MEMORIAL PRESIDENT NATIONAL CANAL CONVENTION, A S S E M B L L J^^ AT CHICAGO, JUNE 2, 1863. C II I A G O : TRIBUNK COMPANY, BOOK AND .101! PRINTERS, 51 CLARK STREET. MEETING OF T H 8 NATIONAL CANAL COMMITTEE. Pursuant to notice, the Executive Committee appointed by the President of the Convention, met at the St. Nicholas Hotel, New York City, on Wednesday, October 7th, 1863, at 3 o'clock, P.M. Mr. I. N. ARNOLD, of Illinois, Chairman, called the Committee to order, and in the absence of Col. FOSTER, R. B. HILL, Esq., of Iowa, was elected Secretary. The States of Illinois, New York, Ohio, California, New Jersey, Vermont, Massachusetts, Indiana, Minnesota, Kansas, Maine, Wisconsin, Kentucky, and Rhode Island, were represented. The Sub-Committee, to prepare a Memorial to the President and Congress of the United States, submitted a draft of a Memo- rial for the consideration of the Committee. The Memorial was read t:> the Committee, and after being amended, on motion was unanimoujta^opted. On motion of Mr. HILL, it was ' Resolved, That a Committee of five, consisting of the Chairman, Mr. ARNOLD, and four others to be named by him, be appointed to present the Memorial to the President of the United States, and ask him to lay the same before Congress, with a recommendation that Congress adopt the most efficient means to secure, as early as practicable, a ship-canal from the Mississippi to Lake Michigan, and from the Lakes to the Atlantic. The Chairman named as members of the committee, JUSTIN S. MORRILL, of Vermont, JAMES A. McDouGALL, of California, A. A. Low, of New York, and RICHARD B. HILL, of Iowa. Whereupon the Committee adjourned, to meet at the call of the Chairman. ISAAC N. ARNOLD, Chairman. RICHARD B. HILL, Secretary. 1 MEMOEIAL TO THE PRESIDENT AND CONGRESS OF THE UNITED ".' -"";,.. ...-' STATES, ' BY THK NATIONAL CANAL CONVENTION, Assembled at Chicago, in June, 1863. AT the close of the last session of Congress, on the second of March, the measures for enlarging the Canals between the Missis- sippi River and the Atlantic Ocean, having by a small majority failed, the following call for a National Convention was prepared and signed : , COMMERCE BHi^EN EAST AND WEST. CONVENTION TO PROMOTE ENLARGED FACILITIES FOE COMMERCE BETWEEN THE EAST AND THE WEST. Regarding the enlargement of the Canals between the Valley of the Mississippi and the Atlantic as of great national, commercial, and military importance, and as tending to promote the development, prosperity, and unity of our whole coun- try, we invite a meeting of all those interested in the subject, at Chicago, on the first Monday in June next. We especially ask the co-operation and aid of the Boards of Trade, Chambers of Commerce, Agricultural Societies, and business associations of the country. WASHINGTON, March 2, 1863. EDWARD BATES, (Attorney General United States,) Missouri. MEMBERS OF THE HOUSE. A. G. RIDDLE, Ohio. E. B. WASHBURNE, Illinois. H. L. DAWES, Massachusetts. A. B. OLIN New York. JUSTIN 8. MORRILL, Vermont. E. G. SPAULDING, New York. S. HOOPER, Massachusetts. PORTUS BAXTER, Vermont. SCHUYLER COLFAX, Inrliana. GEORGE P. FISHER, Delaware. AUGUSTUS FRANK, New York. CYRUS ALDRICH, Minnesota. R. E. TROWBRIDGE, Michigan. JOSEPH SEGAR, Virginia. F. C. BEAMAN, Michigan. A. SCOTT SLOAN, Wisconsin. ALFRED ELY, New York. OILMAN MARSTON, New Hampshire. SAMUEL F. WORCESTER, Ohio. BENJAMIN F. THOMAS, Massachusetts. THOMAS D. ELIOT, Massachusetts. A. A. SARGEANT, California. GEORGE W. JULIAN, Indiana. WM. MORRIS DAVIS, Pennsylvania. J. N. GOODWIN, Maine. JAMES 8. ROLLINS, Missouri. THOMAS L. PRICE, Missouri. HORACE MAYNARD, Tennessee. F. W. KELLOGG, Michigan. JOHN H. RICE, Michigan. A. W. CLARK, New York. R. E. FENTON. New York. HURT VAN HORN, New York. M. P. CONWAY, Kansas. D WIGHT LOOM IS, Connecticut. C. H. VAN WYCK, New York. JOHN F. POTTER, Wisconsin. OWEN LOVEJOY, Illinois. JESSE O. NORTON, Illinois. JOHN HUTCHINS, Ohio. EDWARD HAIGHT. New York. GEORGE C. WOODRUFF, Connecticut. B. F. GRANGER, Michigan. JOHN C. ALLEY, Massachusetts. SAMUEL C. FESSENDEN. Maine. JAMES H. CAMPBELL. Pennsylvania. J. F. FARNSWORTH, Illinois. F. P. BLAIR, Sen., District Columbia. SAMUEL L. CASEY, Kentucky. W. D. McINDOE, Wisconsin. W. P. SHEFFIELD, Rhode Island. J. M. ASHLEY, Ohio. F. F. LOW, California. JOHN W. WALLACE, Pennsylvania. J. G. PHELPS, California. WILLIAM J. ALLEN, Illinois. P. B. FOUKE, Illinois. W. R. MORRISON, Illinois. WILLIAM KELLOGG, Illinois. STEPHEN BAKER, New York. G. W. DUNLAP, Kentucky. J. C. ROBINSON, Illinois. CHARLES DELANO, Massachusetts. ISAAC N. ARNOLD, Illinois. 8. W. SHERMAN, New York. THEO. M. POMEROY, New York. A. 8. DIVEN, New York. R. B. VAN VALKENBURG, New York. WILLIAM WINDOM, Minnesota. R. FRANCHOT. New York. ELIJAH WARD, New York. WILLIAM VANDEVER, Iowa. JAMES B. McKEAN, New York. W. E. LANSING, New York. E. P. WALTON, Vermont. W. H. WALLACE, Washington Territory. A. L. KNAPP, Illinois. AM AS A WALKER, Massachusetts. EDWARD H. SMITH, New York. A. S. WHITE, Indiana. 8. EDGERTON, Ohio. F. P. BLAIR, Missouri. A. J. CLEMENTS, Tennessee. H. P. BENNETT, Colorado Territory. SENATORS. J. R. DOOLITTLE, Wisconsin. Y. O. HOWE, Wisconsin. H. M. KICE, Minnesota. M. S. WILKINSON, Minnesota. J. B. HENDERSON, Missouri. R. WILSON, Missouri. Z. CHANDLER, Michigan. J. M. HOWARD, Michigan. JAMES HARLAN, Iowa. L. M. MORRILL, Maine. CHARLES SUMNER, Massachusetts. HENRY WILSON, Massachusetts. IRA HARRIS, New York. S. G. ARNOLD, Rhode Island. L. TRUMBULL, Illinois. W. A. RICHARDSON, Illinois. J. H. LANE, Kansas. S. G. POMEROY, Kansas. JAMBS DIXON, Connecticut. J. MMcDOUGALL, California. This call, bearing the names of the Attorney General of the United States, and ninety-eight members of the Senate and House of Representatives, was responded to by an assembly vast in num- bers, distinguished in character, and embodying largely the repre- sentative men in agriculture, in business, in commerce, and in the conduct of all the affairs, national and political, of our widely extended country. States, through persons designated by their Governors, as well as Boards of Trade, Chambers of Commerce, and Agricultural Associations, were largely represented. New England and the North-West, New York and Missouri, New Jersey and Kentucky, all the great brotherhood of loyal States, met for the purpose of cementing still more closely the commercial, social and political relations of our great country, and providing for its better defense and greater security. This Convention was fitly presided over by the Vice President of the United States. After full discussion and deliberation, the following resolutions were unanimously adopted: RESOLUTIONS. " The representatives of the loyal States, assembled in National Convention at Chicago, desirous of cementing a closer union, of perpetuating our nationality forever, of providing for the common defense and promoting the general welfare of our whole country, adopt the following resolutions : " Resolved, That we regard the enlargement of canals between the Mississippi River and the Atlantic, with canals duly connecting the Lakes, as of great national, military and commercial importance ; we believe such enlargement, with dimen- sions sufficient to pass gun-boats, from the Mississippi to Lake Michigan, and from the Atlantic to and from the Great Lakes, will furnish the cheapest and most efficient means of protecting the Northern frontier, and at the same time will promote the rapid development and permanent union of our whole country. " Resolved, That these works are demanded alike by military prudence, political wisdom, and the necessities of commerce ; such works will be not only national, but continental, and their early accomplishment is required by every principle of sound political economy. " Resolved, That such national highway between the Mississippi and the Lakes, as far as practicable, should be free, without tolls or restrictions ; and we should deprecate the placing this great national thoroughfare in the hands of any private corporation or State. The work should be accomplished by national credit, and as soon as the cost is reimbursed to the national treasury, should be as free as the Lakes to the commerce of the worhlr " Resolved, That an Executive Committee of one from each State be appointed by the President of this Convention, to prepare a memorial to the President and the Congress of the United States, presenting the views of this Convention, and urging the passage of the laws necessary to carry them into full effect, with power to open such correspondence as may be expedient, and in their discretion to call any further Conventions. Five of the members of said Committee, at any meet- ing duly notified by the Chairman, shall constitute a quorum." In pursuance of the last resolution the subscribers were appoint- ed as such Executive Committee, and now respectfully submit to the President of the United States, and to the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress assembled, the following MEMORIAL. The assemblage of the National Canal Convention, so great a gathering of the people, in the midst of such a war as that which is now taxing the resources and energies of the American people to the utmost, was in itself a striking and significant fact This Convention, national in its objects and its numbers, con- nects itself in the minds of all thoughtful men with the political unity of the country. An instinctive conviction of its great im- portance and direct bearing on the national unity, secured for the call for the Convention a hearty and cordial response, scarcely paralleled in the past history of our country. The meeting also indicated the conviction in the minds of the whole people, of the existence of a great need, profoundly realized, and a determination to supply that necessity. That need is, enlarged water-facilities for communication between the East and the West, both for military and commercial purposes. The sub- ject of enlarging canals between the valley of the Mississippi and the Atlantic was evidently regarded as the great question of the times, excepting always the duty of putting down the rebellion, and maintaining our national integrity. Under the resolutions of the Convention by which this Com- mittee was raised, our duty, as we conceive, is, not to designate the manner in which ship and steamboat channel or channels may be opened between the Mississippi and the Atlantic, but to pre- sent the views of the Convention upon the general subject to the President and Congress, leaving it for the Government itself, in its wisdom, to determine the best and most judicious plan of effecting the great object. The Convention was entirely unanimous in the resolution, that the construction or enlargement of the canals between the Missis- sippi and the Atlantic, with canals connecting the Lakes, was of great national, military, and commercial importance, and that such enlargement to dimensions adequate to pass gun-boats from the Mississippi to Lake Michigan, and from the Atlantic to and from the great Lakes, would furnish the cheapest and most efficient means of protecting the Northern frontier, and at the same time would promote the rapid development and permanent union of our whole country. Your memorialists in presenting the views of the Convention to the Executive and Congress, will not attempt to go into details ; 6 they refer to the mass of facts and statements contained in the able reports of the Boards of Trade, and in the letters, surveys, etc., presented to the Convention and embodied in its published proceedings. NECESSITY OF SHIP-CANALS BETWEEN EAST AND WEST. The one great idea which your memorialists seek to impress upon Congress is, the necessity of a great national highway, in the form of a ship and steamboat-canal between the Mississippi and the Atlantic. This great national highway is demanded alike "by military prudence, the necessities of commerce, and political wisdom." Your memorialists ask the attention of the Government to some of the reasons, military, commercial, and political, why this work should be constructed. 1. THE MILITARY IMPORTANCE OF THE WORK. "We have arrived at that period in our history, in which the Government should adopt a well-considered and systematic plan of defending the Northern frontier. Indeed, the best means of doing this has long engaged the attention of the Government. Reports from the War Department, and surveys from the Topo- graphical Corps, in great numbers, have been made, a large number of forts have been projected and surveyed, but little has as yet been done. The importance of having command of the Lakes, in case of a war with Great Britain, cannot be over-estimated. In 1814, the Duke of Wellington declared that " a naval superiority on the Lakes is a sine qua non of success in war on the frontier of Can- ada." The great military importance of the command of the Lakes was illustrated in the war of 1812, and the victories of Perry on Lake Erie, and of McDonough on Lake Champlain, were de- cisive of the fate of the war on the northern border. In our past history, in the old Colonial and Revolutionary wars, and in the late war with Great Britain, the principal attacks our country had to sustain were made from the Canadian frontier. But the defense of the Northern frontier, always of great moment, has become, by the growth of the West, of incalculable import- ance. Certainly not less than one-third in value of the entire commerce of the nation passes over the Lakes. Ten millions of people live upon their borders, and are directly interested in their security. The great cities, which have grown up on their shores, have become the largest grain depots of the world. Nowhere on earth are collected and distributed such vast amounts of food ; and yet this commerce, vast as it is, these great cities and food-producing States, with their great granaries, lie entirely exposed, and invite, by their helpless condition, ravage and devastation. We say confidently, that this condition of things will not be permitted to continue. The voice of the North- West and of all the Northern frontier will ask, (and their just request will be cheerfully granted,) adequate protection. EXPOSED CONDITION OF NORTHERN FRONTIER AS COMPARED WITH THE ATLANTIC COAST. We respectfully call the attention of Congress to the defenseless condition of the Northern frontier, as compared, or rather as con- trasted, with that of the Atlantic. Upon the defenses of the Atlantic, exclusive of naval defenses, there have been expended more than one hundred and fifty millions of dollars. Large additional appropriations were asked for and obtained at the last session of Congress, and yet the Atlantic shore is more than three thousand miles from a foreign foe. An ocean shields it from at- tack. It is defended by the strongest navy possessed by any nation on earth. For all this we pay cheerfully, nor do we ques- tion the propriety of these expenditures; we only ask that the Northern line shall be no longer neglected. Now, we earnestly call attention to the fact that our Northern frontier, with its commerce, and cities, equal in value to the sea- board, and with a shore-line exceeding in length the Atlantic coast, is within rifle and cannon range for a considerable distance, of the* only great maratime nation which will ever give us serious trouble, and ia entirely defenseless. We have no navy on the Lakes, nor can we have under existing treaties. We have neither forts nor fortifications, nor ordnance, nor navy yards. Our Northern frontier is utterly without the means of defense. DEFENSES OF CANADA. Let us contrast our means of defense with those of our neigh- bors over the line. In 1817 it was provided by treaty between Great Britain and the United States, that both nations should dismantle their vessels of war on the Lakes, and reduce their naval 8 force on each side " to one vessel of one hundred tons burden on Lake Ontario, and one on Lake Champlain, each armed with one eighteen pound cannon, and on the upper Lakes to two such vessels armed with the like force." Since this treaty, Great Britain has never lost sight of the security of her American Colonial Empire. She has expended many millions for its defense. She has large and important mili- tary defensive works at Kingston on Lake Ontario, at Maiden at the mouth of the Detroit river, at Penetanguishene on Georgian Bay, at Toronto, Niagara, Stanley, Windsor and Port Sarnia, and others extending west as far as the shores of Lake Superior, and beyond to Fort Williams and Fort Gary. GREAT BRITAIN RELIES ON HER MILITARY CANALS, CONSTRUCTED FOR MILITARY PURPOSES. But the main reliance of England for maintaining and securing her supremacy on the Lakes, is upon her military canals. These she has constructed at great expense, to enable her to pass her gun-boats from the ocean through the St. Lawrence to the Lakes. These works were constructed with direct reference to their military uses. The canals from Montreal, by way of the Ottawa river and interior Lakes, to Kingston on Lake Ontario, were constructed avowedly as a military work by the Royal Engineers, under the direction of the British Ordnance Department. The preamble of the act of the Canadian Parliament authorizing the taking of lands for the purpose, recites, that "His majesty has been pleased to direct measures to be immediately taken, under the superintendence of the proper military department, for constructing a canal connecting the waters of Lake Ontario with the Ottawa river, and affording a * convenient navigation for the transport of naval and military stores." In 1831, Col. Dumford, of the Royal Engineers, in his testi- mony before a committee of the English Parliament, stated, that provision had been made for the defense of the Lakes, and the canal being intended as a military work, fortifications should be erected at the entrance of the canal, and the immediate vicinity at Kingston. A fortress of very considerable strength has been built at Kingston. This canal was followed by the construction around the rapids of the St. Lawrence of a series of short canals, far transcending in capacity any commercial necessity at the time they were built, with locks 45 feet wide, by 200 feet long, and 8 feet deep. 9 She has also connected Lakes Erie and Ontario by the Welland canal, of great capacity, with locks 26 feet wide, 150 feet long, and water 11 feet deep. Such are the means by which Great Britain, sagacious and per- sistent, and ever looking to the possibility of war, has provided for securing the control and supremacy on the Lakes. It was the confidence growing out of the condition above de- scribed, and a knowledge of our own defenseless condition, that induced the London Times, during the excitement growing out of the seizure of Slidell and Mason, to publish articles like the following : " ARMING THE NORTHERN FRONTIER AND THE LAKES." " The worst part of the struggle, however, will not be on the Atlantic seaboard, but on the Great Lakes of Upper Canada and North America. We are glad, there- fore, to be able to tell our readers that this danger has been foreseen, and amply pro- vided against, and that within a week after the breaking of the ice a whole fleet of gun-boats with the most powerful of screw corvettes sent out to Admiral Milne, will carry the protection of the British flag from Montreal to Detroit." The exposed condition of the Lakes has not escaped the atten- tion of Congress. The Committee on Military Affairs of the House of Representatives, through Hon. F. P. BLAIR, Chairman, at the last session of Congress, called the attention of the country to this startling statement : " A small fleet of light draft, heavily armed iron-clad gun-boats could in a short month pass up the St. Lawrence into the Lakes, and shell every city from Ogdensburgh to Chicago." " It could at one blow sweep our commerce from the entire chain of waters. Such a fleet would have it in its power to inflict a loss to be reckoned only by hundreds of millions of dollars, so vast is the wealth thus exposed to the depre- dations of a maratime enemy." The cost of all the improvements proposed in this connection would be but a trifle, compared with the loss which could be in- flicted by a single raid by these gun-boats through the Lakes. This condition of exposure must not be permitted to continue; and thus we are brought to the question of WHAT ARE THE BEST MEANS FOR DEFENDING THE LAKES? Two plans have been proposed ; one, that of a chain of forts along the shore, defending the entrance of each lake and other strategic points, and fortifications for the security of each consider- able town and city. The other is the construction or enlargement of such canals 10 as will enable our fleets of gun-boats to pass from the Ocean by the Mississippi and the Hudson to the Lakes. The objections to the former are grave, and in the judgment of your memorialists, viewed in the light of the experience of the present, are decisive. The expense would be enormous, and when constructed, as against iron-clad gun-boats, would prove unavailing. The war in which our country is now engaged has shown, especially have the seige of Charleston and the comparative vulnerability of Forts Wagner and Sumter demonstrated, that earthworks are better than regular walled forts, and that neither are adequate to prevent the passage of iron-clad gun-boats. We must, if practicable, do as Great Britain has done con- struct military canals, adequate in capacity to admit our gun-boats to the Lakes. Thus we shall be placed upon an equality with our neighbors. Fortunately, this is entirely practicable, and with but small expense as compared with the important results to be secured. Various plans for constructing and enlarging canals, to enable gun-boats to pass from the Hudson and the Mississippi to the Lakes, have been suggested. Prominent among others, is that of enlarging the present Illinois and Michigan canal from Lake Michigan to Lake Joliet, a distance of only thirty-six miles, and the improvement of the Illinois and Desplaines rivers, so that all steamers and gun-boats which navi- gate the Mississippi, can pass directly into Lake Michigan at Chicago. Also, a ship-canal around the Falls of Niagara, and the enlargement of the locks of the Erie and Oswego canals, by which gun-boats can pass directly from the Atlantic into Lakes Ontario and Erie. We will not undertake to decide between the merits of these various propositions, nor whether it may not be expedient to enter upon the construction of all, or to extend aid to all; but we would most earnestly press upon the consideration of the President and of Congress, the importance of securing at the earliest practicable period, a steamboat- and ship-canal from the Mississippi to the Lakes, and from the Lakes to the Hudson and the Atlantic. It was well said by Washington, " that if we desire peace, it must be known that we are at all times ready for icar." The military position is, in a few words, this : On the American side, the Northern frontier is defenseless. It is amply defended on the British side. England can take her gun-boats from the ocean through the canals and the St. Lawrence into the Lakes with 11 facility. We cannot do it at all. Great Britain has constructed canals for this express purpose. We have no such military canals. England, years ago, did that for the defense of Canada, which our Government is now asked to do for our own country. Without the ship and steamboat-canals, our Lake commerce and cities are at her mercy. With the enlarged canals, through our great su- periority in mariners, steamers, vessels, and material on the Lakes, we are secure, and our supremacy is certain. Our security will be found in providing the means of floating "Uncle Sam's webbed feet" as the President calls our gun-boats, into the Lakes. The work done by these " web-footed gun-boats" in this war, " not only on the deep sea, the broad bay, and the rapid river, but also up the narrow bayou and wherever the ground was * a little damp? " has furnished most valuable illustrations of their importance in all military operations. Surely our Government will not do less in providing military canals for the security of the very heart and life of the nation, the homes of ten millions of people, than Great Britain has done for a remote colony and a dependency, which she seems sometimes not very reluctant to have detached as an incumbrance. Great Britain has constructed the Canadian canals to secure distant and sparsely settled provinces, whose commerce is small compared with ours, and upon which, therefore, the injury we could inflict in case of war, would be trifling as compared with that to which our Lake towns and commerce would be exposed in case England should obtain supremacy on the Lakes. The above are some of the reasons why we most fully concur in the resolution unanimously adopted by the Convention by which we were appointed, " that canals, with dimensions sufficient to pass gun-boats from the Mississippi to Lake Michigan, and from the Atlantic to and from the Great Lakes, will furnish the cheapest and most efficient means of protecting the Northern frontier" 2. COMMERCIAL IMPORTANCE OF THE SHIP-CANALS. Your memorialists, having presented their views of the military importance of these canals, ask attention to some considerations showing that they have become a commercial necessity. The configuration of the North American continent presents the most remarkable adaptation to internal commerce of any portion of the globe. The great interior basin drained by the Mississippi and its trib- 12 utaries, with ten thousand miles of steamboat navigation ; the Lakes, with their shore lines of five thousand miles, and with more than ninety thousand square miles of surface, these great Mediter- ranean seas of the New World, can be connected with the great river of the West by a steamboat and ship-canal only thirty-six miles long ! The commerce of these Lakes, carried in fleets composed of six- teen hundred and forty-three vessels and steamers, reaches in value between four and five hundred millions of dollars per annum. The commerce of the Mississippi and its great tributaries, before the rebellion, it is believed, was not less in value. A direct union between these waters will be like the union of two oceans. The Suez canal does not compare in importance with a ship-canal from the Mississippi to the Lakes. No day should delay its accom- plishment. The outlet to the Atlantic by the East is equally remarkable with that of the South, and equally favorable to the commercial develop- ment and unity of our country. The arm of Almighty God cut down the barriers of the Alleghanies, and ordained that the ocean tides should flow through the highland passes of these mountains. The broad Hudson stretching away northerly towards the Lakes pointed to the sagacious statesmen of New York the pathway to empire. The genius of De Witt Clinton, quick to catch the clear intimation, consummated what nature had so nearly completed, and opened the way by the New York canals from the Atlantic to the Lakes. Illinois, by the aid of the Federal Government, fol- lowed, completing the water-channel from the Atlantic to the Mis- sissippi ; and now we have only to follow the finger of God, as interpreted by Clinton, and consummate what is so nearly done, and we have an east and west Mississippi from the Missouri to the Atlantic. WE HAVE OUTGROWN OUK CANALS. The great commercial fact of to-day, felt and realized, is, that we have outgrown our canals. The country is too big for them. The problem is, shall production stop its increase, or shall our canals be enlarged ? The necessity of this enlargement is mani- fest by the enormous profits of the great railways, and the extravagant rates of transportation, showing that the quantity to be carried forward is so vast that carriers command their own terms. The warehouses and mammoth elevators of the Lake towns for the last two years have been crushed with freight ; every 13 thing which could be made to float on the Lakes and canals, has been taxed to the utmost, and proved insufficient to carry to market the products of the West This necessity for greater facilities, and the failure in Congress of the bills for enlarging the New York and Illinois canals, have led to a zealous effort on the part of the West to obtain, by Canadian canals, that relief which is (we trust only temporarily) denied through our own country, and by our own Government. Illinois and Wisconsin, through their State authorities, and the Boards of Trade of several Lake cities, appointed delegates to Canada, to obtain, if possible, avenues to market for the vast accumulation of Western produce. Necessity will force the West into new avenues to the Atlantic, unless the present are enlarged. That both Canada and Great Britain appreciate the value of this Western trade, is shown by their construction, for the purpose of securing it, of the Victoria Bridge at Montreal, at a cost of seven millions of dollars, and the Grand Trunk Railway at a cost of about sixty millions of dollars, in addition to the canals before referred to. It is obvious from these and other facts, that we have reached that point, when, with our present means of transportation, the production of corn and other cereals cannot to any great ex- tent be profitably increased. This condition should not surprise us. The canals were constructed while the West was in embryo. In 1837, the number of tons transported from west of Buffalo, on the Erie Canal, was 56,255. In 1861, the number reached 2,156,426. The product of wheat and corn carried on the New York canals from the Lake States of Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana and Wis- consin, in 1850, was 252,000,000 bushels ; in 1860, 354,000,000 bushels. The population of these States, and Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri and Nebraska, in 1850, was 5,403,595; in 1860, it was 9,092,009. The value of Western products has increased more than 100 per cent, in the last four years. In 1859, it was, in round numbers, $53,000,000, and in 1862, $111,000,000. Our foreign exports are made up largely of breadstuffs and provisions. In four years they increased from $38,305,991 in 1859, to $122,650,043.27 in 1862, increasing in two years 180 per cent., and in three years 220 per cent. The amount of $122,650,043 for 1862, is exclusive of $11,100,043 which went out through Canada, making the aggregate over $133,750,000. 14 The following tables, compiled from the preliminary report of the census for 1860, will show the progress of the West, and will furnish data by which its present and future necessities may be more fully realized. POPULATION OF THE NORTH-WESTERN STATES IN 1850 AND 1860. STATES. 1850. 1860. Ratio of Increase. Illinois 851 470 1 711 951 101 05 988 416 1 350 428 36 63 192 214 674 913 251.12 Kansas 107,206 Michigan 397 654 749 113 88 38 6 077 172 123 2,732.36 Missouri 682 044 1 182 012 73 30 Ohio 1 980 329 2 339 511 18 13 Wisconsin 305 391 775 881 154.06 TOTALS 5,403,595 9,068 138 Nebraska 28,841 GRAND TOTALS 5 403,595 9 091,979 68.26 VALUE OF REAL AND PERSONAL PROPERTY IN THE NORTH-WESTERN STATES IN 1850 AND 1860. STATES. 185O. 1860. Ratio of Increase. $156,265,006 $871,860,282 457 93 202,650,264 528,835,371 160.95 23 714 638 247,338 265 942.97 31,327,895 59,787,255 257,163,983 330.13 Minnesota 52 294,413 137,247,707 501,214,398 265.18 Ohio 504,726,120 1,193,898,422 136.54 42 056 595 273,671,668 550.72 $1,126 447 585 $3,957,604,697 9,131,056 GRAND TOTALS $1,126 447 585 $3,966,735,753 243.23 NOTE. In the official reports at hand, no separation is made of the respective amounts of real estate and personal property in 1850. 15 NUMBER OP ACRES AND VALUE OF IMPROVED LANDS, AND RATIO TO TOTAL AREA IN THE NORTH-WESTERN STATES, IN 1850 AND 1860. STATES. TOTAL AREA. Acres. IMPROVED LANDS, 1850. HI $ us IMPROVED LANDS, 1860. Ratio of Ini- provM Lauds to Total Area. No. of Acres. Value. No. of Acres. Value. Illinois 85,459,200 21,687,760 82,584,960 78,470,720 35,995,520 106,256,000 48,128,200 25,576,960 84,511,860 5,039,545 5,046,543 824,682 Y,92Vi6 5,035 2,938,425 9,851,493 1,045,499 $96,183,290 186,885,173 16,657,567 "bY,872J446 161,948 63,225,543 858,758,608 28,528,563 14.21 23.26 2.58 '5.'85 0.04 6.81 83.51 8.02 18,251,473 8,161,717 8,780,253 372,835 8,419,861 554,397 6,246,871 12,665,587 8,746,036 $432,531,072 844,902,776 118,741,405 11,394,184 163,279,087 19,070,737 230,632,126 666,564,171 181,117,082 37.51 37.71 11.60 0.50 9 77 0.52 1.44 49.51 10.85 Indiana Kansas Michigan Minnesota Ohio TOTALS 408,615,580 214,9(54,480 26,680,382 $751,723,133 6.52 52,199,080 122,582 2,118,232,640 8,916,002 12.27 0.05 Nebraska GRAND TOTALS.. 628,580,060 26,680,882 $751,723,183 4.27 52,821,612 2,122,148,642 8.18 QUANTITY OP WHEAT AND INDIAN CORN IN THE NORTH-WESTERN STATES IN 1850 AND 1860. STATES. WHEAT. Bush. INDIAN CORN. Bush. 1850. 1360. 1S50. 1860. Illinois 9,414,575 6,214,468 1,530,581 24,159,500 15,219,120 8.433,205 '168,527 8,313,185 2,195,812 4,227,586 14,532,570 15,812,625 57,646,984 52,964,363 8,656,799 115,296,779 69,641,591 41,116,994 5,678,834 12,152,110 2,987,570 72,892,157 70,637,140 7,565,290 Indiana Michigan 4,925,889 1,401 2,981,652 14,487,351 4,286,131 5,641,420 16,725 36,214,537 59,078,695 1,988,979 Missouri . Ohio Wisconsin 43,842,038 93,062,130 72,268 222,208,502 397,968,465 1,846,785 Nebraska GRAND TOTALS 43,842,038 93,134,b98 222,208,502 399,815,240 16 NUMBER OF MILES OP RAILROAD IN OPERATION IN THE NORTH-WESTERN STATES IN 1850 AND 1860. STATES. 185O. I860. 110.50 2,867.90 228.00 2 125.90 679.67 342.00 799.30 817.45 Ohio 675.27 2,900.75 20.00 922.61 1,275.77 11,113.58 With the canals enlarged as proposed, production may be stim- ulated a hundred fold, and yet still yield a fair profit to the pro- ducer. These enlarged canals, reducing materially the cost of transportation, will enable us to compete successfully in, and per- haps control the foreign market, for breadstuffs and provisions. Every acre of land west of the Lakes to the Rocky Mountains, and from Cairo and even Memphis north to, and including Minne- sota, will be brought practically hundreds of miles nearer market, and of course every acre of land throughout this vast area will be increased in value. This will stimulate emigration, settlement and production, and secure the early cultivation of the fertile lands of the Mississippi valley ; and secure to our agriculturists the markets of the world. With these canals, the Western farmer can compete successfully with the grain-producing countries of the old world, and drive them from the field of competition. It should be remembered that the increased production of food in Europe is limited by physical difficulties. The country is old, thickly peopled, and the good land is all improved. Mountains, barren wastes, and irreclaimable marshes, offer obstacles to any great increase in the production of food. With us it is otherwise. We have a soil of inexhaustible fertility, a large portion of it as yet unbroken. There is spread out be- tween the Lakes and the base of the Rocky Mountains, millions and millions of acres of the richest land on earth. This soil has a pecu- liarity of great significance. It is so admirably adapted to the use of labor-saving machinery, that although the North- West has 17 sent not less than half a million of her most efficient laborers to the camp as volunteers, their absence has been so successfully supplied by labor-saving machines, that the quantity of land cultivated has not been lessened, nor the crops materially diminished. God has so fashioned this land, that with small labor it will yield the most bountiful return in endless crops of food. He has fitted it to be the garden and granary of the world, richer even than the Valley of the Nile. He causes the sun to shine, and the rain to fall upon this land, and clothes it with a rank and luxurious vegetation which annually decays where it grows, or feeds the prairie fires which sweep over it in autumn. We have the land, the laborer is ready, but without these enlarged canals, the labor will not be remunerative, and the land will not be cultivated. Corn, for want of adequate means of transportation, is, on the Western prairies, annually consumed for fuel. This does not pay. Shall Europe starve for bread, and our rich prairies remain uncul- tivated for want of these canals to carry the products to market ? Let Congress answer by its action on these great questions now presented. By reference to the reports of the Boards of Trade and Mercan- tile Associations submitted to the Convention, and which we be- lieve to be entirely reliable, it appears that the enlarged canals would reduce the cost of transportation between Chicago and New York at least ten cents, and between the Mississippi and the Atlantic at least fifteen cents a bushel. Divide this saving between the Western producer and the Eastern consumer, and while you raise the price of every bushel of wheat and corn to the farmer, you reduce the price of every loaf of bread in every house in New England and the sea-board cities. The crop of 1862 shipped to the East through the canals alone, exceeded one hundred millions of bushels ! When we remember that the West pays annually more than fifty millions of dollars for transporting its produce to market, it is obvious that there would be saved on the transporta- tion of a single crop more than the entire cost of these improve- ments. But it is not the trade uf the Mississippi Valley only, vast as it now is, and almost incalculable in its future, that will require these enlarged canals. All this will at no distant day be augmented by contributions from the auriferous regions of the Rocky Mountains, the Valley of the Columbia, and the Pacific Coast. The mineral wealth of this region being rapidly developed is not yet appre- ciated. The copper and iron of Lake Superior, the lead of Illinois 2 18 and Wisconsin, the inexhaustible coal-fields of the great interior basin, and the silver and gold of the Rocky Mountains, added to the agricultural wealth of the great interior, make it among the most favored portions of the globe. To develop these advantages requires the immediate construction of these canals. THE WOBDS OP BKNTON. The great statesman of Missouri, THOMAS H. BENTON, a man whose vast information and ideas were worthy of the Mississippi valley, in 1847 addressed the River and Harbor Convention in words worthy of being recalled to the attention of the American people to-day. He says : "The lake and river navigation of the Great West, to promote which your Convention is called, very early had a share of my attention, and I never had a doubt of the constitutionality or expediency of bringing that navigation within the circle of internal improvements, by the Federal Government, when the object of the improvement should be of general and national importance. " The junction of the two great systems of waters which occupy so much of our country, the Northern Lakes on the one hand, and the Mississippi River and its tributaries on the other, appeared to me to be an object of that character, and Chicago the proper point for effecting the union,; and near thirty years ago I wrote and published articles in a St. Louis paper in favor of that object, indicated and almost accomplished by nature herself, and wanting from man little to complete it. These were probably the first formal communications upon authentic data in favor of the Chicago canal. " The nationality of the Chicago canal and the harbor at its mouth are by no means new conceptions with me. " The river navigation of the Great West is the most wonderful on the globe x and since the application of steam power to the propulsion of vessels, possesses the essential qualities of open navigation. Speed, distance, cheapness, magnitude of cargoes, are all there, and without the perils of the sea from storms and enemies. The steamboat is the ship of the river, and finds in the Mississippi and its tribu- taries the amplest theatre for the diffusion and the display of its power. Won- derful river ! Connected with seas by the head and by the mouth, stretching its arms towards the Atlantic and the Pacific lying in a valley which is a valley from the Gulf of Mexico to Hudson's Bay drawing its first waters not from rug- ged mountains, but from the plateau of the Lakes in the centre of the continent, and in communication with the sources of the St. Lawrence and the streams which take their course north to Hudson's Bay draining the largest extent of richest land, collecting the products of every clime, even the frigid, to bear the whole to market in the sunny South, and there to meet the products of the entire world. Such is the Mississippi. And who can calculate the aggregate of its advantages, and the magnitude of its future commercial results ?" 19 Hear SILAS WRIGHT, as worthy to speak for the East, as Benton for the West : " I am aware that questions of constitutional power have been raised in refer- ence to appropriations of money by Congress, for the improvement of Lake har- bors, and I am well convinced that honest men have sincerely entertained strong scruples upon this point ; but all my observation and experience have induced me to believe that these scruples, where the individual admits the power to improve the Atlantic harbors, arises from the want of an acquaintance with the Lakes and the commerce upon them, and an inability to believe the facts in relation to that commerce, when truly stated. It is not easy for one familiar with the Lakes and the Lake commerce, to realize the degree of incredulity, as to the magnitude and importance of both, which is found in the minds of honest and well-informed men, residing in remote portions of the Union, and having no personal acquaintance with either ; while I do not recollect an instance of a Member of Congress, who has traveled the Lakes and observed the commerce upon them within the last ten years, requiring any further evidence or argument to induce him to admit the con- stitutional power, and the propriety of appropriations for the Lake harbors, as much as for those of the Atlantic coast. I have long been of the opinion, there- fore, that to impress the minds of the people of all portions of the Union with a realizing sense of the facts as they are in relation to these inland seas, and their already vast and increasing commerce, would be all that is required to secure such appropriations as the state of the National Treasury will from time to time permit, for the improvement of the Lake harbors." But the scruples which Benton and Wright sought to remove, disappear in the light of the census returns showing the national, not to say continental, character of the commerce to be relieved : and now that the action of Great Britain has given to these im- provements the character of necessary, defensive military works, these scruples disappear, and are no longer entitled to serious con- sideration. It is not too much to say that to the magnificent enterprise of the Erie Canal, the North-West owes its existence. This great section would have been as yet in its feeble infancy, but for the enterprise of Clinton and the genius of Fulton. The enlargement of the canals between the Mississippi and the Atlantic would create a new era, from which would date another career of advance and progress equally rapid and important. The wave of emigration, checked by the war, is already returning, and will soon be upon us with increased volume. The expenditures asked for by the contemplated improvements are light indeed : so much has already been done by Nature and by the States through which the improvements are to pass, that the cost of the completion of the ship-canal will be small compared with the results. We believe the Illinois canal can be constructed in the manner proposed by the Legislature of Illinois to the last 20 Congress, without costing the National Treasury a single dollar, that its tolls would soon pay interest and principal upon its cost, and thus this great national work, free at all times for the military purposes of the Government, would soon, having paid its cost, become free to the vast and constantly increasing commerce of the Lakes and the Mississippi. These enlarged communications between the Mississippi and the Lakes and the Atlantic would save, every year, in lessening the amount paid for transportation, more than their cost. There is not an acre of land between Lakes Michigan and Superior and the western barrier of the Rocky Mountains, and including the Valley of the Mississippi to New Orleans, but would be increased in value, and the aggregate of such increase would bear no proportion to the amount required to complete the works. There is not a bushel of wheat or corn, nor a barrel of pork or of beef, nor of any article of food in this whole area, but would be enhanced in value. The year these works should be completed they would add to the taxable property of the nation, an amount the taxes upon which in a single year would pay off their cost. Such we believe, without exaggeration, are some of the advan- tages commercially and economically to result from these im- provements. We have referred to the commerce and trade of the Lakes and the Mississippi combined as vastly greater than our foreign com- merce, and as supplying the bulk of our foreign exports. This is the West of to-day, with less than one-twentieth part of its avail- able land improved. Stimulate industry, invite emigration and improvement by these canals, and who can estimate its future ? What figures or language shall describe its greatness? To render complete this great national work it will be necessary to clear the rapids of the Mississippi river at two points, namely, above Keokuk, and above Rock Island ; this is an improvement long demanded by every State bordering on the great river, and of such acknowledged importance as already to have been partially accomplished by the Federal Government. This will perfect the water-communication both between the extreme Northern States and the South, and the same States and the East ; the first by the river alone, the latter by river, canals and lakes combined. The outlay required for the removal of obstructions at these two points, to make good the navigation, is inconsiderable, and the advantage most important iri a military as well as a commercial point of view. 3. NATIONAL UNITY WILL BE I-OREVEK SECURED BY THESE CANALS. No reflecting mind who has marked the events of the last two years, but will admit that among the influences that have made sep- aration and disunion impossible, was the Mississippi river. The great river of the West has been strong enough to hold the Union together. Never in the darkest, gloomiest hour of the rebellion, has the West considered it a debatable question that she could ever, under any circumstances, consent to separation. Her gallant soldiers have marched right on from Cairo to the Gulf, like the current of her great river, resistless, overcoming every difficulty, triumphing over every obstacle, until no rebel flag now floats upon her waters. She was deaf to the overtures of the traitors, who sought by alluring promises of commercial advantages to seduce the North-West from her fealty to the Nation. The West means to maintain the unity and integrity of the whole country. With one hand she grasps the South, and with the other she clasps the East, and she will never consent to reach the ocean in either direc- tion through foreign territory. But it must have occurred to every thoughtful mind how the ties which bind us together would be strengthened and multiplied by these ehip-canals, creating another Mississippi from St. Louis, and Kansas, and St. Paul, to New York and Boston. It has been well said, that the myriad-fibered cordage of commercial relations, slight in any individual instance, but indissoluble in their multitudi- nous combination, produces such unity of purpose, unity of interest, intelligence, sentiment, and national pride, and social feeling, and that homogeneousness of population which unites peoples and maintains nationalities. Such will grow up with a power which no sectional feeling can break between the East and West, when connected together by these canals. It is a curious fact in our history that the same man who was the father of nullification, the author of the secession heresy the man who planted the seeds of this bloody rebellion, and nurtured them while he lived in his earlier and better days was a truly national statesman, with an enlightened patriotism which embraced the whole country. In 1824, John C. Calhoun, then Secretary of War, in advocating the construction of roads and canals by the National Government, 22 said: u Let us bind the Republic together, let us conquer space.; by a perfect system of roads and canals." It was said by Montesquieu, that a Republic could not exist and govern a large territory. There was some truth in the remark when he made it, and it has in it still enough of reason, in spite of steam, railways and telegraphs, and other agencies that annihi- late distance, to make it wise for our statesmen to bind our different sections together by every means in their power. The rebellion has demonstrated the necessity of a closer union and a more consolidated nationality. No agency will be more effective in securing these, than these great ship-canals. The nation has expended its millions of treasure without regard to the amount, and its blood has been poured out like water to open the Mississippi, and yet no one has been found to declare that the cost has been too great for the object. Such is the profound conviction that we must maintain the integrity of the Union and a free passage to the Gulf and the Sea. The Eastern pathway to the Ocean by these enlarged canals would be still more important, and would serve still more strongly to bind the Union together. And yet this can all be secured by a sum less than a month's mili- tary expenditure in the valley of the Mississippi, and without one drop of precious blood. If the map of the territory, which is to be connected by these canals, extending from the West to the shores of the Atlantic, were laid over the map of Europe, that portion of the globe which for the last thousand years has engrossed the attention of the civil- ized world, would be entirely covered. It would overspread mon- archies, empires and nationalities, which for ages have been antagonistic, belligerent the great battle-fields of Europe. It would cover the theatre of the great wars, which have desolated and depopulated again and again that continent, from France and Waterloo to Sebastopol. Human beings by the million have been sacrificed in the wars of the Fredericks, of the Louises, of the Phil- lips, and the Charleses, of the Marlboroughs and of the Buonapartes. Millions and millions of treasure wrung from the toil of the laboring masses, have been expended in fortifying frontiers, and the opera- tions of these wars. Rivers of blood have flowed, so that you can- not take a day's ride in Europe, without passing over fields memor- able for human slaughter. Shall these scenes of butchery and desolation be re-enacted in our own beloved country ? Shall this fair country, lately so peaceful, prosperous and happy, break into fragments ? Shall the Hudson, the Susquehannah, the Delaware^ 23 and the Ohio bristle with fortifications ? Shall the Atlantic States contend in battle with the generous West ? Shall we ever re-en- act upon these fair prairies and broad lakes the bloody pages of European history? Shall fratricidal wars, with all their horrors, their merciless expenditures of blood and treasure, darken the future pages of American history ? God forbid. Could some divine agency, a thousand years ago, have made of Europe a great confederate nationality, levelling its dividing mountains, and mingling its clans into one great homo- geneous people, and made it free, virtuous, and wise enough to be united, what untold misery and suffering would have been pre- vented. No levelling of dividing mountains is here necessary. God in his goodness has fashioned our country, vast as it is, for unity. He has given us one language, the same laws, and one glorious flag. He has made one great nationality a necessity. He has blessed us with liberty. Let us second God's plans, and aid and strengthen by every generous means the influences which shall hold us together forever. What are a few millions expended, if the tendency is to strengthen the bonds of our Union ? Could the present horrid rebellion have ben prevented at any cost of money, or treasure, how wise, how economical, how beneficent the expenditure ? Let no narrow jealousies, let no sectional prejudices delay these great improvements so important to the general welfare, so neces- sary to our security, so favorable to our commercial development, so just to the Western producer, so beneficial to the Eastern consumer, so essential to the growth of the West ; but above all, so indispensably useful in binding our wide territory in one per- petual Union. It seems to your memorialists that no one can study the outlines of our country without becoming satisfied that the works con- templated are not only necessary, but inevitable. Such vast ad- vantages at such small cost will not be neglected by a people so sagacious and enterprising as those represented by the American Congress. Let us then crown the mighty military struggle in which we are engaged and which now seems to be approaching a triumphant close, let us crown it by one of those signal triumphs of peace, which, not less than the victories of war, shall exhibit our devotion 24 to the Union, and our determination that by its multiplied bless- ings we will make it perpetual. Then, looking down the future, may we contemplate an ocean- bound Republic a glorious band of an unbroken brotherhood of States with its hundreds of millions of people, speaking the same language, living under the same laws, worshipping the same God, and over all, floating the same flag, consecrated forever to Liberty and Union. ISAAC N. ARNOLD, Illinois. A. A. LOW, New York. P. CHAMBERLIN, Ohio. JAMES A. MoDOUGALL, California. EZRA NYE, New Jersey. JUSTIN S. MORRILL, Vermont. HENRY L DA WES, Massachusetts. GEORGE W. JULIAN, Indiana. THOMAS M. EDWARDS, New Hampshire. RUSSELL BLAKELEY, Minnesota. D. R. ANTHONY, Kansas. T. C. HERSEY, Maine. M. M. DAVIS, Wisconsin. SAMUEL L. CASEY, Kentucky.