The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1909-08-23
BROADER PLANS
FOR WATERWAYS
Leading Men Recognize Neces-
Sity for Active Work
BIG CAMPAIGN PLANNED
Water in Waterways Must First Be
Controlled, Good Supply of Wa
ter Secured and Terminals
Must Be Improved.

Washington August 22-(Special)-In
its unqualified Endorsement of the move
ment for waterways Improvement the re-
port of the national conservation com
mission, which has just been printed in
full as a Senate document, places upon
an authoritative basis the claims that
have all along been made by the friends
of the movement. In this report a score
of the biggest men in governmental cir
cles today, the men who know most
about the matter, agree that broad plan
for waterways improvement should be
Immediately laid down and followed to
completion. The report says in part:
ut is now recognized by statesmen and
experts that navigation is interdependent
with other uses of the streams that each
stream is essentially a unit from its
source to the sea; and that the benefits
of a comprehensive system of waterway
Improvement will extend to all the peo-
pie in the several sections and states of
the country.
ut is also recognized, through the
unanimous declaration of the governors
of the states and territories adopted in
conference with the leading jurists and
statesmen and experts of the country.
that in the use of the natural resources
the independent states are nterdependent
and bound together by ties of mutual
benefits, responsibilities and duties.
ut has recently been declared by ma
jority of our leading statesmen that it is
an imperative duty to enter upon sys-
tematic improvement, on large and COM
prehensive plan, just to all portions of
the country, of the waterways and har-
bors and great lakes, whose natural
adaptability to the increasing traffic
of the land is one of the greatest gifts
of benign providence; while the minor
ity indorsed the movement for control of
the waterways still more specifically and
in equally emphatic terms.
"Within recent months It has been rec
ognized and demanded by the people,
through many thousand delegates from
all states assembled in convention In diff
ferent sections of the country, that the
waterways should and must be improved
promptly and effectively as means of
maintaining national prosperity.
1.-THE first requisite for waterway Inn
provement is the control of the waters
in such manner as to reduce floods and
regulate the regimen of the. navigable
rivers. The second requisite is develop
ment of terminals and connections in such
manner as to regulate commerce.
TN considering the uses and benefits to
be derived from the waters the para
mount use should be water supply; next
should follow navigation in humid regions
and irrigation in arid regions. The de-
velopment of power the navigable
and source streams should be co-ordinated
with the primary and secondary uses of
the waters. other things equal, the de-
velopment Of power should be encour-
aged, not only to reduce the drain on
signed reservoirs and power plants retard
the run-off, and so aid In the control of
the streams for navigation and other
uses.
Broad plans should be adopted pro-
viding for a system of waterway i'm
provement extending to all uses of the
waters and benefits to be derived from
their control, including the Qualification
of the water and abatement of floods for
the benefit of navigation; the extension
of Irrigation; the development and appli-
cation of power; the prevention of soil
wash the publication of streams for
water supply, and the drainage and util-
ization OF the waters Of swamp and over
flow lands"