402 DOCUMENTARY HISTORY OF THE FLOBIDA CANAL merce from which the monetary return, vast and incalculable thought it be, is through the stimulus to trade and navigation and the consequent upbuilding of the national income. In the case of the Florida canal, however, the value is measurable in dollars and cents. It has been so measured by the Corps of Engineers of the United States Army and by the engineers of the Public Works Administration. I have seen the reports of both of these economic surveys. Both of them agree that the direct money benefit to shipping, leaving all other economic considerations aside, will be of the order of $7,500,000 a year. And that, figured at 3% percent, would pay interest on more than $200,000,000. And the canal won't cost anything like that. HIGHLY IMPORTANT TFOM VIEWPOnIT OF DEFENSE But, some carping critics ask, is the Federal Government Justified in spending $150,000,00 or so for the benefit of shipowners and operators? Surely not, if those were the only beneficiaries. Does the Government build highways solely for the benefit of motorists? No. No small part of the justification for Federal highway construction is that armies as well as mails can be moved over them. Let us, then, examine the Florida canal from the broad aspect of national defense. Military men will confirm the statement that a foreign foe which could seize effective control of the Gulf of Mexico could dictate its own peace terms to the United States. It would strike at the very heart of the Nation. The settled policy of our Government is and has been for years to make the Atlantic coast less vulnerable to an enemy by encouraging the estab- lishment of the basic industries in the Mississippi Valley, lessening the danger of vital war supplies being cut off by the raiding or capture of Atlantic ports. In line with this policy Is the recent decision to build large vaults at Fort Knox, Ky., to house the Nation's gold reserve, as Germany guarded the gold indemnity which it collected from France in 1871 in the Julichsturm at Spandau, until It needed it to fight France again in 1914. In war as in peace the Nation relies upon the Mississippi Valley for food- stufs, cotton and wool, oil, sulphur, and other vital natural products, and in- creasingly for the primary products into which they are converted by manu- facturing industry. In the World War, one of the most difficult problems was that of getting munitions and food supplies from the Mississippi Valley to Atlantic ports. Delays due to freight congestion held up vital shipments for periods as long as 6 weeks. The biggest problem in our whole transportation system is how to get freight over the Allegheny Mountains. It has been a problem ever since the first settlement of the Ohio Valley. New York solved it in 1825 by going around the mountains with the Erie Canal, which lifted the port of New York from third place to first. From the Erie Canal south there is no east-west transportation route which does not have to climb over the mountains, until you get down to Florida. OULF PORT TRAFFIC Is INCREASING RAPIDLY Increasingly, shippers are using the water route between the Mississippi Valley and the Atlantic coast Water-borne cargoes to and from the Gulf ports have multiplied enormously since the war. More than 10,000 ships steam through the Florida Straits annually, more than pass through the British Channel or the Straits of Gibraltar; the largest volume of salt-water traffic through a restricted passage anywhere In the world. Only the fresh-water Soo Canal carries more tonnage. More than 40,000,000 tons of cargo are carried in and out of Gulf ports every year. It all has to pass between Cuba and the Florida keys. From a point west of the Dry Tortugas to a point a few miles south of Miami, a distance of more than 300 miles, shipping traversing the Florida Straits goes through a passage averaging less than 100 miles wide. There is insufficient sea room for maneu- vering in the face of a West Indian hurricane, a seasonal hazard which all this traffic must reckon with, and in time of war the straits furnish an ambush for enemy submarines. To the south there are none but foreign flags, except for Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, and there are innumerable possible sub- marine bases.