USA > New York > New York : the planting and the growth of the Empire state, Vol. II > Part 10
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country to Green Bay, and thence to the Missis- sippi, and suggested that the Northwest might be connected with the sea " by canais or shorter cuts, and a communication opened by water to New York, Canada, etc., by way of the lakes." The prediction is remarkable for the extent of the scheme which it foreshadowed. Local con- siderations were to prompt the first action.
Governor Sir Henry Moore suggested canals for the portages on the Mohawk, when. August 17, 1768, he described a journey during which he " went up as far as the Canajoharie (now Little) Falls on the Mohawk River, with the intention to project a canal on the side of the falls with sluices, on the same plan as those in Languedoc." Perhaps George Washington's vision reached farther, when, after accompany- ing Governor George Clinton on the ascent of the Mohawk to Wood Creek and Oneida Lake, and visiting the sources of the Susquehanna, he wrote in 1783 to the Marquis of Chastellux of the immense diffusion of the vast inland nav- igation of the United States, and favored con- nections by these routes to the West. In 1784 Christopher Colles, having submitted to the legislature plans for removing obstructions in the Mohawk, was tendered, in perpetuity for himself and his associates, the profits on the navigation of the river, if improved by them,
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and at the next session an appropriation of $125 was made to enable him to complete his exam- inations. He proved to be only a prophet. In 1791, on the recommendation of Governor Clin- ton, a committee of the legislature was appointed to inquire what obstructions to navigation in the Hudson and Mohawk needed to be re- moved ; and a survey was ordered between Fort 'Stanwix and Wood Creek, then in Herkimer county, and the Hudson and Wood Creek in Washington county. From these surveys fol- lowed the incorporation of two companies, - one to open lock navigation from the Hudson to Lake Ontario and Seneca Lake, and the other to make a like connection between the Hudson
and Lake Champlain. The directors included the foremost men in the State. and the legisla- ture, as the work flagged, voted loans and sub- scriptions to the stock. A canal nearly three miles long, with five locks, was built around Little Falls on the Mohawk ; another, of a mile and a quarter, at German Flats ; and a third, of a mile and three- fourths, from the Mohawk to Wood Creek, with several wooden locks on the latter stream. The cost was $400,000 for a structure which called for frequent repairs, and after all did not prevent freight and pas- sengers from seeking more rapid conveyance by land. The Champlain project came to nothing,
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and of various other companies chartered, only that for connecting the Oswego River with the Cayuga and Seneca Lakes accomplished any pa 't of their designs for improving navigation.
The journey from New York to Albany, ac- cording to the narrative of Christopher Schultz, took in 1807 from two to five days, at a cost of from $6 to 810 for each passenger, including board ; while the charge for bulky freight was forty cents a hundred, and for heavier articles from twenty-five to fifty per cent. less. From Al- bany to Schenectady, a good turnpike road con- nected the two rivers. From the latter town to Utica, the windings of the Mohawk made a distance of one hundred and four miles, and freight by land or water was conveyed for sev- enty-five cents a hundred. On this river the favorite boats were from forty to fifty feet in length, steered by a large swing oar, and carry- ing a movable mast in the middle, with a square sail and topsail. With a fair wind they would make six miles an hour against the stream. In the absence of this help they were pushed for- ward by long poles, set against the bank or bot- tom of the river. Four men on each side were able to make from eighteen to twenty miles a day up the stream, and considerably more with the current. Other styles of boats were used, including those of flat bottoms for low water.
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The tolls on the lower canals were $2.25 a ton, besides charges of from $1.50 to $2.62 on each boat. At Wood Creek the tolls were $3.00 a ton, and as much more on the boat, and the freight charge $1.25 a hundred. From Utica to Oswego, by this route 114 miles, the journey took nine days. Our garrulous traveler reports the "cost of travel about $2 for a hundred miles, if any charge is made," and modern de- vices have hardly lowered that rate; but he adds, " if you furnish a good table, no passage money will be received, and these open-hearted fellows," the boatmen, "always seem much pleased to have gentlemen for passengers," in return, doubtless, for liberal hospitality. The farmers preferred to take their products to mar- ket in their own wagons, rather than stand the cost of water transportation. and they secured freight on their return, so that, for example. in Utica, which was besides " overstocked with shopkeepers." foreign goods were "nearly as cheap as in New York."
With the increase of traffic and population, and still more the confident predictions of growth in all directions, the slow and uncer- tain navigation of the inland rivers, valuable as it had been, particularly in the wars. was no longer satisfactory. Steam was in use on the Hudson. Since John Stevens in 1791 began
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experiments for steam navigation, inventors and thinkers were busy with the problem. In 1797 Chancellor Livingston, who had seen John Fitch's experiments the preceding year, built a steamboat on the Hudson, and received a grant of exclusive rights within the State, on condition that within twelve months he could secure a speed of three miles an hour. He failed to secure this speed, but continued interest in the subject, and afterward found an ally in Robert Fulton. Both Fulton and Ste- vens built boats that were successful, but Ful- ton's Clermont, making the trip from New York to Albany at the average rate of five miles an hour, August 7, 1807, secured for Liv- ingston and himself a monopoly on New York waters. On the Hudson, trips soon became regular, and gradually other boats were added.
Schemes of a great system dawned on many minds. De Witt Clinton attributes the "orig- inal invention of the Erie route " to Judge Francis A. van der Kemp, who, in August, 1792; proposed the route from Wood Creek by the Mohawk and Hudson, through the Seneca River to the Genesee lands, and through the Onondaga and Oswego Rivers to Lake Ontario. He, however, still relied on the slack water of the rivers. Gouverneur Morris, as early as 1777, declared that "at no distant day the
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waters of the great inland seas would, by the aid of man, break through their barriers and mingle with those of the Hudson ; " and in 1800, after a visit to Lake Ontario, skirting the south- ern shore and going to Niagara and Lake Erie, he drew a glowing picture of " ships to sail from London through the Hudson River to Lake Erie." He devoted his splendid abilities, his enthusiasm, and his great influence, to open- ing our waterways for the fulfillment of his prophecy. He urged the construction of that which became the Erie Canal, but believed that it should be built with a uniform declivity from west to east. The general project was taken up and discussed in private and in public, and in the newspapers.
After Albert Gallatin, in 1807, had reported favorably on President Jefferson's plan for ap- plying the surplus revenues of the national government for the construction of canals and railroads, Joshua Forman, of Onondaga county, presented a preamble and resolutions in the as- sembly in 1808 for the appointment of a joint committee to consider the project of a canal be- tween the tide-waters of the Hudson River and Lake Erie, "to the end that congress may be enabled to appropriate such sums as may be necessary to the accomplishment of that great national object." Thomas R. Gold, of Oneida
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county, presented an eloquent report, declaring that " while this State would forbear to dero- gate from the claim of others, she felt war- ranted in presenting to the government of the Union her own territory as preeminently dis- tinguished for commercial advantages." On the recommendation of the committee, the legislature unanimously directed the surveyor general, Simeon De Witt, to cause the various routes proposed to be accurately surveyed, and $600 were appropriated to defray the ex- penses. The survey was conducted by James Geddes, of Onondaga, who reported that a ca- nal from Lake Erie to the Hudson could be made without serious difficulty. The newspa- pers and magazines welcomed the enterprise and discussed its details.
In 1810 a commission, consisting of Gouver- neur Morris, De Witt Clinton, Stephen van Rensselaer, Simeon De Witt, William North, Thomas Eddy, and Peter B. Porter, was ap- pointed to explore the whole route, and they personally passed over the line. In March, 1811, they submitted their report favoring a canal, with an estimated cost of $5,000,000, on which, within a century, products worth $100,000.000 would be annually transported. The author, Gouverneur Morris, put it as a privilege to the nation to build the canal, and
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insisted that the conditions "must be the sub- ject of treaty." De Witt Clinton introduced a bill, passed April 8, 1811, to carry out the project ; and Robert R. Livingston and Rob- ert Fulton were added to the commission al- ready named, and now clothed with full powers. Morris and Clinton were sent to Washington to secure action on the part of congress. The republic was drifting into war, and needed its surplus for preparation, while Mr. Jefferson's plan of internal improvements by the national government was losing favor, and other projects, including a canal around the falls of Niagara, arose as rivals. It became evident that no help could be secured at Washington.
The commissioners, the next year, submitted a florid report from the pen of Mr. Morris, that, as the national government virtually declined to go on with the enterprise, the State was at liberty to build the canal, adding : " When the records of history shall have been obliterated, and the tongue of tradition have converted (as in China) the shadowy remembrance of ancient events into childish tales of miracles, this na- tional work shall remain, bearing testimony to the genius, the learning, and intelligence of the present age." Surely the magnitude and be- neficence of the plan were fully appreciated.
June 19, 1812, the term of the commissioners
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. was extended, and they were authorized to bor- row money and deposit it in the treasury, and to take cessions of land, but not to proceed with measures for constructing the canal. In 1814 the commission reported that grants of land were offered by the Holland Land Company, whose vast estate was traversed by the route, of 100,632 acres ; by Bayard and McEvers, of 2,500 acres; by Governor Hornby, of 3,500 acres ; by Gideon Granger, of 1,000 acres ; and these gifts were in due time in fact received, while there were landowners who struggled to secure heavy damages for the right of way.
For a while, legislature and people were called upon to devote all their energies to the war, first for the invasion of Canada, afterward, by strong and liberal, almost wasteful measures, for the defense of the commonwealth. The defeat of De Witt Clinton for the presidency kept him at home, and gave him opportunity to devote his zeal and talents to internal improvements. He was among the foremost in 1816 in reviving the canal project. Governor Tompkins, in his message, submitted the subject to the legisla- ture. The popular voice expressed. from New York and Albany and along the whole route. intense interest for the immediate prosecution of the work. A memorial from New York, written by De Witt Clinton, stated the case
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with great clearness and force and elaboration, advocating a route to Lake Erie rather than to Lake Ontario and around Niagara. The legis- lature appointed a new commission, consisting of Stephen van Rensselaer, De Witt Clinton, Samuel Young, Joseph Ellicott, and Myron Holley, to explore and examine routes, to in- vite aid from sister States and from land pro- prietors. In 1817 the commission, of which De- Witt Clinton had been chosen president, esti- mated the cost of the Erie Canal, 353 miles in length, forty feet wide at the surface, twenty- eight feet at the bottom, with seventy-seven locks, at 84,571,813. The Champlain Canal was estimated at $871,000. For both works it was believed money could be secured by loan, and both principal and interest could be paid without taxation. An act for the construction of these canals was passed on the last day of the session, April 15, 1817, by a vote of sixty- four to thirty-six in the assembly and eighteen to nine in the senate. A canal fund was con- stituted, and placed under the control of a board composed of certain state officers, and this board was authorized to borrow money not ex- ceeding 8400.000 a year. The former com- missioners were reappointed, and authorized to build the canals and fix and collect tolls.
The canals were already a political question.
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De Witt Clinton had become their most con- spicuous advocate. In his last message, Gover- nor Tompkins made no reference to them, and his supporters were not inclined to favor them. He was reelected governor by a vote of 45,412 to 38,647 for Rufus King. Both candidates had aspirations, and both were regarded by their partisans as qualified for the presidency. Mr. King in fact received in the electoral college such few votes as the federalists had to give, thirty-four in number. The republicans were not so favorable towards a New York candidate, for the " Virginia dynasty " had chosen James Monroe for the succession, but Governor Tomp- kins was named for vice-president. When, in November, 1816, the legislature met, it chose electors for Monroe and Tompkins, and the governor resigned just in time to proceed to the national capital.
This change in governor was vital in its bearings upon the canals. The members of the legislature who supported the act for their con- struction were designated as Clintonians, with the federalists, who were not numerous. Tomp- kins' jealousy of Clinton may explain his cool- ness to the enterprise ; it is certain that he was an obstacle rather than an aid. His transfer to Washington made necessary a special election for governor; and, not altogether with the ap-
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proval of the managing politicians, for the first time a State convention was called, instead of a legislative caucus, to select the candidate, and De Witt Clinton was nominated. Prominent in opposition to Mr. Clinton, although in 1812 he had managed his canvass, was Martin Van Buren, at this time attorney general, marvel- ously adroit in stratagem and manipulation, and already aspiring to personal leadership. He had separated from those with whom he gener- ally acted. in favoring the canal policy, doubt- less because he recognized the growing power of the northeastern, the central and western counties, which were intensely enlisted, and be- cause he foresaw the lasting advantages of the work. The southern district was less favorably inclined to the canals. But the general senti- ment was overwhelming, and at the election Clinton received 43,310 votes to only 1,479 for Peter B. Porter. The governor-elect was thus restored to the primacy which his defeat for the presidency seemed to have taken away from him, and the administration of the State became devoted and unreserved in pressing the con- struction of the canals.
Governor Clinton assumed his executive duties July 1, 1817, and on the national anni- versary, three days later, he was present when ground was broken at Rome for the under-
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taking which for ten years he had vigorously pressed. His messages in succeeding years pre- sent the progress of the work. In 1819, the same year in which the first steamship to cross the ocean was built in New York, he looked for- ward to the improvement of the navigation of the Susquehanna, the Allegany, the Genesee, and the St. Lawrence ; to a plan for connecting the lakes with the Mississippi ; to a route from the Erie Canal by the Oswego River to Lake Ontario ; and to a scheme, in union with Penn- sylvania, to connect Seneca Lake with the Sus- quehanna. October 23, 1819, the canal between Utica and Rome was open to navigation, and November 24 boats passed through the Cham- plain Canal. In 1820 Governor Clinton noti- fied the legislature that the navigation between Utica and the Seneca River had been in prog- ress for four months, and he urged that meas- ures be taken for completing the Erie Canal within three years.
In the preceding State election, Vice-Presi- dent Tompkins, although a candidate and sub- sequently chosen for a second term to that position, became also a candidate for governor. The opponents of Governor Clinton were intent on his defeat, not on personal grounds only, but on the plea that he was an ally of the federal- ists, and still more that his canal policy was
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carrying the State forward to bankruptcy and ruin, and Tompkins' name was regarded as the strongest that could be presented. The oppo- sition to Governor Clinton was led by Martin Van Buren and Tammany Hall, already a pow- erful organization ; and as some of its members wore on certain occasions the tail of a deer in their hats, those who joined in this move- , ment were styled " Bucktails." The contest was very bitter and close, Clinton receiving 47,447 votes to 45,990 for Tompkins, and ani- mosities did not cease with the closing of the polls, while the legislature was favorable to Tompkins, and still had the choice of presiden- tial electors.
In his message, Governor Clinton urged a change in the constitution, giving that choice to the people, while he referred to the charge current and hardly denied of the free use of the patronage of the national government to affect the recent election. His language was hypo- thetical, and as it gave rise to one of the most noted controversies in the State, it has become historic. He said : " The power of the general government has increased with the extension of its patronage. And if the officers under its appointment shall see fit, as an organized and disciplined corps, to interfere in the State elec- tions, I trust there will be found a becoming
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. disposition in the people to resist these alarm- ing attempts upon the purity and independence of the local government. I have considered it my solemn duty to protest against these un- warrantable intrusions of extraneous influence, and I hope the national legislature will not be regardless of its duty on this occasion." Elec- tors favorable to Monroe and Tompkins were chosen by the legislature, and they were duly elected for a second term. In the house of representatives, the New York rivalries were brought out in the organization in November, 1820, when, against the vigorous hostility of the party of the vice-president, John W. Taylor, of Saratoga county, was chosen speaker. At home the senate by resolution challenged the governor to produce proof of the interference of the officers of the national government in the recent election, " as an organized and disci- plined corps," which Mr. Clinton promised at the next session. Peter R. Livingston. Samuel Young and Roger Skinner distinguished them- selves by the acrimony of their assaults on Governor Clinton; and the first charged that " the ambitious executive of the State of New York, in his pride and arrogance, has brought himself to the very verge of treason against the government of the United States. He has at- tempted, in support of his deep-laid political
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plans, to sever the relations of allegiance and good feeling between the general government and the State of New York. He has insidiously attempted to separate one of the great States of the nation from the Union of States. And for what? Because many of the officials of the general government are opposed to his bound- less schemes of personal ambition."
In January, 1821, the governor submitted in- cidents of the activity of State officers, with a mass of documents and a letter from Van Buren asking for the removal of postmasters, to "alarm " the Clintonians in office, and some changes were made on his demand. A joint committee did not find the proof sufficient to sustain his charges, and reported, in strange disregard of facts, "that the existence of any extraneous influence has never been observed in any of our elections."
The legislature chose Martin Van Buren United States senator ; the council of appoint- ment made haste to remove the friends of the governor from positions that could be reached ; a majority of the canal commissioners was made up of his enemies ; and so overwhelming was the adverse current that his intimate advisers notified him that he could not be reelected in 1822, and he accordingly declined to be a candi- date ; whereupon Joseph C. Yates was chosen,
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with only scattering votes in favor of Solomon Southwick. Mr. Clinton's executive career seemed to be ended when, April 12, 1824, he was removed from the office of canal commis- sioner by a vote of twenty-one to three in the senate, and sixty-four to thirty-four in the assembly. The partisan trick was a surprise to the legislature, and it aroused a storm of in- dignation which produced a political revolution, and at the election the same year carried the intended victim back into the executive chair by 16,359 majority over Samuel Young, one of his most virulent assailants. He was there- fore governor when, October 26, 1825, the waters of Lake Erie were let into the canal, and navigation was open from the lake to the Hudson. The popular jubilation extended from New York to Albany and along the route to Buffalo; cannon, banners, fêtes, balls, ad- dresses, medals, gave expression to the joy, in which party strife was forgotten, and the dawn of a new era was greeted.
Work properly chargeable to construction was continued on the Erie Canal until 18:6, and the entire cost proved to be 87,143.789. In the completed canal, boats could be used a little more than seventy-eight feet long by four- teen and a half feet wide, with a draft of three and a half feet, and of seventy-five tons
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burden. The great benefits accruing led to a movement for enlargement, which was success- ful in securing legislation for beginning opera- tions, in the act of May 11, 1835.
For years the policy of enlargement was the occasion of conflict. Plans were proposed for the expenditure of 840,000.000. In 1842, so general was the charge of extravagance and waste, that the work was stopped and the settlement of all contracts ordered ; and by the constitution of 1846, payments were required from the canal revenues for a general sinking fund and the support of the government, in ad- dition to obligations incurred for the public works, while the legislature was limited in the creation of any new debt. In 1847 the enlarge- ment was begun again and pressed. not without opposition, to completion in 1862. The en- largement cost more than six times as much as the original work, and brought the outlay for the Erie Canal up to $52,491.915.74. Vast as this sum is, it is claimed that it has been repaid to the State by the canal, with an excess of $42,000,000 in addition to cost of superintend- ence and repairs.
The engincers, by the enlargement, reduced the lockage on the whole canal by twenty-one feet, and the number of locks by eleven, while their length was increased by twenty feet. The
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prism was widened to seventy feet at the top and fifty-six feet at the bottom, with a depth of seven feet ; and the boats were allowed a length of ninety-eight feet, with a width of seventeen and a half feet, and a draft of six and a half feet. The greatest amount of tolls collected on all the canals of the State was in 1862. $5,188,943, and the maximum value of all merchandise carried was $305,301,920 in 1868, and the maximum tonnage was 6,673,370 in 1872.
The average tolls per ton, which were in 1839 81.12, were reduced to $1.06 in 1850, to 64 cents in 1860, to 42 cents in 1870, to 24 cents in 1880, and in 1882, the last year before they were abolished, they were only 12 cents. In the mean time the boats on the Erie Canal were increased in size. They averaged 64 tons burden in 1844, and first passed 100 tons in 1854, when they measured 105 tons. In 1866 they averaged 154 tons, and in 1880 reached 212 tons, falling to 166 tons in 1884. The cost of transportation between New York and Buf- falo has been reduced in a geometrical ratio. From Albany to Buffalo, before the canal was built, the charge for freight was, along the Mohawk, 15 cents a ton per mile, and where rivers offered no competition to land carriage, 50 cents, making an average of more than 25
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