The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-11-25
ALI. IN X MUDDLE.

ALE IN A SUDDLE.
 The New York Evening Post is dis- posed to he severe in commenting on the canal situation and all connected
 with 1t. From a recent editorial we
 copy this:
 The whole thing is, first of all, a sar-
 fsns sn nn mth Ss nrsr way a
 ways on 2 hair-tr lgger. What was the excuse given foi lIfs lswless course in
 Panama two years ago3 Why 1t was
 the peoples hope of an Isthmian canal
 must be ended, once for all. Talk not
 to MT. Roosevelt of being patient with to renew and perfect q treay in an or-
 derly way. The. thing had to be done
 out of hand. There must not be an
 9sser days delay If hss,y reyo 1e a,en
 tion and bouffe republic, do. it with out hesitation--anything rather than
 lose an hours time in setting to work.
 Secretary Taft. ffl his speech on Sat
 urday at St. Louis, deprecated the use
 of the phrase make the dirt fly" But
 It was the Presidents own, To the Yale
 of his action, he sent the triumphant
 message; "Tell them that l am going
 to make the dirt fly on the Isthmus.
 we now? still. according to the major
 ity of the consulting engineers. fifteen
 or twenty years away from the conn % before 9s s s of ssso sa S or soo ooo ooe
 instead ofs the s14o.ooo.ooo asked of
 Congress.
 This final muddle will. be highly dis
 ed for unanimous report. surmount-
 ing all technical difficulties. and he finds the engineers he appointed. sharp Iy and hopelessly disagreed. In his ad- dress to them at Oyster Bay. he put
 the utmost practicable speed" in the forefront. They coolly talk of a period even after MT. Roosevelt's fourth term in the Presidency--if he fulfills the predictions of his. friends and is elected urged "immediate building;' he has got something painfully like 'aimme- diate ownership' in Chicago. .Imme- tionaries as "American political slang. meaning never.
 There are a number of discouraging-7 not to say creditable--features con- nected with the canal project. wheth- CT the President honestly deceived him. self and by this means misied the pub lie. or whether he was merely talking for effect, makes little difference in the results. The fact remains that the whole matter is about as badly mud dled now as it has ever been. The radi- cal disagreement on the part of the cons sulting engineers leaves the great scheme in the air. On various occas- ions the President has talked in way that would lead those who have that all obstacles were out of the way and that the great work would move smoothly along to completion. It matters not whether he deceived him self or was misleading the public, for the result is the same.
 We cannot see that it makes any diff ference whether the President endorses the decision of the majority of the board of engineers OF whether he sides with the minority for lock canal. The whole matter must so before Congress and that body is not in the habth of hurrying important questions. We have seen the statement. coming frdsn an important canal official, that unless Congress appropriates several million dollars at once even the preliminary work must stop. Nobody can expect such an appropriation under present conditions. If the. coming Congress does anything to advance the work we shall be agreeably disappointed. As long ago as last February The Engi- neering Magazine, a good authority. said:
 Tt is the unanimous opinion of all the engineers who have had practical experience in canal work, and time to study the problem thoroughly. that no project without locks, and no sea-leve1 canal with a tidal lock, is that would be comparable in ease and safety of transit to one equipped with modern locks and plan ned to take advantage of all the de- ditions offer. Why. then, waste an ex- tra ten or a dozen years and untold of dollars. to execute a scheme which the investigation of thirty y-five years have demonstrated to possess on- ly sentimental merit due to the fmagi- nation of NJ. de Lesseps?"
 And thus it goes--confusion added to uncertainty. If engineering experts differ so radically on the most impor- tant features of the work what hope have we that Congress will reach definite conclusion so that actual con- struction operations may go forward without any more hitches? The whole | husineas seems to he in n uliddle