and Ohio railroad, and, for a considerable portion | amount of expenditure upon that estimate. Now, of the time, the Pennsylvania Central and other if the Convention were going to undertake this railroads further south; and it entirely blockaded work, the question is, whether they will run the the Mississippi. Consequently, large amounts of property were forced in this direction, and upon the Erie canal, which would not otherwise have come here. It is unsafe, I submit, to base a large expenditure of money upon the revenues in those exceptional years. It is not prudent nor careful management to do so. Assuming, then, that the average of the last ten years is a fair average of the net revenues of the canals, I have ascertained that, according to the section proposed by the Canal Committee, they will get, down to 1870, something over four millions of dollars: and then they get nothing, according to their own programme, from 1870 to 1880-not one dollar.

risk, if they deem it so necessary and desirable, of being prevented in 1870 from going on with the work for ten years thereafter; and I submit to members of this Convention whether they would not run that risk by adopting this estimate of three millions a year, which is about $100,000 more than the average of the last seven years. Now, sir, I have said all that I desire to say in relation to the propositions submitted by the Canal Committee, and I desire to repeat that I have spoken with great freedom and frankness, because I believe those provisions deserve it; I believe that this Convention, when they enter upon this scheme, should do it with their eyes Mr. PROSSER-I inquire from what report the open. At the same time, I desire to repeat, howgentleman reads when he speaks of four millions? ever, that I have no intention to reflect upon the Mr. CHURCH-Well, sir, I read from a state- honesty and good faith of the committee who ment made by the accountant in the auditor's de- have reported these provisions to the Convention. partment, by which he shows that on the first The gentleman from Ontario [Mr. Lapham] has day of October, 1868, the Canal Committee can told us that he has no interest in this take from the sinking funds two millious and a question; that he has examined it for the first half; on the first of October, 1869, they can take time in his life, and has become an enthusiastic one milliou two hundred thousand; on the convert to this policy of debt and expenditure. first of October, 1870, they can take one For my own part, sir, unlike that gentleman, I have million one hundred and seventy thousand, had some experience in relation to these matters. which makes between four and five millious of I have heard the glories of the Erie canal talked dollars. about before, when money was desired to be exMr. PROSSER-I would ask the goalica topended. I have heard before how great and point out to the committee wherein the Committee glorious were these works, and how great and on Canals, in providing for the interest and princi-glorious were the men who projected them and pal of the canal debt falling due and to be paid in carried them forward. But I never did think, and 1878, and in providing for the interest on the I do not now think, that such considerations alone general fund debt duo in the mean time, have made any error, upon the supposition that there would be three millions net revenue in making the $7,600,000, the first of January, 1870.

Mr. CHURCH-If the gentleman from Erie [Mr. Prosser] had listened to my remarks, he would have discovered how unnecessary it was for him to make this interruption; for I was proceeding upon the ground that the net revenues of the canals could only be safely caiculated at $2,418,000.

Mr. PROSSER-One other question, if the gentleman please. I will inquire whether, in the gentleman's judgment, the year 1866 was an exceptional year for the revenue, as were the other years?

Mr. CHURCH-The year 1866 was in some respects an exceptional year, for the reason that all kinds of produce ruled at very high prices; and when that is the case an extraordinary amount is sent forward. If the gentleman will take this present year, during which prices have also ruled high, and which year expires on the first of October next, in less than thirty days from this time, he will find that the net revenues will not be more than $2,418,000. Yet we have had, during the whole year, as I have said, very high prices for all kinds of produce, which has induced the sending forward of a larger amount than usual. The point to which I desire to call the attention of the Convention is this: I do not say that it is impossible that three millions of dollars may be realized as the net revenues from the canals; I do say that it is unsafe to base a large

ought to insure the adoption of any specific measure of expenditure which may be proposed to a Constitutional Convention, or the Legislature, or the people. It is enough for us to say that we have these works upon our hands and must take care of them. For one, I am in favor of continuing them in the possession of the State. I would have the State nourish and cherish them, and protect them, and make them as useful as it is possible to make them; I would have these canals free from debt; I would have the commerce that passes over them free from taxes or tolls; and I would have free and open highways, not only to citizens of this State, but to the citizens of the whole country, as a line of transit from the West to the financial center of the country. The objection I have to the management of the canals, heretofore and now, is in relation to their finan cial management. I say it is a mistake, sir, a grave mistake, to load these canals down with debt. It always was a mistake. It can be demonstrated as plainly as mathematics can demonstrate that two and two make four, that if you had never borrowed one dollar to enlarge your canals, but had applied the revenues faithfully from year to year, your enlargement would have been completed before it was completed, and you would have been out of debt, and your commerce free from taxation. Sir, we have arrived at the point now when we can accomplish that object. Within a few short years this outstanding debt of the State can be paid. If the estimate of the Canal Committee is correct, it can be paid in eight years; if the estimate we have made is correct, it

comments in relation to now, as at any other time. This proposed enlargement of the canal is not necessary, in my judgment. at this time. It is premature. I do not mean to say that it never will be necessary; I have taken no such ground in the report, nor any where. It is not necessary for me to take any such ground. But I do take the ground that at this time it is unnecessary. I aver that the canals are capable cï carrying a very large amount more than they now du. I aver that the capacity of the canals has not been reached by more than one-half, to speak within bounds; and I do not believe there is a practical, disinterested man in the State, conversant with these surjccts, who believes there is any necessity for this enlargement for the purpose of carrying all the produce or all the property which will be brought, or is being brought, to the canals for transport. There are various ways of ascertaining whether these canals are overtaxed with business. In the first place, if we go to the reports of our State officers who have charge of the canals, you will find that uniformly they have shown that the capacity of the canals has not been reached by one-half. Take the reports of our State Engineer, the officer who, of al! others, is the most compete to make au esti. mate on this subject; and for the last five, six, seven years, in every one of the reports, this subject has been discussed, and in every one of them these officers have determined that the capacity of the canals has not been reached by at least one-half. The present State Engineer, not only in his report, but in his testimony before this very Canal Committee, has said that the capacity of the canal, assuming that the business will increase for the next few years as much as it has in the past, will not be reached before 1882.

can be paid in eleven years. These years, sir, are one or two other subjects upon which, while will soon roll round; and in the mean time we can I am up, perhaps I might as well make a few devise some way to facilitate navigation upon the canals. We can keep them in better repair; we can invite the commerce of the West to pass over them; and when that debt is paid, we can remove these tolls, which operate as a greater obstruction to the commerce of the country than your narrow locks. Yes, sir; and that is the precise issue between the Canal Committee and myself. I believe it is the policy of this State to pay off this outstanding debt, remove your tolls, and cheapen your transportation by about one-third. They believe it is better to run in debt, and attempt to increase the facilities on the canal itself, and keep up and perpetuate the tolls. That is the issue between us exactly; and upon that issue I am willing to go to the people of this State; I am willing to go to the men who use these canals, and navigate them; I am willing to go to the people of the West, who feel so much interest in them, and let them determine whether they prefer these large exactions upon the commerce passing over these canals, or whether they are willing to wait for a few short years, until this outstanding debt shall be paid, when we will be enabled to remove the tolls down to the standard of keeping them in repair. That is the issue between us exactly; and I desire the Convention to understand it, so that we may not have this question decided upon any false issue. And I say that every foot wider you make your locks, you fill them up two feet by your tolls and taxes on commerce. That is the effect of it; it has always been the effect of it. My friend from Ontario [Mr. Lapham] says we would have had much more revenues during certain years if the canal board had not reduced the tolls. Well, now, how does he prove that? How does any man prove that, if the tolls had not been reduced in those years, we should have had more revenues? I should like to have the gentleman from Ontario [Mr. Lapham], who evinces all the enthusiaism of a new convert on this question, tell us how he arrives at that conclusion. It does not follow, by any means. Those years, sir, were years of depression. And the gentleman has told us that the commerce upon the railroads, as well as upon the canals, fell off very largely. So it did. They were years of great competition for a small amount of business, on the canals and on the railroads. And, sir, I undertake to say (and I was an actor in the board which reduced the tolls during a part of those years), that but for the reduction of the tolls during those years, we would not have received as much money as we did. I undertake to say that it was the reduction of the tolls that saved us the commerce that we got. That was the ground on which it was placed after full investigation. The Legislature relieved the railroads from the imposition of tolls in 1851, which enabled them to compete more sharply with the canals; and the commerce was very Mr. CHURCH-The question to which the gen light. Business was very much depressed; and tleman called my attention was not the question it was necessary, in order to retain the business that I was discussing. Whether the State Engi that we got, to reduce the tolls to some extent. neer is in favor of this project or against it is a It is not true, therefore, that the reduction of the matter of no sort of importance to me. I only tolls tended necessarily, or in fact, to reduce the say, in answer to the gentleman from Erie [Mr. revenues derived from the canals. But, sir, there latch], that the State Engineer did state to me

Mr. HATCH-Will the gentleman allow me to ask a question? I have not the report of the State Engineer here, but does not the gentleman know that the present State Engineer recommends the enlargement of the Erie canal ?

Mr. CHURCH-I have no doubt that the pres ent State Engineer, and almost every other engi neer in the State, will advocate. the expenditure of any amount of money that this Convention might authorize; but, sir, I know on that subject that the present State Engineer—as anxious as engineers ordinarily are for the expenditure of money-regards it as unwise and unnecessary to provide for this enlargement in the Constitution. He has repeatedly told me so, and I have no doubt that is his opinion.

Mr. HATCH-The propositions in his report, as sworn to, are entirely different.

Mr. CHURCH-Undoubtedly. I am speaking only of the capacity of the canals.

Mr. HATCH-We look at his reports for evidence of his opinions.

on different occasions that he thought it unwise and unnecessary to adopt this measure in the Constitution.

Mr. HATCH-The gentleman, in his report, refers, as authority, to the present State Engineer, for very material statements that he makes in his reports.

Mr. CHURCH-Yes; and it does not follow from that that he may not have made some other statements in his report that I do not concur with.

Mr. HATCH-Privately.

known of no obstructions in the navigation of the canal, the passage of boats; is it not a fact that during the latter part of September, and the months of October and November, in a good season for western products, that the boats are hin dered in passing by lack of room? A. Weil, there are a variety of causes that go to make up these delays; there is a want of efficiency in the working of the locks—in the management of the lockages."

But they press him still further:

Q. We ask it as a practical question? A. I don't know that there are any great delays that fall under my observation."

Mr. CHURCH-Or publicly, either. I was talking about the capacity of the canals; and I say that our present State Engineer, in his re- There is the evidence of your present State Enports, and in his evidence before the Canal Com-gineer, called to make out the case of the Canal mittee, has shown-not as a mere matter of opin- Committee. Take Mr. Van R. Richmond, than ion-but he has demonstrated that the capacity whom a more honest and capable public officer of the canals will not be reached, assuming that never was in the employ of this State, and he the business is to increase in the same ratio that says in his report of 1861, which gentlemen it has increased, before 1882. That is fifteen can examine for themselves, and has demonstrayears, I think, from this time. ted that this canal is capable of bringing to tidewater 5,220,000 tons of property, and it never has brought to tide-water three millions of tons. The largest amount was in 1862, when it fell short of three millions of tons. I desire to read what he says before the Canal Committee on that subject:

Mr. HATCH—I will state that the present Engineer repudiates that statement which you have there. He states, in reply to a letter-which I have not got here-that Commissioner Bruce gave him a basis for a certain calculation, on which it should be made, and upon the strength of which he made the calculations for Commissioner Bruce; but he says, "If you want to know what my opinions are about the Erie canal I will refer you to my reports."

Mr. CHURCH-It is of his report I have spoken. Let me read a little from the evidence of Mr. Goodsell before the Canal Committee. He was called as their witness, to prove that the canal was overburdened and overtaxed with business. That was the object of introducing the testimony.

"Q. What is your opinion as to the capacity of the present locks to accommodate the business and the emergencies of trade? A. Well, sir, that is a somewhat difficult question to answer.

66

Q. Give us the result of your observations, as a practical question. A. If trade could be distributed uniformly upon the canal, my judgment is that the present locks would answer for the next fifteen years. The maximum capacity of these locks would not be reached within about fifteen or twenty years; but you can't distribute the trade uniformly through the season; you can't force the spring and fall crops into the summer months, so that some months they are taxed to their full capacity, while others hardly at all.

Q. Are there not seasons now when they are overtexed? A. I have never known the double locks to be overtaxed, sir. There are instances where there are cases of a week of a large crowd of boats, but that is exceptional."

A. In my annual report in 1861, to the Legislature, I made an estimate of the capacity, as near as I could, and it is as near as anything I can get at now, probably; it is equal to a tourage, to furnish ample facilities for the delivery through the Erie canal to tide-water of 5,220,000 tons.

"Q. That is averaging through the year? A. Yes, sir; and the revenue with the same rate of tolls as charged in 1860, $6,902,318; they each have reference to an equal distribution of busi

uess.

"Q. As to the business in fact which has been done, what has been your observation as to the capacity of the locks? A. There are times, of course, when it is more than others; I never recollect seeing the canal when I thought it overtaxed; I have seen it crowded, but when there has been a sufficient supply of water and business moving uniformly along, I do not even remember noticing the time when the canal was overtaxed; it might be so and I not have noticed it; I have not been on it for five or six years since 1862."

The year 1862 was the year when we had the largest amount of business, and when there was most inconvenience in passing locks. But the gentleman from Ontario [Mr. Lapham] has, and the Canal Committee in their report have told us that this mode of estimating the capacity of the canal was fallacious. They say that these estimates are based upon a uniform transit of property in boats over the canal, and that in point of Now, that is what the State Engineer has told fact it is not true that property passes uniformly us-the most recent thing that he has said on the over the canals-that business is crowded into a subject. But the Canal Committee were not sat- few weeks in the fall and a few weeks in the isfied with these answers. They examined him spring, and that in the summer months the canal on a variety of other subjects; and, for the pur-is almost entirely deserted. Now, this is the pose, I suppose, of qualifying these answers in argument of the Canal Committee, as I underBome way or other, they asked him this ques-stand it. I say the argument is fallacious; the tion: fact is not so, as I will show to this Convention "Q. I understood you to say that you had by a few statistics which I have here. I have

Mr. LAPHAM-In 1862 the total tonnage was 5,598,785; in 1863 it was 5,557,692; and in 1866 it was 5,775,320, or greater than either of the foregoing years.

Mr. CHURCH-The gentleman is now taking the whole tonnage of the canals.

Mr. LAPHAM-Certainly. I am.

Mr. CHURCH-I take.it, so far as tonnage is concerned, nobody has ever had the impudence to claim that there is any lack of capacity to carry all tonnage going westward; it is only the tonnage coming to tide-water that there has ever been any complaint about. I say that in 1862 they carried from five hundred thousand to a million more tons than in any other year to tidewater; that they carried more than they will reach, in my judgment, for many years.

Mr. ALVORD-In 1862 they carried 3,402,709; in 1866, 3.305,607.

Mr. CHURCH-That, I am sorry to say, is not the precise fact. Your three million takes in the property coming from the Erie canal and the Champlain canal.

Mr. ALVORD-Certainly.

obtained from the canal department the number | had been true that property was coming to your of lockages in thirteen locks of the Erie canal in canals that could not be carried over them, you every month of the three years 1864, 1865 and would have heard such a howling from the docks 1866. Let us see whether it is true that the busi- in Buffalo to the docks in New York, as would ness of these canals is crowded into one or two have waked up the entire people of the State to of the fall months or the spring months. I will come to the rescue, to provide more money for take 1864 in the first place. The number of the canals. We did that business; we did it lockages in May was 31,000 (I will not read the easily and comfortably and conveniently; and, odd numbers); in June, 40,000; in July, 39,000; sir, according to, a fair calculation, it will be many in August, 42,000; in September, when the years before you reach the amount of property crowding commenced, according to these gentle that we carried over the canals in 1862. men, 37,000; in October, when the crowding culminates, 37,000; in November, 30,000, and in December a very small number. The largest number of lockages was in the month of August, and in that month there were 5.000 more lockages than there were in the month of October, and when these gentlemen say the canal is most crowded. Now, let us take the next year, 1865. In May, 20,000; in June, 27,000; in July, 32,000; in August, 35,000; in September, 35,000; in October, 38,000, and in November, 33,000. In that year there was only 3.000 difference in the month of October and the month of August. I was surprised myself to some extent-although I knew this pretense was not true, as a matter of practical knowledge-but I was somewhat surprised to find how uniformly the business on the canals was done throughout the season. In 1866, last year, May, 25,000; June, 30,000; July, 39,000; August, 43,000, and in September, when the crowding commences, 41,000; October, when the crowding culminates, 40,000; November, 35,000. Again, you find in July and August a larger number of lockages than you had in September or October, but there is a remarkable uniformity all through the season. It is very easy to account for that uniformity, because, sir, the men who do business on these canals understand their business. They are perhaps as sharp, shrewd and keen business men as are engaged in any business in the world. And the men who deal in the products of the forest, such as lumber and other products, and in coal-which are articles when the greatest increase of business is to be found on the canals-do their business in July and August. They take the months when the canals are not needed for the produce of the country. The wheat and corn is carried in the fall and spring-corn in the spring and wheat in the fall, and very little in the summer months; but the other articles of property, such as lumber and coal, are carried mostly in the summer months; and in that manner you equalize the business of the canals and make it uniform. For that reason these estimates, which have been made on the basis of ascertaining how long it will take to pass a lock with The Convention re-assembled at four o'clock, a boat and how much that boat will carry, is a and again resolved itself into Committee of the fair, legitimate way of ascertaining the capacity of Whole on the reports of the Committee on the the canals. There is another consideration about Finances of the State and the Committee on Ca the capacity of the canals. We did the business nals, Mr. SHERMAN, of Oneida, in the chair. in 1862, when the canals carried from 500,000 to Mr. CHURCH-Mr. Chairman, when the com. 1,000,000 more tons than they ever carried be-mittee rose I was referring to the testimony of a fore; and how many members of this Convention witness by the name of Breed, called by the Com before we assembled here, ever heard that the mittee on Canals, to prove that the canal was canals were overtaxed and overburdened? overtaxed and burdened beyond its capacity I How many members of this Convention ever suppose that there have been times when detenheard of it during that period? Why, sir, if it tions have occurred upon the canal. I suppose

Mr. CHURCH-Well, now, I take it that the locks on the Erie canal are not very much crowd. ed from boats coming from the Champlain canal.

Mr. LAPHAM-If the gentleman will allow me, the tonnage on the canal in 1862 was 2,917,000 tons; in 1863, 2,647,000 tons; and in 1866, 2,523,000 tons.

Mr. CHURCH-Precisely what I said.

Mr. LAPHAM-What! a million difference? Mr. CHURCH-I said five hundred thousand or a million, did I not? I have shown that these gentlemen have evidence before them from two of the State Engineers that these canals were not overtaxed in point of fact nor overburdened. Well, sir, they called another witness by the name of

The hour of two o'clock having arrived, the PRESIDENT resumed the chair in Convention, and announced that, under the standing order, the Convention would take a recess until four o'clock.

AFTERNOON SESSION.

there will be times, whatever you do with the be your judgment that that was the utmost cacanals, when detentions will occur upon them. It pacity of the canal to pass boats at Syracuse? is impossible, by any experditure of money, to A. At that particular season of the year you may prevent these detentions at times at some of the know that the horses and men are worn, and half locks and for some reasons. This witness, it of the boats want men; the horses are unable to seems, was called by the Committee as a kind of pass the boats in and out. expert upon the subject. He had been a contractor upon canals, and had been a superintendent upon a canal, residing at Syracuse. He was inquired of by the chairman:

"Q. Will it necessarily arise in the future, providing the canals are unchanged, that there will be detentions at certain periods from the causes already mentioned? A. I do not suppose it is possible to construct a canal so there will be no detentions.

"Q. I mean detentions from the inability of the locks, as they now are, to take boats through as rapidly as commerce would require them to be locked through. A. I think detentions are unavoidable.

"Q. Do you think an enlarged lock of twentyfive by one hundred feet, a single tier of such locks, would add to the capacity of the canal in the way of lockage? A. My idea is, you will have the same detentions no matter how you construct it.

"Q. Aside from accidents, do you think there will be detentions? A. Perhaps not; nor would it with its present capacity; you would not, aside from accidents, have very much detentions if it was properly managed."

"Q. We must deal with things practically as they have been and are to be. Now if we find at the Auditor's department that the number passing at the latter part of November is a given sum, may we then say that that is the practical capacity to pass boats at that point at that period of of the year? A. Your idea is to get at the capacity of the canals?

"Q. The idea is, if the canal did at that period all that could be reasonably and fairly done? A. Here comes the question: it may take one man half an hour to pass a boat which could be passed in fifteen minutes; the capacity of the canal is one thing and the habits of men another.

"Q. Take it as it will be? A. You may lock boats from six to twelve an hour, with a good class of boatmen ready to move in whenever the lock is open, and you may increase the number to fifteen or twenty boats, but the next few hours you may have to get extra teams to fetch in the boats-it is all draw."

There is the testimony of this expert who has been brought here from Syracuse to show that at that particular lock there were such detentions that this Convention is authorized to expend large I desire gentlemen to look at this for a moment. sums of money to enlarge the canals. He tells The only point where the Canal Committee have you that if the boats are properly managed you pretended, by the evidence which they have may lock through from six to twelve an hour. If brought before themselves that detentions have it is twelve an hour it is one in five minutes, and occurred, in order to show that we should enter if it is one in five minutes you can transfer three upon the scheme of enlargement, is at the lock times the amount of property you ever did on the near Syracuse. There seems to be a lock there, canal. He tells you this may be increased from in the vicinity of the weigh-lock-a lock which is fifteen to twenty boats. If you pass twenty boats so situated that you are obliged, in transporting it is one in three minutes, which will carry boats toward tide-water, to lock against the cur- through more than four times the amount of proprent. These boats have to be drawn in erty which has ever been transported over this against the current, and it is the point canal. And this is at a point where the most where the Oswego canal comes in. Now, difficulty is created, and it is a point to which I see by the testimony that all the burdens these gentlemen have directed their evidence, in of the canals are confined to that one lock, and order to satisfy this Convention that this canal this witness was called because he was conver- is overtaxed in point of capacity. Why, it does sant with that particular lock. And it is probably not require a man of any particular experience in the most difficult lock in the whole canal, a lock navigating the canals of the State to know aud where there are more detentions and more diffi- understand that if there is a particular lock where, culties on account of the mingling of these boats in consequence of the circumstances that surround from the weigh-locks and boats navigating the it, there are crowds of boats occasionally coming Erie canal with boats coming in from the Oswego in, producing detentions-it requires no experience, canal; and yet a practical witness whom they I say, in navigating canals, to understand that a called tells us and he told the committee that de- very slight expense will remedy all these difficultentions will occur upon any canal that you may ties. And we are told by one of the gentlemen make, and that if this lock and the canal were who was examined as a witness before this comproperly managed there would not be any deten-mittee, and who was a practical man, that the tion even at this point-the place most difficult trifling expense of putting a tow path upon the for navigation. But the committee did not seem berme side of the canal at this particuto be entirely satisfied with this gentleman's evi- lar point, so that you would have a towdence, so they pressed him a little further; and path upon both sides, would increase the capacity after they had examined him on other subjects, of that lock from thirty to fifty per cent. they returned to this question again and asked

him:

"Then by referring to what was done, if we find that the number is 200 boats for the longest period, for one week in November, would it then

The State Engineer has told you that if you will double the men at this lock, or if you will put a windlass upon it, you can increase its capacity very much. Now, I do not believe one word of this idea that we must go on with this enlarge