The Recompense
One might naturally suppose that when a private citizen, at the head of a great railroad company, averted a national calamity, andsaved for the country public property that was actually worth $25,000,000 and that had a potential value of “from $350,000,000 to $700,000,000,” he would be entitled, at least, to the thanks of the national legislature. If, even in Russia, a railroad president, at the request of the Czar, controlled a great flood in the Volga, barred that river out of the city of Astrakhan, and saved from total destruction “700,000 acres” of fertile land potentially worth “from $350,000,000 to $700,000,000,” he would certainly receive the thanks of the nation, expressed in a suitably worded resolution of the Duma and the Council of the Empire. It is more than probable that, even in China, something of this kind would have been done for a railroad president who had controlled a disastrous flood in the valley of the Hoang-ho. But no such acknowledgment of valuable service was ever made by the Congress of the United States.
Perhaps, however,Mr.Harriman was not entitled to credit, for the reason that the work in the field was done by the Southern Pacific Company and its engineers. This was not the view taken by the company and the engineers themselves. IfMr.Harriman, personally, had been asked who finally controlled the ColoradoRiver and saved the Imperial Valley, he undoubtedly would have replied: “Epes Randolph, H. T. Cory, Thomas J. Hind, C. K. Clarke, and their associates.” But these gentlemen have publicly said that the driving power behind their work—the one thing that made it successful—was the invincible determination of their chief. In a written discussion of the operations on the lower Colorado, which was conducted by the American Society of Civil Engineers,Mr.C. K. Clarke said:
“The writer desires to put on record the fact that the accomplishment of the work was due primarily and exclusively to the independent judgment and courage ofMr.Harriman, who persisted in his belief that the breaks could be closed, and his determination to close them, in the face of opposition, and regardless of the positive assertions of a host of eminent engineers that the closure was a physical impossibility.” (Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Paper 1270,pp.1551-2.)
In the course of the same discussion,Mr.Elwood Mead, Chief of the Irrigation and Drainage Division of the U. S. Department of Agriculture, said:
“It was the duty of the State or Nation to take charge, and provide the money and menneeded to restore the river to its former channel. Apparently no one in authority was interested; the State Government only considered the matter long enough to write a letter to the President, and the President, having Congress on his hands, shifted the responsibility to the head of a railroad company; and it was not until the railroad company took charge that we have the first refreshing example of generosity and public spirit. Nothing could have been finer than the action ofMr.Harriman. The loan of $250,000, when his time and resources were overtaxed by the earthquake at San Francisco, and the providing more than $1,000,000 for the last hazardous attempt to save the valley, furnish an inspiring contrast to the supine indifference and irresponsibility shown by both the State and Federal authorities.” (Same Paper,p.1510.)
Mr.Epes Randolph, who as President of the California Development Company directed and controlled the engineering operations in the lower Colorado from 1905 to 1907, said, in a private letter to a student of the subject:
“It was a great work, and I do not believe that any man whom I have ever known, exceptMr.Harriman, would have undertaken it. All of those of us who actually handled the workwere merely instruments in the hands of the Master Builder.”
From these expressions of opinion it clearly appears that, in the judgment of the men “on the firing line,” the fight with the Colorado was inspired, directed and won by E. H. Harriman; but no acknowledgment of indebtedness to him personally was ever made by the Congress of the United States. The service that he personally rendered was recognized and publicly acknowledged only by the people of the Imperial Valley. In testifying before the House Claims Committee, in March 1910,Mr.J. B. Parazette, speaking for the farmers of the Valley, said:
“We do feel rather differently in that Valley towardMr.Harriman from the way others seem to feel elsewhere over the United States. We believe thatMr.Harriman felt a very human interest in our troubles there.... We volunteered to furnish about five hundred horses, and to bed and board them, and to furnish men to work during the time that the break was being closed; but we heard thatMr.Harriman said that the farmers down there, he supposed, had a great deal to do (it was seeding time with them) and they had about all the work to attend to that they could handle, and the Southern Pacific would fix the break anyway. What wecould have done would not have amounted to much to the railroad company, but it would have amounted to considerable to the farmers there, taking their teams out at that time of the year when they wanted to put in crops.”
This expression of gratitude toMr.Harriman for “showing a human interest” in the farmers’ “troubles,” and for declining to increase their hardships by shifting a part of the burden of work from his own shoulders to theirs, must have pleased him more than any formal vote of thanks from Congress could have done.
WhenMr.Harriman, on the 20th of December 1906, telegraphed the President that, “in view of” his “message,” he would resume efforts to control the Colorado, he ventured to express the modest hope that the Government, as soon as the necessary Congressional action could be secured, would “assist with the burden.”Mr.Roosevelt replied that he would recommend legislation to “provide against a repetition of the disaster and make provision for an equitable distribution of the burden.” (House ReportNo.1936, 61st Congress, 3rd Session,p.163). Three weeks later, however, when the work was actually in progress, he merely said, in his message to Congress, that “the question as to what sum,if any, shouldbe paid to the Southern Pacific Company for work done since the break of November 4th, 1906, is one for future consideration. For work done prior to that date no claim can be admitted” (Same Report,p.157). This may have seemed toMr.Roosevelt a proper recommendation, and one likely to secure “an equitable distribution of the burden;” but it would not have made that impression upon an irrigation expert, say, from the planet Mars, because it suggested a doubt whether “any” of the burden should be borne by the chief beneficiary, namely the Government. However, when a bill to reimburse the Southern Pacific Company was introduced in the House of Representatives in 1908, the President did give it cordial support by saying, in a letter to the chairman of the Claims Committee:
“... I accordingly wrote an earnest appeal to the officials of the road” (the Southern Pacific) “asking them to act. They did act, and thereby saved from ruin many people in southern California, and saved to the Government the Laguna dam.... I feel that it is an act of justice to act generously in this matter, for the railroad, by the prompt and effective work that it did, rendered a notable service to the threatened community. In no other way could this result have been accomplished.”(House ReportNo.1936, 61st Congress, 3rd Session.)
“... I accordingly wrote an earnest appeal to the officials of the road” (the Southern Pacific) “asking them to act. They did act, and thereby saved from ruin many people in southern California, and saved to the Government the Laguna dam.... I feel that it is an act of justice to act generously in this matter, for the railroad, by the prompt and effective work that it did, rendered a notable service to the threatened community. In no other way could this result have been accomplished.”(House ReportNo.1936, 61st Congress, 3rd Session.)
Mr.Roosevelt’s “earnest appeal” had been addressed, as a matter of fact, to E. H. Harriman, not to “the officials of the road;” but the President, apparently, could not bring himself, either in this letter or in his previous message, to mention the name of the man who, at the very time when he was struggling with the Colorado River at the request of the Government, was being prosecuted by that same Government as a malefactor. Names are often embarrassing, and the name in this case might have suggested to the public mind the obnoxious idea thatMr.Harriman, after all, might not be a wholly “undesirable citizen.” Then, too, there would have been a certain incongruity in denouncing “Harriman,” by name as a public enemy, while asking the same “Harriman,” by name, to render a great public service; so it was apparently thought safer to mention the name in one case and drop it out of sight in the other.
The President’s appeal to Congress to “act generously,” was not so successful as had been his appeal toMr.Harriman to stop the Colorado River and save the Imperial Valley. Congress seldom acts “generously” except on measures likely to influence votes, such as pension bills,public building bills, and bills for the improvement of rivers and harbors.Mr.Harriman and the Southern Pacific Company had “improved” a national river, at a cost to themselves of about $3,000,000; but inasmuch as they were then under a cloud of unpopularity created by official and unofficial misrepresentation, their influence on Congressional elections was negligible, and Senators and Representatives might safely—perhaps judiciously—ignore their claim regardless of its merits. The reimbursement bill, therefore, dragged along without action for about three years. Hearings were held, witnesses from California and Arizona were examined, expert engineers were consulted, and the whole subject was thoroughly threshed out. Memorials in support of the bill were received from towns, communities and chambers of commerce in the Imperial Valley; and the entire Congressional delegation from California, as well as almost all the newspapers of the State, urged reimbursement as a matter of simple justice. But Congress could not make up its mind to do justice, either toMr.Harriman or to a railroad company. In 1909, when William H. Taft became President, he at once took up the matter, and in his first message to Congress referred to it in the following words:
“This leads me to invite the attention of Congress to the claim made by the Southern Pacific Company for an amount expended in a similar work of relief called for by a flood and great emergency. This work, as I am informed, was undertaken at the request of my predecessor, and under promise to reimburse the railroad company. It seems to me the equity of this claim is manifest, and the only question involved is the reasonable value of the work done. I recommend the payment of the claim, in a sum found to be just.” (House ReportNo.1956, 61st Congress, 3rd Session.)
“This leads me to invite the attention of Congress to the claim made by the Southern Pacific Company for an amount expended in a similar work of relief called for by a flood and great emergency. This work, as I am informed, was undertaken at the request of my predecessor, and under promise to reimburse the railroad company. It seems to me the equity of this claim is manifest, and the only question involved is the reasonable value of the work done. I recommend the payment of the claim, in a sum found to be just.” (House ReportNo.1956, 61st Congress, 3rd Session.)
Two years later, when nothing had been done, President Taft sent to the Chairman of the House Committee on Claims the following letter:
White HouseWashington,Jan.16, 1911.Hon.George W. Prince,Chairman of Committee on Claims,My dearMr.Prince:As I recommended in my message, I sincerely hope that Congress, at this time, will compensate the Southern Pacific Railway for work which it did in the Imperial Valley under stress of great emergency. I do not know what amount is just, but I do know that that company came to the rescue of the Government at the instance of President Roosevelt, and that there was an implied arrangement under whichthey were to be compensated, and I think that Congress should take up the matter and do justice to that corporation in this instance.Sincerely yours,W. H. Taft.
White HouseWashington,Jan.16, 1911.
Hon.George W. Prince,Chairman of Committee on Claims,My dearMr.Prince:
As I recommended in my message, I sincerely hope that Congress, at this time, will compensate the Southern Pacific Railway for work which it did in the Imperial Valley under stress of great emergency. I do not know what amount is just, but I do know that that company came to the rescue of the Government at the instance of President Roosevelt, and that there was an implied arrangement under whichthey were to be compensated, and I think that Congress should take up the matter and do justice to that corporation in this instance.
Sincerely yours,W. H. Taft.
Under this pressure from the White House, the Committee on Claims finally acted. On the 28th of January 1911, after having reduced the proposed appropriation from $1,663,000 to $773,000, the committee, by a divided vote, reported the bill to the House with the recommendation that it pass. Five members, however, namely Representatives Goldfogle, Kitchin, Candler, Shackleford and Adair, presented a minority report in which they described the bill as “an attempted raid on the Federal Treasury;” denied that there was “any legal, equitable, or moral obligation on the part of the Government” to pay this sum, “or any amount, for closing the break in the Colorado River;” referred to the proposed appropriation as “purely a gratuity,” “a gift of the people’s money,” and declared that they were opposed to this “gift to the Southern Pacific Company, as well as all other gratuities to private enterprise.” (House ReportNo.1936, part 2; 61st Congress, 3rd Session.)
This minority report seems to have giventhecoup de graceto the reimbursement bill. Whether the members of the House were lacking in a sense of justice; whether they were indifferent to the bill because there was “nothing in it for them;” or whether they were afraid, in an election campaign, to face the charge that they had “given the people’s money,” as “a pure gratuity” to one ofMr.Harriman’s railroad corporations, it is impossible to say. Certain it is that no action was ever taken on the bill, although it had been favorably reported by the Committee on Claims; had been repeatedly recommended by two Presidents, and had been unanimously supported, regardless of party lines, by the people of the Imperial Valley and by the whole State of California. There are certain events which may seem inexplicable, but upon which it is not necessary to comment. The barest recital of facts is eloquent enough.
Shortly before his death,Mr.Harriman made a trip through the Imperial Valley and over the reconstructed levee which kept the Colorado River within bounds. Upon his return to Imperial Junction, he was met by a representative of the Los Angeles Examiner who, in conversation about the work, said:
“Mr.Harriman, the Government hasn’t paid you that money, and your work here does notseem to be duly appreciated; do you not, under the circumstances, regret having made this large expenditure?”
“No,” repliedMr.Harriman. “This valley was worth saving, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” said the reporter.
“Then we have the satisfaction of knowing that we saved it, haven’t we?”
It is unfortunate that so fine an achievement as the controlling of the Colorado River and the saving of the Imperial Valley should have been clouded by national ingratitude or indifference; but ifMr.Harriman were living today, he would doubtless find compensation and satisfaction enough in the results of his work as they now appear. The Salton Sea, which once threatened to submerge and destroy the artificially created oasis in the desert, ceased to rise in 1907 and is now slowly drying up. The great Laguna dam above Yuma is done, and is furnishing water to tens of thousands of acres in southern California and Arizona. The territory along the Colorado River below the Grand Cañon, whose prospective value President Roosevelt estimated at “from $350,000,000 to $700,000,000” is safe. The Imperial Valley, which was yielding only $1,200,000 to its cultivators ten years ago, is now producing cotton,barley, alfalfa, cantaloupes, grapes, vegetables and live stock worth more than ten times that amount. According to an estimate made by the Imperial Valley Press in June, 1916, the farmers of the Valley will earn this year a sum equivalent to the interest on $500,000,000. And all of this actual and potential wealth, as well as the land that has produced or will produce it, was threatened with total destruction in 1906, and was saved for the nation by the constructive genius and the invincible resolution of the “Master Builder.”
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