Erie Canal Opens

This series has six easy 5 minute installments. This first installment: Resolution in New York State Assembly.

Introduction
Among the great canals of the world, the Erie Canal ranks just behind the Suez and Panama Canals in importance. It connects the Great Lakes to New York City Harbor and the Western Atlantic. It extends from the Hudson River at Albany to Lake Erie at Buffalo. Its present length is three hundred fifty and one-half miles; width at surface, seventy feet; at bottom, fifty-six feet; depth, seven feet. Its opening in 1825 was two years earlier than the building of the first railroad in America.

This selection is from The Building of the Erie Canal essay by William H. Seward published in Great Events by Famous People, volume 16. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

William H. Seward (1801-1872) was Governor of New York and Secretary of State.

Time: 1825
Place: New York City

History will assign to Gouverneur Morris the merit of first suggesting a direct and continuous communication from Lake Erie to the Hudson. In 1800 he announced this idea from the shore of the Niagara River to a friend in Europe, in the following enthusiastic language: “Hundreds of large ships will, in no distant period, bound on the billows of these inland seas. Shall I lead your astonishment to the verge of incredulity? I will! Know then that one-tenth part of the expense borne by Britain in the last campaign would enable ships to sail from London through the Hudson into Lake Erie. As yet we only crawl along the outer shell of our country. The interior excels the part we inhabit in soil, in climate, in everything. The proudest empire of Europe is but a bauble compared with what America may be, must be.”

The praise awarded to Gouverneur Morris must be qualified by the fact that the scheme he conceived was that of a canal with a uniform declination, and without locks, from Lake Erie to the Hudson. Morris communicated his project to Simeon De Witt in 1803, by whom it was made known to James Geddes in 1804. It afterward became the subject of conversation between Mr. Geddes and Jesse Hawley, and this communication is supposed to have given rise to the series of essays written by Mr. Haw ley, under the signature of “Hercules,” in the Genesee Messenger, continued from October, 1807, until March, 1808, which first brought the public mind into familiarity with the subject. These essays, written in a jail, were the grateful return, by a patriot, to a country which punished him with imprisonment for being unable to pay debts owed to another citizen. They bore evidences of deep research and displayed singular vigor and comprehensiveness of thought, and traced with prophetic accuracy a large portion of the outline of the Erie Canal.

In 1807 Albert Gallatin, then Secretary of the Treasury, in pursuance of a recommendation made by Thomas Jefferson, President of the United States, reported a plan for appropriating all the surplus revenues of the General Government to the construction of canals and turnpike roads; and it embraced in one grand and comprehensive view, nearly without exception, all the works which have since been executed or attempted by the several States in the Union.* This bold and statesmanlike, though premature, conception of that eminent citizen will remain the greatest among the many monuments of his forecast and wisdom.

[* This refers to a period ending about 1840. — Ed.]

In 1808 Joshua Forman, a representative in the New York Assembly from Onondaga County, submitted his memorable resolution:

Whereas, The President of the United States did by his message to Congress, delivered at their meeting in October last, recommend that the surplus moneys in the treasury, over and above such sums as could be applied to the extinguishment of the national debt, be appropriated to the great national project of opening canals and making turnpike roads; and

Whereas, The State of New York, holding the first commercial rank in the United States, possesses within herself the best mode of communication between the Atlantic and Western waters, by means of a canal between the tide-waters of the Hud son River and Lake Erie, through which the wealth and trade of that large portion of the Union, bordering on the upper lakes, would forever flow to our great commercial emporium; and

Whereas, The legislatures of several of our sister-States have made great exertions to secure to their own States the trade of that widely extended country west of the Alleghanies, under nat ural advantages vastly inferior to those of this State; and

Whereas, It is highly important that those advantages should as speedily as possible be improved, both to preserve and increase the commercial and national importance of this State; therefore be itResolved, if the honorable the Senate concur herein, That a joint committee be appointed to take into consideration the propriety of exploring and causing an accurate survey to be made of the most eligible and direct route for a canal, to open a communication between the tide-waters of the Hudson River and Lake Erie, to the end that Congress may be enabled to appropriate such sums as may be necessary to the accomplishment of that great national object.”

In pursuance of a recommendation by the committee, a resolution unanimously passed both houses, directing the surveyor- general, Simeon De Witt, to cause an accurate survey to be made of the various routes proposed for the contemplated communication. But how little the magnitude of that undertaking was understood may be inferred from the fact that the appropriation made by the resolution to defray the expenses of its execution was limited to the sum of six hundred dollars.

There was then no civil engineer in the State. James Geddes, a land surveyor, who afterward became one of our most distinguished engineers, by the force of native genius and application in mature years, levelled and surveyed under instructions from the surveyor-general, with a view to ascertain, first, whether a canal could be made from the Oneida Lake to Lake Ontario, at the mouth of Salmon Creek; secondly, whether navigation could be opened from Oswego Falls to Lake Ontario, along the Oswego River; thirdly, what was the best route for a canal from above the Falls of Niagara to Lewiston; and, fourthly, what was the most direct route, and what the practicability of a canal from Lake Erie to the Genesee River, and thence to the waters running east to the Seneca River. The topography of the country between the Seneca River and the Hudson was at that time comparatively better known.

Mr. Geddes’s report showed that a canal from Lake Erie to the Hudson was practicable, and could be made without serious difficulty. In 1810, on motion of Jonas Piatt, of the Senate, who was distinguished throughout a pure and well-spent life by his zealous efforts to promote this great undertaking, Gouverneur Morris, De Witt Clinton, Stephen Van Rensselaer, Simeon De Witt, William North, Thomas Eddy, and Peter B. Porter were appointed commissioners ” to explore the whole route for inland navigation from the Hudson River to Lake Ontario, and to Lake Erie.” Cadwallader D. Colden, a contemporary historian, himself one of the earliest and ablest advocates of the canals, awards to Thomas Eddy the merit of having suggested this motion to Mr. Piatt, and to both these gentlemen that of engaging De Witt Clinton’s support, he being at that time a member of the Senate. Another writer commemorates the efficient and enlightened exertions, at this period, of Hugh Williamson, who wrote, with reference to the contemplated improvement, papers entitled Observations on Navigable Canals and also Observations on the Means of Preserving the Commerce 0f New York, which were published in magazines of that day.

More information here and here and below.

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