The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-11-19
|oUTvoTEDB BY FOREIcNERs
President and Congress Mu6t Now Pass on It.
aaa.y More lrliIis.s If Dslisss en1 Several Tears Tine Necessury for cempletasn q sss-I~vsa
 Waterway.

Engineers of the Isthmiau Canal Com-| mission, q body which. If Presfdent Roosevelt realizes hin hopesy embodied the greatest and moat representatixe engineering talent Of tho world. placed ftstlf upon record as favaring the cons struction of the Panama Canal on tho sea-leve1.
 This decision represents the outcome of nearly three months of hard work. Early in September the eu9iueefes for the President. deeirous to avai3 oe the best talent as we'll as to avoid ad-
 verse foreign criticism in the katurA
 had called upon governments of the five nations distinguished for tho euc- cessful construction of great hydraulic works, to send each one of their beg1 engineers to assist the American enHi- neers In the decision of the momenton> question of constructing the Panama Canal at Baa-iayel or at greater nltf~s tude. involving system of looks. Tho foreigners came to Washington absolutely without instructions from their own governments and without bias. determined to bc guided to their decision solely by the facts to he pre- scented to them in the shape of great mass of physical data and supplements ed by several protects. notably that
 upon which tho French Panama Cona- pany worked So patiently for more than | | Panama Commission that of M. Hu< neau-varilla, the French engineer who was In charge of the canal works In I the last days of tho French adminix-
 fratton, and that of American Bates Eehe Chicago engineer who was ooa- nected with great enterprises on tha drainage canal.
 study of Data.
 Ie The Americans for their pNxf W@TA acquainted with the main features of these pro5eets before tho board mot m its first ssssiqn Npyerthelesa they ! with their foreign colleagues went over countless blue pf4nts ana maps. went to the Sis1MfnuE ana s1anue1 eS~ cry inch of the route Of the nroperky and had made up their minds when the board reccnvensd in Washingfon abouk the beginning of this month as to tlis type of canal they favored
 IL was not until last Tuesday that anything in the nature of decisive vote was taken. Just what that pro- position was cannot be stated with ab- solsite certainty, but 1t is conjecturea
 shat the issue Yes whether or not local canal of certain type should ba constructed. At afy rate the vsate dis- closed the fact that a majority of tho eight American members. under fhs lead of General Abbott. was strongly in favor of q lock canal
 The foreigners were against the par ticuiar type mentioned in the propoai- ton. but 1t was not clear at that moment they were opposed 10 the whole promo <ttfon of Iock ( .nal.
 The real test came today and the time between Tuesday and the meeting this morning was consumed In some very strong presentations on the part of the American delegates to influence their foreign colleagues to accept one or the other lock propsitions.
 Americans Not Unanimous.
 The Americans. however, were not unanimous for there Is reason to be- ifeye that three of their number, prob ably General Davis and Mir. Parsons and Mir. Burr. joined the foreign dele- gates in this last proposition, which decided the board as favoring the sea level.
 The decision was reached at noon and thereby the board practically con- cluded its labors. There will be few more meetings next week simply to deal with small details and to put into ornament forms the results of the boards protraeted meetings. The for efgn delegates desire to leave for their homes by the 27th instant. To ae- commodate them fin this tho full board has agreed that they may conclude some purely formal work connected with this project, such as the approval of certain military matters and eiG- natures of certain papers to be held in Paris in January.
 It Is expected that one of the Amer ican members of the board will go to Parts to wind up this business. all of which must be done before the final action of the board can be regarded as complete. The commission in return must record it's conclusions reached by the board of engineers and thara is even now belief current that that judgment will be adverse to the boards plan.
 However, there are two more impor- tant steps at either of which there may be great changes proposed for the com mission must pass the plans and it's own recommendations to the President who in turn must stamp them with hls own approval or disapproval and for ward them to Congress. which after all, will be the court of last resort as between the sea level and lock canal projects; simply through the fact that additional legislation will be necessary If a sea level canal Is to be built or the board finds that such a canal will cost from $75.000.000 to $.1gu.00e, ,oe0 more than the cheapest practical lock canal and will consume from five to seven years more In the construction