The Wilmington morning star., 1947-01-09

Members of the wilmington En-
oineers Club, it is with lively
sinosure that l have this opportuni-
T. If appearing before you this
evening. | do appreciate your in
s.;tation and hope that | shall bring
,,on something of interest as En-
~sineers. You of Wilmington are all
1pII acquainted with the Corps OF
T~noinecrs and the work it has ac-
complished in eastern North Caro-
Ina along the waterway, the har-
hors and the rivers, but 1 do not
beIieve you are equally familiar
Nth the work that is being ac-
complished by the Corps on the
inland waterways elsewhere in the
South.
wish TO speak briefly concern
ino the two large projects now
Hnder construction on inland water
wavs here in the southland. Both
nroiects have multi-purpose bene-
IT'S including flood control, navi-
cation and hydr~oelectric power
%SToduction. The states of the south,
Particularly Georgia and South
carolina, will be highly affected by
those two developments now under
wav-Clark Hill dam and reservoir
on the Savannah River and the Al
latoona dam and reservoir on the
F4owah River.
For many years the efforts OF
tho Federal Government in i'm
nrovinp our water resources were
i.roolv confined to navigation,
fIood control, and irrigation. Navi-
cation and fl%ood-control works
wore executed by the Corps of En-
o,neers. and irrigation works by
the Reclamation Service. Local
interests contributed in varying de-
grees to those Improvements, for
fbe GOOD and sufficient reason that
1ocai interest assures the people
-bat they will get what they want.
Formerly, the development of cleo
tric energy was almost entirely
reformed by private corporations,
and cities developed their own
municipal water supplies. There
wore. Of course, exceptions to these
n~rocedures. In general, however.
nroiect executed under one of
the aforementioned agencies was
y single purpose project. Under
these policies the Corps of En-
gineers might build a series OF
low navigation dams on a strength
NJ river which should more prop
erlv be improved by high dams
that could serve two or more
/ purposes.
States Rights
The reason for this lack of in
8 tegration may be traced to our
earlv interpretation of the Con-
Il s~titution with regard to States
rights. The Federal Government
maintained only that, under the
constitutional authority to regu-
late interstate commerce, it had
the right to make navigation I'M
provements and to control other
improvements which affected navi-
cation. As time passed, the national
thinking changed, and we now find
the Federal Government engaged
in flood-control works and power
projects in which transportation be-
tween states is only of secondary
Importance. An outstanding exam
! PIE is the Okeechobee levee which
controls waters falling entirely
within the State of Florida.
In 1927, Congress passed an act
calling for the examination of a
large number of streams, the
plans for which were to be tested
and migrated for navigation,
power, flood control, and irrigation.
These studies we're made by the
Corps of Engineers, and are known
as the House Document BOB Sur
veys. Since that date, all of our
waterway investigations have
covered these four possible uses.
The benefits derived from such
uses; namely, navigation, power,
Hood control, and irrigation, are