The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-10-05

time. so that assured results may be klned and tho communities affected oepend upon the Improvements. More over as an incident in caring for the isf eisef sI sb that 1t may become an eff nnited States government should do US run part in levee building. which. In the lower reaches of the river. will not only give channel for commerce. jacent bottom lands.
 Money for Missfssippl
 immense sums have already been sspent upon the Mississippi by the nsates and the nation. yet much of 1t merce. The reasons for this fact are many. One is that the work done by sne nafional government at least has Hot Hot been based upon definite and con- .lnuous plan. Appropriations by Com progress and timely completion nr each piece of work as 1t was underta- Ken rave been irregular and uncertain. AS direct consequence. far-reaching plans have been discouraged and con tinuity in execution has been made impossible. It Is altogether unlikely mat better results will be obtained so long as the method is followed of mak- lug partial appropriations at irregular intervals, for works which should new CT be undertaken until it is certain that they can be carried to completion within definite and reasonable time
 Planned and orderly development is essential to the best use of every nat ural resource, and to none more than 10 the pest use or our inland water ways. Tn the case of the waterways 1t has been conspicuously absent. Re- cause such foresight was lacking. the interests of our rivers have been in fact overlooked. in spite of the im- mense sums spent upon them. It is ev- ident that their most urgent need Is a farsighted and comprehensive plan, dealing not with navigation alone, nor with irrigation alone, but considering our inland waterways as a whole, and with reference to every use to which they can be put The central motive of such a plan should be to get from the streams of the United States not only the fullest but also the most per- manent service they arS capable of rem dering to the nation as whole.
 The industries developed under the stimulus of the railroads are for the most part permanent industries, and therefore they form the basis for future development But the railroads have shown that they alone can not meet the demands of the country for trans- portation. and where this Is true the rivers should begin to supplement the railroads, to the benefit of both by relieving them of certain of the less profitable classes of freight.
 The more farseeing railroad men, I
  and many of them have become earnest advocates of the improvements of the Mississippi, 80 that it may become sort of inland seaboard, extending from the Gulf far into the interior, and hone ultimately to the Great Lakes. An Investigation of the proposed Lakes-to- the-Gulf deep waterway is now in progress under an appropria-- tion of the last Congress We shall await its results with the keenest in- terest. The decision is obviously of capital importance to our internal development and scarcely less so in re- lation to external commerce.
 Inland Navigation.
 This is but one of the many pre- jects which 1t is time to consider, although a most important one Plans for the improvement of our inland navi- greatest river and It's chief tributaries. but they cannot end there. The lands which the Columbia drains include a vast area of rich grain fields and fruit lands. much of which Is not easily reached by railways The removal of Instructions In the Columbia and its chief tributaries would open to navf- gation and inexpensive freight trans- portation fully 2.e00 miles of channel. The Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers with their ddal openings into San Francisco Bay are partly navigable now. Their navigation should be main- tained and improved, so as to open the marvelously rich valley of California to inexpensive traffic. in order to facili- tate both rate regulation and the con- trol of the waters for other purposes. And many other rivers of the United States demand improvement, so as bet ter to meet the requirements of in4 creasing production from the soil. in creasing manufacture, and rapidly growing population.