Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1907-10-08
THE PRESIDENT AND RIVER I'M
PROVEMENT.

President Roosevelt made it plain
in his speech at Memphis that
he is a hearty supporter Of the river
Improvement project. From the tone
of his speech it may be inferred that
this question will be given more or
less prominence in his forthcoming
message to congress. and t.may be in
ferred, too. that he will be a cham
of any appropriation measure That may
be introduced when the engineering
problems connected with the project
Of canalizing the Mississippi are solved
and the promoters of waterway
improvement are ready to go before
congress with a complete plan of ac-
ton prepared.
The president held it to be plain
that the railroads alone cannot meet
the demands of the country for trans
portation, and this being true, ne held
that the rivers should begin to supple
ment the railroads to the benefit of
both by relieving them of certain Of
the less profitable classes of freight.
He held, too, that adequate transporta-
ton facilities by water would better
permit rate regulation. Putting forth
the matter in this wise:
uGSS udlul oil ul6uWoyo, oIOA-
ways, can never be monoplized by any
corporation. They belong to all the
people, and it is in the power Of no one
to take them away. Wherever a
navigable river runs beside railroads
the problem of regulating the rates on
the railroads becomes far easier, be-
cause river regulation is rate regula-
ton. When the water rate sinks, the
land rate cannot be kept at an excess
sive height.
The president also took time in mis-
speech to refer to the needs Of the coun-
try of greater navy and those far
seeing people who saw nothing but a
bluff, a threat to Japan, in the inten-
ton announced by the administration
of moving the battleship fleet to the
Pacific coast, will find by careful
perusal of the presidents Memphis
speech that this program was planned
long before the first brick was thrown
at a Frisco Jap.
This question was brought out in his
reference to the Panama canal work
and Of the probability that the canal
will DE built sooner than was expected.
Discussing this the president. said:
Remember, gentlemen. that any
work like this entails grave RESPONSE
bilities. The one intolerable position
of a self-respecting nation, as for a
self-respecting man, is to bluff and
then not be able to make good. We
have accepted the Monroe doctrine as
cardinal feature of our foreign policy.
We have undertaken not only to build
but to police and to guard the Pan
anna canal. This means, unless we are
willing to accept the humiliation Of
being treated some time by some
strong nation as a vain and weak
braggard that we must build and main
tain our navy at the highest point Of
effia.srcy. When the canal Is finished
our aaI2 can move from one ocean to
the oibs- at will; for, remember that
our doors open on both oceans. Until
then our battle fleet, which should al
ways be kept and Unanswered as a
unit ought now to appear in our home
waters in one ocean and now to ap-
pear in our home waters in the other.
The Taft visit to Japan and the Of
fetal burying of the Ratchet shows,
too, that Japan has been made to see
that the plan Of sending the fleet to
the Pacific was arranged as practice
cruise and was planned long before
international complications were
threatened as result of the San Fran
cisco assaults.