will, go. If the products of the West will have a better market in Greenland than any where else, then to Greenland they should go, and, in the end, will go. Moreover, whoever he be, that would put or perpetuate obstacles in the way of their going there. be it even with the good motive of saving the Erie Canal from becoming worthless, makes himself guilty of fighting against the laws of commerce and nature, the rights and interests of mankind and the authority of God.

In all early part of this letter, I spoke warm and earnest words for the immediate building of the Niagara, Ship Canal. But I spoke them in view of your own unequalled estimate of the business, and therefore benefit of the Canal, and on the condition of the estimate's being a reasonable one. I owe it to candor to confess that, notwithstanding my great respect for your judgment, especially in commercial matters where your knowledge, is so great and my own so little, I cannot believe that the Niagara Ship Canal would make so great and therefore so beneficial a revolution as that which you, in effect, claim for it. I cannot believe with you that it would so reduce the business of the Erie Canal, as to leave the State without income from that magnificent and probably ever-to-be highly useful work. It might, perhaps, work some diminution of its business between Buffalo and Rochester : - but the greatly increased contributions to it from the mouth of the Genesee River, from the Sodus Bays and Oswego would very far more than counterbalance such diminution. Nor can I believe with you that the bulk of the Western produce, or even any very considerable share of it, would, be cause of the Niagara Ship Canal or indeed of any thing else, go through the St. Lawrence to Europe. Instead of the absorbing influence, which you claim for the Niagara Ship Canal on the business of the Erie Canal, and consequently, and more emphatically, on that of all the other paths to Western produce, I suppose that, if it shall ever be built, it will be but one of innumerable competitors for that produce. And, here, let me say that instead of being jealous of ally of these competitors, we should rejoice in them all. For the more there are, the greater will be the reduction in the present excessive charges of transportation, and, therefore, the more will the producing West and the consuming East be benefitted.

So far from your being right in assuming that the bulk of Western produce will go down the St. Lawrence, it is not credible that a river, barred by ice half the year, and the navigation at its mouth peculiarly perilous, will, amongst so many highly advantageous outlets, be a very formidable competitor for the carrying of this produce. It certainly has not been hitherto. Montreal, notwithstanding her advantages in the Welland Canal and in the improved navigation of the St. Lawrence, has, as yet, received but a very small share of the produce of the West: and a part even of this small share has gone hence to Portland. Beyond all reasonable doubt, by far the greater part of this produce, which shall reach Lake Ontario, will stop at Rochester,

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Sodus, Little Sodus, Oswego, Sackett's Harbor, Ogdensburgh, Montreal and other points between the mouth of the Niagara and Montreal. An important rail-road is coming up from the South to. Little Sodus, Sacketts Harbor will not long be without a rail-road across the State; and Sodus, which like Sacketts Harbor, has a Bay capacious enough to receive all the craft of all the Lakes, cannot fail, when her canal is finished, to make her claim for a share of the produce of the West an effective one. You say that none of this produce will be transhipped, "only what we shall need for home consumption''. Why do you say only? Does not this "home consumption" furnish a market for this produce always steadier and often larger than foreign? But it is "a very mistaken opinion, that none of this transhipped produce will go from Boston, New York &c. to foreign countries.

How absurd in every point of view is this opposition to the Niagara Ship Canal! The Welland Canal, as it appears, is to be enlarged forthwith. It shall remain the only canal connecting Lake Erie with Lake Ontario, great will be its freight of Western produce. But will not the proportion of this freight that will go to Canadian and European ports be like to be like to be greater instead of less than would be the proportion of such freight on the Niagara Ship Canal, that would take those directions ? Surely, an American vessel having passed through an American Canal and its American influences, would be no less like to turn into an American port than it would, had it passed through a Canadian canal and its Canadian influences. After all, the one question, at .this point, is not, whether we would or would not have Western produce descend to Lake Ontario; - for much of it must do so, whether there be only the Welland Canal or the Niagara Ship Canal also. But the one question is whether Americans shall or shall not prefer to have it descend through an American canal: I love all nations, and permit myself to cherish prejudices against none of them. Nevertheless, I confess that I am so much of an American as to prefer the American canal. Moreover, I am sure that you also would, could you but let your patriotism interfere with the habit of seeing no good outside of the increase of canal tolls. It is under the force of this unhappy habit that even commerce itself has become as nothing with you compared with the paramount importance you accord to tolls. And may I not here ask - what man, whose wrong training has not reversed the sound motto : "Canals should be built for commerce and not for tolls", opposes the Niagara Ship Canal ? Or, in other words, what man more emphatically "holds at the spigot, whilst it runs at the bung" than he, who opposes this Canal ? And may I not, also, ask - who, that would conscientiously observe the pointings of nature, and bar out none of her blessings from West or East, can be opposed to this Canal ? - and, also, who are they that oppose it but men, whose patriotism, not sufficiently ardent to permit the construction of a grand commercial pathway within their own country's territory, prefer to patronize a rival one within a foreign.

I referred to the Sodus Canal. I trust that no unreasonable impediments will be thrown in the way of its completion. Oswego must not be jealous of Sodus; and Buffalo must not be jealous of Oswego. Buffalo fears the effects of the Niagara Ship Canal upon her prosperity. But, beside that she should be too generous and patriotic to oppose her local interests to a great national, and, so far as the West is concerned, vital improvement, she is to be benefitted and not harmed by the Niagara Ship Canal. It will in my judgment serve to make her, very far more than she is now, a collecting and distributing depot, to which and from which produce and merchandize, in vast quantities, shall come and go in a multitude of directions, both by land and, water. I repeat here what I said, a year ago; in a public letter to Horace Greeley on the effect of the Niagara Ship Canal upon the interests of Buffalo:

"Whatever shall contribute to draw the produce of the West to the foot of Lake Erie will be for the interest of Buffalo. The Niagara River would, with its proposed improvement, be lined with ship-yards - ship-yards for both Lake and Ocean vessels. Where could the materials for ship-building and for a vast variety of manufactures be more easily collected? These ship-yards and manufactures would be largely Buffalo's. From her commanding position, great population and great wealth, Buffalo would necessarily have the lion's share of that immense commerce, which would soon make the Niagara River and the foot of Lake Erie one of the busiest scenes of earth. Surely, danger to Buffalo is not from routes, which lead to her and by her. It can be only from such as lead elsewhere - as, for instance, from present and projected routes through Canada, and from rivers, canals and railroads, that attract commerce from the region of the Lakes to Philadelphia, Baltimore and Western cities."

Men are wont to make great mistakes in their forecastings of the consequences of some important event or measure, which they greatly desire or dread. It is its consequences on such a state of things as the present to which they confine their vision and estimates Whereas they should lift up their eyes on the new and different state of things to be produced by the event or measure; and should, therefore, calculate its results far less upon what is now than upon what will probably be then; far less upon the present condition of things than upon the condition into which it will be constantly changing under the influence of the event, or measure.

The fears of Buffalo from the Niagara Ship Canal recall the fears of the farmers in the neighborhood of London to whom Adam Smith, in his "Wealth of Nations" refers These farmers of more than a century ago so greatly feared, that the extension of the London Turnpike roads into more remote Counties would subject them to a very injurious rivalry on the part of the farmers of those Counties, that they petitioned Parliament against the extension; - and (,laugh at them, as we may,) just as earnestly as, under your lead, the fearful and short-sighted of our State (,who in their turn, will also be laughed at,) are petitioning our Legislature not to let the proposed improvement of the Niagara take place. But these London farmers soon found to their great and happy disappointment, that the growth of London (,owing largely, no doubt, to this extension of her Turnpikes,) whilst it benefitted the remoter farms, turned their own into butchers' pastures and other not less lucrative uses. The Niagara Canal will, no less than did the extension of the London Turnpikes, turn fears into joys. When this Canal shall have made the Niagara River perhaps the most commercial of all the rivers of the earth, and thus have opened to Buffalo new and ever-multiplying sources of wealth and prosperity, this City, now so needlessly alarmed, will then be thoroughly convinced that what she most dreaded has most benefitted her. Her present interests, which she now (bars will, in the event of the building of the Niagara Canal, find very damaging rivals in Oswego and Sodus and other ports on Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence) may be dwarfed and overshadowed by the far more important interests for whose creation she will be indebted to this Canal.

Nor should the City of New York, any more than the City of Buffalo, stand in the way of an undertaking so emphatically national in its interests and bearings and immense benefits. She, however, is under no, temptation to do so. For this grand emporium of the nation cannot fail to be profited by whatever profits the nation. The City and, indeed, the whole State of New York, so far from fearing anything from the Niagara Ship Canal, should, as should Buffalo also, be welcoming the prospect of soon having it. In short, the great question with our great State, including emphatically her largest Cities, is not whether the Niagara Ship Canal would be so cheap a channel, as to diminish the income from the Erie Canal, but whether there are not like to be passages through Canada, Pennsylvania and elsewhere so cheap, as to make the building of the Niagara Ship Canal an absolute necessity for saving to our State her present share of the Western trade. Her cry against this projected canal may yet be confessed by her to have been a cry against her savior. That Pennsylvania and Maryland

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should look upon it as a somewhat formidable rival to the channels by which they tap the Great West; is not strange. But the fears of our State from it are absolutely nonsensical - are even ludicrous.

I need say no more. Is it not, Mr. Benton, high time for us to rise up out of this unenlightened, selfish, narrow policy, which makes more account of tolls than of commerce ; of local interests than of the general good; of a State than a Nation ? If men will build us canals more useful than those we have, I do not say that we should help them - but I do say that we should let them. Our present improvements are to be prized by us ; - but we must not make them a finality. On the contrary, the door for greater improvements must be constantly left open. Great has been our progress in the past. But "Excelsior" - happily chosen motto of our State - must continue to be her motto. She must still be going higher: and if her future progress and improvements shall be so great, as to reduce to wrecks much that was cherished and was truly and even pre-eminently useful in the past, she must not pause to waste tears over those wrecks, but she must go forward, and with songs of rejoicing, over the better things, which have taken their place. It the Erie Canal, which was so entirely sufficient in its day, is now enable to meet all the fast-growing demands upon it, let us not sorrow over the deficiency, and do nothing to supply it - but let us rejoice that the Niagara Ship Canal can supply it; and that there are men, who stand ready to build it.

Respectfully yours

GERRIT SMITH.