The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-01-08
Thu NICARAGUA Canal,
Senator Allen Points Out It's
Importance to the Coast.
ADJOURNMENT TO MONDAY.
Chairman Springer Drafts a Bill
Placing Wool on the Free List.
Duty on Woolen Manufactures Greatly
Reduced-Chance of Seattle Public
Building Bill Passing -Stateho cd
for Arizona and New Mexico.

WASHINGTON CRY, Jan. Especial. l.
Senator Allen made good speech today
on the question of the Nicaragua canal.
he was listened TO vita great deal of in
terest by all the senator's. 1t will have a
good influence on legislation. The senator
said:
In obedience to the express wishes of my con-
stituents and because l entertain the same
opinions as they do. avail myself of this oppor-
tunity to give utterance to their profound inter
est in this matter While the results OF this
enterprise are beneficial to all nations it will
especially stimulate our own country and par
tcularly the Pacific coast and the state of Wash
ington. 1t has been the dream of navigators to
have some passageway from the Atlantic to
the Pacific coast between the ports of Brito,
on the Pacific coast, and Greytown, on the At
lantic The distance is 1863 miles. and the high
est water level 102 feet OF this transit Lake
Nicaragua furnishes ffty-six miles, the San
Juan river, which discharges from it into the
Atlantic. sixtv-three miles, while for the re-
naming the valleys are so converted into basins
that of the entire length of this connecting
channel there viii be but eight or ten miles so
contracted as to impede the vessels. Engineers
have placed the cost Of this enterprise at $780,
100000, and concessions have been made by the
Nicaragua government ana Costa Rica to the
Maritime Canal Company, of Nicaragua, a cor
poration created by an act of congress- for
ninety-nine years after the completion of the
work
The proposed guaranty of the bonds of the
Company by the United States should enact
that no enormous tolls be charged to pay fcti-
tious stocks, while the ownership in trust OF
more than two-thrds of the stock of the COM
pany by the government should render its finan-
cial liability but normal and its control un-
questioned. The responsibility assumed and
the national character of the work should make
1t matter of the first Importance. and there
should be an honest expenditure of the money
so far as legislation can make it. About twenty
eight hours is the estimated time for the pass
age OF ship from ocean to ocean. The abund-
ance of water dischargfng through Lake Mic
aragua will admit OF enlarged canal facilities
to meet any requirements OF commerce,
and frequent rapid streams along the route
will enable the use of electric light,
so that the movement of ships will not be
hindered at night, This short waterway con-
yerts the continent of South America into an
island, with stretch of over 1900 miles of sea-
wall at the center, and cuts off the detour of
commerce of nearly half OF the world. 1t will
shorten the voyage between our Atlantic and
faeihc ports about 10000 miles. 1t will prac-
ncally unite our Atlantic and Pacific seaboards.
Ii VIII cheaper the transportation of staple
freight to a rate that the railroads cannot give.
The immense freights OF European and Asiatic
nations Will move through the Nicaragua canal:
also those of Australia and the Hawaiian islands,
and the Central and South American repu blics.
twill bring the Eastern markets nearer TO the
Puget sound region, with its gigantic forests,
and with its walls of coal and iron.
1t is estimated that in the state of Washington
alone there are 81 0000 900 acres of timber lands.
Lumber, of which we have an indefinite supply,
can be transported to the markets of Europe.
The catch of fishes is already counted by the
millions of pounds Nature has given us un-
limited quantities of iron and Bessemer ores and
limestone. The encircling mountains from the
northwest to the southeast, in radius OF $50
miles, with Spokane as a center, and through
Idaho into Montana, are rich in lead, silver end
gold. while Eastern Washington and Oregon
and Western Idaho offer n cereal belt surprising
any part of our country, or of the world. In
the Walla Walla valley the farms for
the past twenty years have been yielding
forty bushels to the acre. The last census re-
veals the fact that the state OF Washington is
only surpassed by the state of New York in tho
production of hops. Aside from the wheat
loaded at the port OF Tacoma for San Francisco,
there has been 5000, 900 bushels shipped foreign
since the harvest. The completion of this canal
places Puget sound in position TO load any
vessel that floats the sea, and at all times in the
year Ii will afford volume of traffic through
the Nicaragua canal little dreamed of at this
time
The necessity for this canal is imperative. 1t
is too costly for private enterprise. Ii will be a
monument to the civilization of this age-more
to the Western hemisphere than the Suez canal
has been to the Eastern.