JAMES RENWICK, LL.D.

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CHAPTER XII.

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Earliest Legislation of the State of New-York in relation to Canals. – Petition of Colles. – Report of Jeffrey Smith. – Messages of George Clinton. – Resolution of Judge Forman. – Survey made by Geddes, who first demonstrated the Practicability of a Route to Lake Erie. – Essays of Jesse Hawley. – Resolution of Judge Platt. – Appointment of a Board of Commissioners, of which Clinton is one. – Character of Morris, the senior Commissioner. – Notice of the other Commissioners.

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Much discussion has been held, and innumerable tracts have been published, in respect to the merit of projecting or carrying into effect the canal policy of the State of New-York. The greater part of these have grown out of mutual misunderstandings of the terms and subject of the dispute. It has never been doubted, that not only a few distinguished individuals, but even thousands of public-spirited citizens, have contributed, with the whole force of their talents and influence, to the progress and completion of the canals, yet no one of these was either so efficient or so influential as in any way to impair the claim set up for Clinton as having associated his name in imperishable characters with that of the great system of internal improvements, of which the Erie Canal is the chief.

The earliest legislative action in relation to canals in the State of New-York was in 1784, An engineer of the name of Colles, who, before the Revolution, had been employed in an unsuccessful attempt to supply the City of New-York with water, petitioned the Legislature to aid him in an attempt to remove obstructions in the Mohawk River. A favourable report was made, but no legislative action followed. In the succeeding year he obtained a grant of $125 for the purpose "of enabling him to make an essay towards the removal of these obstructions, and making a plan thereof." During the next session (1786), and, as it appears, in pursuance of the plan of Colles, a bill was introduced by Mr. Jeffrey Smith, of Long Island, "for improving the navigation of the Mohawk River, Wood Creek, and Onondago River, with a view of opening an inland navigation to Oswego, and for extending the same, if practicable, to Lake Erie." This bill did not become a law. In it we find the first idea of extending a navigable communication to Lake Erie, but the route by Oswego and Lake Ontario is evidently the one pointed out.

Governor George Clinton, in the year 1791, called the attention of the Legislature to the importance of internal communications in general. The committee to whom this speech was referred, reported a law, in which, among other things, provision was made for a survey of the ground between the Mohawk and Wood Creek, and farther proceedings were held which led to no valuable result. In 1792 the governor referred to the report made under the law of the preceding session, and again called the attention of the Legislature to the subject. The result of their action has been already spoken of, as the law incorporating the "Western Inland Lock Navigation Company."

From this time no farther action in respect to canals was had, either by the executive or the Legislature of the state, until 1808, when Judge Forman, at that time a member of the Legislature from Onondago county, proposed a concurrent resolution, to direct a survey to be made of the "most eligible and direct route for a canal from the Hudson River to Lake Erie." Judge Forman himself has stated, that he was led to propose this inquiry in consequence of his perusal of the article "Canal" in Rees’s Encyclopedia, in which he found a full exposition of the advantages of canals over attempts to improve the navigation of rivers; and that he therefore conceived a preference to a continuous communication, over the extension of the operations of the Western Inland Lock Navigation Company and the lockage around the Falls of Niagara, for the last of which an act of incorporation had been obtained from the Legislature.

In 1809, Mr. Thomas Eddy, on behalf of the Western Inland Lock Navigation Company, proceded to Albany for the purpose of procuring the passage of a law authorizing the appointment of commissioners to explore a route from Oneida Lake to Seneca River, with a view to the execution of the canal by that company. At that moment Judge Platt was the acknowledged leader of the federal party in the Senate, and its nominated candidate for the office of governor. To him, Eddy, who was his political adherent, applied for his influence in obtaining the passage of the proposed law.

Judge Platt, who had long been a resident of the western part of the state, and knew, perhaps, better than any other person, its wants and wishes; who had, as it appears, long considered the policy which the state ought to pursue in the premises, replied at once, "That the company had disappointed public expectation, and that it would be inauspicious to present any project which should be subject to that corporation." As a substitute, he proposed a plan for instituting a board of commissioners to examine and survey the whole route from the Hudson to Lake Ontario, and to Lake Erie also. Mr. Eddy having been satisfied that this plan was to be preferred, it was agreed, on the suggestion of Judge Platt, to call Clinton forthwith into their councils. He, as we have seen, held at that moment a preponderating influence with the democratic party; and, as the object involved no party views, not only Eddy, but Platt also, was satisfied of the propriety of obtaining his sanction.

It is one of those things which augur best for the permanence of our institutions, that, however imbittered may have been the disputes of mere party politics, however loudly the underlings and hack writers of factions may have declaimed against the motives and characters of their adversaries, no sooner does danger threaten the country, or is a scheme of real advantage presented, than the leaders of the opposing parties resort to each other as the most likely supporters of the necessary measures. Here was an occasion which an astute politician might have seen an easy opportunity of winning popularity and accumulating electioneering capital; yet Platt sought Clinton as the first person to whom his scheme was to be imparted. On the other hand, Clinton could not have been insensible to the fact that the scheme was one on which it could be easy, as was afterward done, to shower down the most pointed ridicule, and to convert its proposal by Platt into an engine of political warfare. These distinguished men, however, forgot all except its bearing on the prosperity of their country, and discussed the plan only in its relations to the public welfare. The result of the interview was, that Platt forthwith presented in the Senate a resolution for the appointment of commissioners, and the resolution was seconded by Clinton. By the aid of their joint efforts, the resolution passed both houses; and Gouverneur Morris, Dewitt Clinton, Stephen Van Rensselaer, Simeon Dewitt, Peter B. Porter, William North, and Thomas Eddy, were named commissioners. Care was taken to take the names alternately from the two opposing parties; while Eddy himself, who closed the list, although a federalist, was not an active partisan.

Morris was named by Judge Platt in consequence of the high standing which he held in his party. Distinguished by his descent from a family possessed of manorial privileges, and the heir of an ample fortune, he had, at an early age, thrown himself, with all the ardour of youth and the enthusiasm of genius, into the cause of the Revolution, and, abandoning his home, had become domiciliated in Pennsylvania. This state he had represented in Congress under the confederation, and had been associated with Robert Morris in the schemes of finance by which the Revolutionary war was brought to a happy issue. In the convention which framed the existing Constitution, he had filled a useful place; and, on its adoption, had been nominated by Washington ambassador to France. Here he replaced Jefferson, who was recalled to fill the high post of Secretary of State. While in France, Morris became disgusted with the excesses of the popular party, and disappointed their hopes of gaining the countenance of the representative of the republic whose successful resistance to royal power they for a time held up as a model. When that party acquired the ascendency, his unpopularity with it was such as to render it expedient that he should be recalled.

On his return he retired to his paternal estate, and rebuilt the mansion of his ancestors ruined by the British troops. From this retirement he was speedily called to represent his native state in the Senate of the United States, where we have seen him at the same time the colleague and the opponent of Clinton.

Morris was endued by nature with all the attributes necessary to the accomplished orator; a fine and commanding person, a most graceful demeanour, which was rather heightened than impaired by the loss of one of his legs; a voice of much compass, strength, and richness. These natural advantages he had carefully cultivated; grounded in classical literature in a manner far beyond what was then usual in America, he had continued to peruse the orators and poets of antiquity; familiar with more than one living language, he was acquainted with all the best productions of modern literature.

For style as literary productions, and still more for the manner of their delivery, his speeches would have held no mean rank among the productions he studied as models. He thus acquired an influence among persons who were his equals in all but the external graces and embellishments of oratory, which at the present moment appears extraordinary; and with a self-confidence which never deserted him, often arrogated to himself a higher place than they, when out of the sphere of his fascination, would have been willing to assign him.

But, while thus qualified by natural gifts and careful study to acquire an influence, he wanted all the sound knowledge which was necessary in the office to which he was now appointed. With a feeling not unusual in classical scholars, he looked with contempt on the sciences, which were then beginning to be brought into the service of industry, and which have since produced such astonishing revolutions in the state of the civilized world. If, then, of all men living, he was the best qualified to exhibit in a popular light the advantages with which the adoption of a system of internal improvements would be attended, he was, perhaps, among all who could have been selected, the worst for the purpose of entering into the painful and laborious investigations on which alone a true exposition of these advantages could be founded, and on which the actual practicability of a canal from Albany to Lake Erie would principally rest.

Morris had directed his thoughts at an early period to the navigable communications of the State of New-York; and evidence is extant that, even before the close of the Revolutionary was, he had declaimed with his accustomed eloquence upon the capabilities which existed for the extension of its internal trade. In the year 1801 he had visited Niagara. His route was by the way of Oswego to Lake Ontario, and along that lake to the Niagara River.

The vivid impressions of the scenery, soil, and climate which he received on this journey, are delineated in a letter which he wrote on his return to his friend David Parish, of Hamburgh; and in obvious reference to the route which he had traversed, points out the possibility of making a communication for the passage of ships from the upper lakes to the Hudson.

This letter is a finished piece of eloquence, wanting, in truth, only metrical form to be classed as a fine specimen of descriptive poetry. It has more than once been published, for the purpose of proving him to have been the original projector of the substitution of a canal for the communication by Lake Ontario. But, although the mere words of the passage which speaks of this navigation might be susceptible of such an interpretation, it is very clear from the context that he entertained no such idea.

The idea of ships sailing from the great Western inland seas to the Hudson is in keeping with the lockage of the Falls of Niagara, and the improvement of the navigation of the Oswego and Mohawk Rivers, but it is utterly at variance with the idea of a continuous canal.

Having already given utterance to a prediction that vessels would descend from the upper lakes to the Hudson, it will not surprise us to find Morris entering into the execution of the duties of his office of canal commissioner with a zeal that distanced the more cautious movements of his less excitable colleagues.

We cannot, however, but consider that the enterprise was not furthered by the appointment of Morris, and that the public mind would have been more easily satisfied of the feasibility of the project of the canal, had Judge Platt permitted himself to be named on the commission instead of Morris. With his sound and steady judgment, it would have been impossible that any plan bearing impracticability on its face should have been laid before the public. Platt, however, seems to have shrunk with innate modesty from assuming the first place on a commission established by a resolution drawn by himself. Here, therefore, all direct agency on his part in the canal policy of the state seems to have ceased; yet he is well entitled to the merit of having made the first efficacious step towards the attainment of the great object of uniting the lakes with the Atlantic.

The remaining members of the commission are well and advantageously known to the world. In particular, Stephen Van Rensselaer ought to be cited, for the long, steady attention which he devoted to the furtherance of internal improvements. From this time to the day of his death he was strenuous in the promotion of the cause, and held, from the date when the actual construction of the canals was commenced, the office of a commissioner. The last person who inherited an entailed estate before the system was swept away by the Revolution, he was for many years the sole surviver of the ancient aristocracy; yet such was the affability of his manners and the benevolence of his disposition, that he enjoyed deserved popularity with those most democratic in their principles. Possessed of an estate which had descended to him from the first projector of a settlement for any purpose but trade on the banks of the Hudson, he exercised his powers as landlord with such moderation as to secure the devoted attachment of his tenantry.

In the cause of internal improvement he not only aided by his services as canal commissioner, but lent his powerful name and embarked funds in the earliest project of a railroad, the first link of that chain which, running parallel to the Erie Canal, will, by facilitating personal communication, enhance its benefits.

Simeon Dewitt had served with distinction as an engineer during the war of the Revolution, at a time when the learning required in that branch of the service was extremely rare. He held, from the close of the Revolution to the time of his death, the office of surveyor-general to the state, and under his direction, among other important duties, the great survey of the military townships was accomplished; a work, which, from its extreme accuracy, has prevented all disputes about boundaries among the landholders of that region.

Eddy has been already mentioned as a director of the Western Inland Lock Navigation Company, and was, at the moment, looked to as the practical man of the commission, in which respect the appointment was certainly his due.

Peter B. Porter had distinguished himself by a very able speech, delivered in the House of Representatives, in support of a resolution introduced by himself, directing an inquiry into the propriety of appropriating the proceeds of a part of the public lands to purposes of internal improvement. A resident of the extreme western portion of the state, he had collected a vast amount of valuable information; and, although he finally differed from his colleagues in relation to the comparative merits of the Ontario and Erie routes, his aid was not unimportant in the early stages of the inquiry.

General North had served with great reputation in the Revolutionary war, and by his talents, his landed property, and the remembrances of his military actions, was deservedly possessed of great influence, both politically and morally.

Of such materials was the commission formed, and the results of its operations justified the Legislature in the wisdom of its selections.

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Transcribed from the original text and html prepared by Bill Carr, last updated 12/10/99.