THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS THURSDAY, JUNE 2, 1938 A GREAT AMERICAN PROJECT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23053, 2 June 1938, Page 12

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS THURSDAY, JUNE 2, 1938 A GREAT AMERICAN PROJECT

Much interest attaches to the tentative treaty submitted by the American Secretary of State to the Canadian Government in connection with the development of the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River Basin. As indicated in the cable message published to-day, the project is one of vast magnitude and combines several purposes. Should all that it proposes be achieved, the outcome will be one of the most notable in the industrial history of the world. What is immediately in view is related to important undertakings already completed separately by the United States and Canada on the waterway forming most of the eastern half of the boundary between the two countries. Its full effect would be to give a shared passage from Lake Superior to the Gulf of St. Lawrence; the last portion, relatively short, traverses Canadian territory from Lake Ontario to the ocean outlet. No treaties have hitherto been necessary for the sectional construction that created the existing passage of the chain of lakes; these undertakings were almost wholly confined by each country to its own side. The United States formed locks and a canal to connect Lake Superior and Lake Huron, and later cut a deep channel between Lake Huron and Lake Erie. When Canada finished in 1932 the Welland Canal on her own soil near the Niagara Falls, the last of the chain of lakes (Ontario) was opened to navigation from the extreme west; a minimum depth of 21 feet was thus provided for 1200 miles from that inland point to the International Rapids of the St. Lawrence —more than half-way to the sea. At these rapids, now passed by inadequate canals on the Canadian side, is the sole remaining barrier, which under the terms of the proffered treaty is marked for removal. So "the American Mediterranean" would be joined to "the river that has no end," as the Indians called the St. Lawrence. But under the new scheme moi*e than a wonderful waterway from the heart of a continent to the ocean will be created by human ingenuity and co-operation. Quite as important are the other purposes —the reciprocal production of abundant and cheap hydro-electric power, the tapping of extensive mineral resources, and the giving to both countries of a powerful defensive weapon in the event of a war endangering them. The United States would become possessed of one of the greatest hydro-electric plants in the world, serving an industrial area equivalent to fully a third of the whole federal territory. Its service in an international emergency would be strategically immense. These gains are so obvious that surprise may be expressed at repeated delays in the prosecution of the scheme. A century of cooperation between the two countries has included joint action with reference to this border region. As long ago as 1818, indeed, when ships of war were withdrawn from the Great Lakes under the earliest successful disarmament plan of modern times, mutual guarantees were given to establish equal navigation rights from the headwaters of the chain to the mouth of the St. Lawrence; the piecemeal improvements making this more than a paper-pact were carried out in the spirit and letter of it. But nothing has so far been done to deal with the International Rapids, and without the removal of this barrier to ocean-going ships the waterway is of manifestly limited value. Even the possibility of utilising the vast store of water-power there going to waste has not been | sufficient inducement to get on with the inviting task. The explanation of this, tardiness lies in commercial j and political quarrels in the United I States. Conversations with Canada on the subject were begun in 1914 by President Wilson; they were resumed by President Harding after the war had interrupted his predecessor's activity, and President Coolidge carried them on. In 1924 plans for constructive work at the International Rapids were ready in detail, prepared by a board of engineers representing the two countries. Between President Hoover and Mr. Franklin D. Roosevelt, then Governor of New York, a conflict arose on the question of Federal and State rights in relation to the project, the particular subject of contention being the hydro-electric power scheme. So the whole matter was left in abeyance.

Two objectives had been emphasised, with a difference, by President Hoover: the seaway was of major importance and production of power merely incidental. Then, us a presidential nominee, Governor Roosevelt stood by the dual purpose. "In public justice," he urged, "both aspects should be pressed—cheap transportation by deep waterway for the agricultural and other products of the West, cheap electricity from the State-owned and controlled resource." Within six weeks of his inauguration as president, Mr. Roosevelt took action; a treaty was negotiated with Oanada. However, Eastern opposition to tho seaway was effective in tho Senate, and the requisite two-thirds majority for ratification was denied by a narrow margin. The conflict of opinion, based on a conflict of interests, which defeated the project in 1934, has not altogether disappeared. It remains to be seen whether Mr. Roosevelt carries enough guns to win a victory on his side of the frontier. Canada's agreement is apparently beyond doubt. The American offer to finance development at the International Rapids and to assure Canada equal, rights to hydro-electric power should make that agreement doubly certain.