The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-09-22

! tine very important ami influential Rivers
and Harbors convention assembled at
Tuscaloosa composed of delegates from
several adjoining states, but principally
from Alabama. II has been explained
that this notable event was conceived by
the Birmingham Daily Age. Louis J. Du-
Pre- special editor. The convention was
presided over by United States District
Judge Harry Toulmin of Mobile. Senator
Pugh delivered an elaborate address,
Governor O'Neal an enthusiastic and ap-
preciative speech, Congressman Martin
and Jones Taylor Jones and ex-Congress-
man Thomas Williams spole Congress-
man Davidson. Oates Joseph Wheeler
wrote sympathetic letters.
| The principal letter written to the con-
vention was from Senator Morgan. The
senator took the position that the state
owned the land through and over which
| the rivers flow, the banks and the beds
| Of the river, but ii was the right of all
| the states Maine and Alabama equally,
to improve the navigation. That is to
say the congress of all the states had the
right to improve navigable streams in
all parts of the union. He would not ad-
nit, however, that Congress had the right
to cut canals in any state thus providing
artificial courses of commerce
| The letter contended the people OF the
United states had the right to the min
erals and the timber along the Warrior
and Coosa rivers, that the cities OF st.
Louis, New orleans and Chicago had the
] 40 hot ha IenDeS-
see would empty at their wharves.' IL
was therefore the duty of Congress 10
omen those streamssto free Navigation
| Besides wrote the senator, "pesiues
| a transisthrnian canal is now as certain
of construction in 10 years % time as
1.-The Canadian Pacific railway was 10 years
ago Whether the United states
builds it or not it will be constructed;
whether through Tehauntepec, Nicaragua
or Panama is not a matter of so much I'M
portance to Alabama as the fact that the
| tide of commerce that 1t VIII create "iii
dow along our coast. Through 'he saie
and beautiful Bay of Mobile we Will meet
| the ships on their voyage to ana from
the Atlantic and the Pacific, with our coal
and other supplies
| The Tuscaloosa convention was tea'-
l;re only of a general movement TO I'M
prove the rivers and harbors OF the state
mfr in motion by the success of the Elyton
Land Company's enterprise in Birmlng-
ham. A preceding feature OF the same
movement was to be found in the Joiht
resolution of the Legislature OF lsS4-o pc
titioning Congress for increased appro-
pria tions to continue the Improvements of
the Tennessee and the Coosa rivers and
the Joint memorial asking for sufficient
money to complete the same kind of work
on the Warrior.
| Senator Morgan's marvellous capacity
| for work will not be understood except by
the student of The Congressional Record.
lie covered the entire range of legislative
| subjects known to his office. In the
! same session he introduced bill to reg
ulate immigration, a bill to define a
| treaty. bill to increase the salary of
a Senate employe bill for the relief OF
James A. Alden and scores of other like
| bills of a personal nature. bill relating
| to the coneordate between the Pope at
Rome and the state of Colombia, South
America; a bill to print the report of DR..
Hodgson on ."Tropical Countries" He
made various committee reports and de-
| livered innumerable arguments from his
seat
| In a speech at Opelika, in the Alabama
CANA nign of 1894, the Oates campaign for
governor, the senator describing his habits
of life, said he went to bed at u O'Clock
and rose at 5, and that the intervening
time was spent in labor His colleague,
Pugh, said although he lived in his own
house at Washington, in the quarter of
century of his close contact with Morgan,
with frequent visits to his house, the lat
| ter had never crossed his Threshold. He
owned the conventional dinner coat. but
so rarely put ii on that when a gentleman
from Alabama was caught in Washington
without one. the senator offered the use
of his
| Senator Morgan satisfied himself by
his easy defeat of Watts. Langdon and
III. c. Tompkins in the legislature of
| 18S2-3 for a second term, that he was
linyincible in Alabama Before that elec-
ton he had made frequent visits to the
state After then he seems to have az
rived at the settled plan of devoting his
| whole time to study and preparation,
leaving his claim upon his office by Pc
| rodic elections to take care of itself. RE
never asked any man to vote for him He
sold his residence in Selma, bought onsa
| in Washing ton and labored on, an INTEL
lectual hermit to the last; styling him
| self on the floor of the Senate IAN ambas-
sador from Alabama in fact, a coun-