Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1880-06-20
ON THE MISsIsSLPPI.

It is romantic story telling of the discov-
cry of the Mississippi and of the death of
De Soto on its banks, somewhere about the
18th of June in 1912, and of his burial be-
meath its waves. Its discovery was an event
of scarcely less Importance than that Of
America. It's existence is one of the Won
ders of physical geography. Its commercial
relations are not confined to one continent,
but affect the whole earth It flows from
Itasca lake, almost on the verge of the North
ern ocean, to the tropics and Southern seas.
It drains nearly two-thirds of the area of
the United States. It passes through royal
domain of production-a harvest field of
wealth and population.
The mind becomes bewildered with the
capacity of this magnificent highway of
commerce. 1t is to-day national humilia-
ton. Ordinary spring tides overleap its
marshy banks and scatter devastation in the
track of its muddy waters. The poor mans
cottage and the rich mans farm are swept
away by the food of destruction.
And yet how easily and with
what comparative little expense
all these things might be prevented, and the
river itself made a perpetual blessing and
ceaseless source of wealth.
Look at the mysterious, classic Nile, with
sources puzzling science during all the CEN
turtles. Long before civilization had reaped
the fruits of scientific discoveries, its over
flow had been utilized so as to fertilize all
the surrounding country, and the rising of
its waters was awaited with the same hope
full expectancy as the coming of the gall fly
to the fig trees of Smyrna.
Considered from every standpoint the sub
stantial and permanent improvement of the
Mississippi river is national necessity.
Multiply railroads until the iron is laid at
every Llan's door in the land, and they can
never supply the place of this river. It's
thorough improvement is thoroughly prach-
cable. It is worse than waste to attempt it
in driblets. What is needed? board of
survey. composed of the best talent of the
world. There must be no jobs, no specula-
ton, no private schemes of plumber. Men
of honor, Of world wide
reputation, of ability, men
such as De Lesseps had under him with De
Lesseps himself added. 1t would be better
to do this than to trust to pigmies and to
trife as for the last thirty years. The Cape
of Good Hope has no longer to be doubled
on the way to India, nor Cape Horn to Cali
fornia. Progress and enterprise spanned
one isthmus with iron, and poured through
the other the waters of the Mediterranean.
And here the people of the United
States slumber over these terrible
barriers to free commerce, these
periodic losses to working people, and these
devastatiors of crops and labor, while the
romantic exodus of negroes and Munchausen
schemes of transportation engage the atten-
ton of aspiring statesmen.
Let board of survey be appointed to de-
wise plans for the permanent improvement
of the navigation by deepening the channel,
preventing overhows, by the establishment
of reservoirs to hold in reserve surplus
waters, and by all other methods neces-
sary to accomplish the grand
result. Money should be voted
by Congress without stint, and money would
be voted by Congress, if the representatives
of the people legislated more for the coun
try and less for themselves and party. At
tention can not too often be called to this
subject. 1t is one pressing home upon the
people of this widespread valley. It is not
only of commercial necessity but of political
MISUNDERSTANDING the prosperity of mil
lions of people. The scattered and weak
frontier States have already become imperial
commonwealth, and the dazzling heights of |
the future clothed with power and plenty, |
are rising from the great valley of the Mis-
sissippi.