DOCUMENTARY HISTORY OF THE FLORIDA CANAL 363

 Mr. Anmis Mr. President, the Senator argues the premise upon which I had
agreed with him, but the Senate, having decided against the view of the Senator
from Missouri, says to us that an estimate from the Bureau of the Budget is suf-
ficient to authorize the Senate to include in an appropriation bill these items of
appropriation. The Senator and I were in the minority upon that question, but
I assume that, the Senate having decided the matter, from that point on we dis-
cussed the matter upon the theory of parliamentary procedure laid down by the
Senate. Consequently, the Senate having said that the Florida ship-canal
amendment could be offered and that the amendment covering the Conchas Res-
ervoir and the Bluestone Reservoir could be offered, it was then up to the Senate
to decide whether or not it would approve these individual projects. In other
words, the question as to whether there was a legal authorization had disap-
peared out of the argument. The estimate of the Bureau of the Budget, under
the ruling of the Senate, had come to constitute a legal authorization for an
appropriation by the Senate.
 In my own judgment I felt that the Florida ship canal could not be approved.
I felt that a canal, the absolute and entire cost of which was to be borne by the
United States, which would take 10 years to complete, was wholly beyond the
scope of any project to relieve unemployment. I was opposed to it because I
thought it to be economically unsound. It is proposed that we spend $200,000,000,
though the estimates of the engineers drop to as low as $143,000,000. My expe-
rience with engineers' estimates, however, leads me to make very expansive
allowances beyond them.
 If the canal shall be constructed, the benefits will go only to the shipping
 which uses it It is proposed that there shall be no tolls charged; that it shall
 be a free canal. The shipping companies say, "If there shall be a charge of as
 much as 8 cents or even 5 cents a ton, we will then not use the canal." Its eco-
 nomic advantage is so slight, even to the shipping companies, that unless the
 canal is a free canal it will not be used.
 It seems to me the Government, in view of its present financial burdens,
 ought not to spend $200,000,000 and then assume the burden of a yearly cost of
 maintenance and interest payments which I think will run between $7,000,000
 and $10,000,000. I think those from the State of Florida who favor the canal
 would be gravely disappointed in the results to their State. I think they would
 find simply a great gash across their State.
 As I have looked hurriedly into the effect of the construction of other ship
 canals, I have failed to fnd that through traffic tends to build up the country
 through which it goes. I know that the building of highways does not result
 in building up communities which border upon the highways at which those
 using the highways do not stop. The same thing would be true of the Florida
 ship canal. The ships would go through it; but Florida, in my judgment, would
 derive little, if any, benefit from the passage of the ships through the canal,
 regardless of how many ships might go through.
 So, Mr. President, we are planning to spend a vast sum of money upon a
 project initiated as a relief project which would not economically justify the
 charging of any tolls. Some of the other projects would be completed-and I
 have better knowledge concerning the project in New Mexico-in probably
 another year, within the period of need for relief work. In connection with
 some of the other projects there will be a financial return from power or
 through assessment on lands benefited. There would be no return, however,
 upon the money spent in constructing the Florida canal It runs beyond the
 need of relief work; it seems to me to be unjustified, and, to my mind, there
 is a distinction between the projects.
 I say to the Senator from Missouri [Mr. Clark] that if I was wrong in either
 vote, I was wrong when I voted for the three small projects, and I was not
 wrong when I voted against the Florida ship canal. Therefore I do not think
 the motion to reconsider the part of the vote which, in my judgment, was un-
 questionably correct should be sustained.
 Mr. FLTrcHE. Mr. President, I wish to say just a few words. I do not wish
 to prolong the debate, but merely to correct some of the assumptions made by
 the Senator from Colorado [Mr. Adams].
 The Senator made some reference to the merits of the Florida ship canal.
 We went into that question the other day, and I shall not review it. The board
 of review, composed of P. W. A. engineers and Army engineers for rivers and
 harbors, estimate the beneft to commerce arising out of the canal at $7,500,000
 annually. That estimate results from considering it as a river and harbor
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