Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1852-10-23

But the moment the peace Of 1888 extended the boun
Diary of the United States that river the Of the day
began TO turn their attention to this great acquisition
They had gone through the Revolution under certain Ar
ticles Of Confederation intended mainly for military pur
poses and which had worked badly enough in that
respect Their affairs were managed by Federal Con-
gress in which each State had vote An ordinance
introduced into that body by Mr. Jefferson in 1854 for the
portion Of the territory beyond the
tans but il wholly silent on the subject of commerce
or navigation.
And now the Mississippi is first seen, dimy feresha-
dowing its future power great element of American
unity Some of statesmen caught glimpses not only
of its geographical extent and the widespread develop
ment Of its valley but also Of its vital political import
ance great seat of empire and perpetual bond of Ma
tonal Union. But stream possessing such power and
attributes fact in the history Of human cvii-
zaon In Asia the eagle eye of Alexander the Great
have something little like it in the Indus but West
Europe afforded no example Its scanty and ragged
peninsuas projecting into the Atlantic from the Eastern
Continent could hold such basin. The two small Bril-
fish Islands dismembered from that continent furnished
US language and laws, but no idea of a river
But the tring streams of Europe wholly
without instruction. In England, the tyranny of King
john six hundred years ago. obstructng of their
little rivers led the bold reformers at Runnymede to in
sert freedom of rivers" fundamental clause in
Magma Charta while the Continent, darkened by d-
pomacy, the treaty of Westphalia in 1648 deliberately
locked up the navigation of the Schedt valuable
mercal stream leading into the German Ocean, and in
the face Of civilized Christian Europe, kept it locked up
nearly century and a half
under the sauary instruction thus afforded by
the Sched and just before the French Revolution broke
its shackes, that thirteen Confederated States ac
quired the Mississippi.
In March, 1885, Rufus King, then Delegate from
Massachusetts, in the Congress of the Confederation re-
ceiyed from Timothy Pickering letter containing these
emphatic and memorable words:
The water communications in that country will always be
in the highest degree interesting to the inhabitants seems
very necessary the freedom naoJag these to all
the inhabitants Of all the States hope shall have no
Schetdts in that country
The high duty of carrying into effect that great
ton Immediately occupied the attention of Mr. King and
his associates The honor Of framing the clause which
secures, ''not for day, but for all time, freedom OF
commerce unbroken network OF navgable water,
spread out for more than sixteen thousand miles, was
shared between Massachusetts, and Virginia. then stand
ing shoulder to shoulder where they had stood through
out the Revolution
The clause was formally introduced into the Congress
by Mr. Grayson of Virginia, and seconded by Mr. King,
of Massachusetts, Listen to its words, so broadly ma
tonal SO purely American:
"The navigabe waters ding Mississippi and ST.
Lawrence and the carrying places between the same shall be
property and Free well to the inhabitants
of the said the citizens of the United States
and those of any other States that be admitted into the
confederacywITHoUT TAN DUTY, OR MPosT THEREFOR
The clause Immediately incorporated into the ordi-
nance and passed by the Congress on the 18th day OF
july 1887.
Here, them we behold the magma charta Of the inter-
nal navigation Of America. 1t throws its protecting
mantle not only the magnificent drained by the
Mississippi and all its tributaries but covers with its
ample folds the whole basin of the ST. Lawrence with its
chain of inland and prophetic of the labors Of
posterity it smooths the way by securing perpetual free
dom even to the land portages carrying places be-
tween those two great systems of waters The precursor
the constitution it built basis too broad to be
displaced by that majestic structure It was never
superseded, modified, or weakened