Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1877-05-11
TRANSFORMATION from the West.


HE Ehth'sENA1 VT INV h'iNN-
Hen. Thomas G. Alyord, of Onondaga
county, on the line of the Erie Canal, IN
a recent speech in the New York Senate in
advocacy of lowering the tolls on the Erie
Canal, said
| ask you. men of New York city; ask
YOU, men of the Empire State, to look at the
results Of the receipts of trade from the far
off west-New York gradually lessening and
losing its hold upon this great mass OF prop
erty that is coming from the West and must
seek tide water and 20 across the ocean I;
Baltimore steadily and rapidly increasing
upon it Philadelphia, with strides like a
giant, going in the same direction far beyond
US; that dominion Just across the water
which divides us from Great Brita lin lands,
that dominion pouring out untold wealth
what for, sir? To build up railroads? No ;
the day of railroads so far as she is con-
cerned is gone, and gone forever. 1t is
for the purpose Of opening her water
highways coming down around Niagara
and pouring the water of Lake Erie
into canal for the purpose of making
water highway to Lake Ontario, widening
out her canals below; raising their locks,
making them capacious and efficient to hoat
with ease eighty thousand bushels OF grain
in one single cargo twenty-iour hundred
tons upon fresh water craft in the western
portion of this country floating down here
right along side of our border to Montreal
and Quebec, seeking an outlet to the sea,
shortening the distance very largely.
We did think in times past, and said, let
Montreal. let Quebec do their best /; they arc
locked in with ribs Of ice for six months of
the year but the enterprise of our neigh
bors, our cousins of the sturdy Saxon blood,
do not stop at any such obstacle as this.
They have already in the past Winter in
vented machinery in the shape oil steam
boat that has opened and kept up commu-
nication fror: Quebec on the one hand and
Pictou on the other They mean that that
water highway shall be open each and every
month, and day, and hour of the year,
from the source of supply to Montreal and
Quebec, and until the property is landed on
the docks at Liverpool.
| tell you We have gigantic enterprise
upon our hands. We must grid ourselves
for the contest We must come III to the
mark We must put our water highway IN
conflict with the railroads of the country, 50
that it shall be necessary for them to 90 into
bankruptcy rather than to contend with US.
Sir. they have again and again and again
tried it and bankruptcy now starcs them all
in the face They can keep up the contest
but little longer, and it behooyes us as
men, as statesmen, who desire commercial
supremacy and superiority for our great
State Of New York, to put the matter as
low as We possibly can under the Constitu
ton, in order finally to come ont victorious
in the contest.
The expedient of lowering the canal tolls
which is the same thing as taxing the people
of New York by direct tax for the cost OF
transporting breadstufls from Buffalo to Al
bauy, is not the best remedy for the trouble
depicted by this New York Senator. If New
Workers do not wish to see almost the entire
grain crop of the Northwest going to Mon
treal and Quebec, they must take hold and
build the Caughnawaga canal. The grain
of the Northwest, when the enlargement oil
the Wcland is completed. cannot he diverted
from the st. Lawrence route; hut by the
Caughnawaga canal, costing three millions
the greater share OF it can he turned from
the St. Lawrence into Lake Champlain and
down the Hudson New Workers are SLOW
to see this but it is 50.