BUREAU OF RAILWAY ECONOMIW»
Washington. o> c.
THE PROPOSED NICARAGUA CANAL.
A Reply to an Asserted " Refutation "
by Thomas B. Atkins, Seci'etary of
the Maritime Canal Company of
Nicaragua.
It was not until a few days ago that I first saw the
pamphlet entitled A Refutation of The Proposed
Nicaragua Canal an Impracticable Project, by Joseph
Nimmo, Jr., LL. D.," the author of which pamphlet is
Thompas B. Atkins, Secretary of The Maritime Canal
Company, of Nicaragua. I would make no reply to
this publication but for the fact that it contains an
aspersion upon my reputation for veracity. The words
called in question are found on page 4 of my communi¬
cation to the Nicaragua Canal Board, dated Sep ember
30, 1895, and are as follows :
I also invite your attention to a statement in regard
to the attractive influence of the Nicaragua Canal which
I prepared in the year 1890 at the request of the New
York Chamber of Commerce."
Mr. Atkins declares that that statement contains a
suggestio falsiJ^ This I declare to be unwarranted.
The facts in regard to the matter are as follows : A
statement entitled Report on the Tonnage of Traffic
of The Maritime Canal Company of Nicaragua" was
presented by that company to the New York Chamber
of Commerce at its monthly meeting held October 2,
1890, with a solicitous request for the endorsement of
the Nicaragua Canal project. This formidable docu¬
ment of forty-one legal cap pages, in typewriting, em¬
bracing tables and complex computations, was referred
to the Committee on Foreign Commerce and Revenue
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Laws, with an order ''to investigate and verify the
statements therein contained, and to submit its conclu¬
sions thereupon at the next regular meeting of the
Chamber.'^ The Chairman of that Committee referred
this document to me, as a student of commercial and
economic questions, for examination and criticism. I
made the desired investigation of its contents, and my
reply, dated October 14, 1890, states that I found it to
be "a misleading statement," based upon "mistaken
»assumptions " and "erroneous methods," and therefore
unworthy of serious consideration. Later I have char¬
acterized it as " a statistical juggle." At the next
monthly meeting held November 6,1890, the Committee
submitted its report to the Chamber, with no recom¬
mendation in favor of the endorsement of the Nicara¬
gua Canal project, and with no other suggestion as to
action upon the statement of the Canal Company than
is contained in the words "we heartily commend to the
Members of the Chamber a careful examination of the
report on the prospective traffic, herewith submitted."
The Chamber of Commerce declined the solicitous re¬
quest of the Nicaragua Canal Company for endorse¬
ment.
About thirteen months later, viz., on the 15th of
December, 1891, another attempt was made to secure
for the Nicaragua Canal the endorsement of the New
York Chamber of Commerce. On this occasion the
distinguished President of the Nicaragua Canal Con¬
struction Company presented the project, but without
any practical result ; and up to fche present time the
endorsement of the New York Chamber of Commerce
has not been secured. This is stated to me in a letter
of recent date by the Secretary of the New York Cham¬
ber of Commerce.
And yet, at this late day, Mr. Atkins, the Secretary
of the Canal Company, attempts to make it appear that
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the New York Chamber of Commerce did endorse the
Nicaragua Canal scheme.
In the light of the foregoing I submit the question :
Who has been guilty of an attempt to deceive, and
against whom does the charge of siiggestio falsi lie ?
I have never had the curiosity to inquire what effect
my criticism upon the prospectus of the Nicaragua
Canal project had upon the minds of the members of
the New York Chamber of Commerce, but it is my be-
lief that a very large proportion of those gentlemen,
and indeed a very large proportion of the merchants of
the city of New York, have been led to an adverse con¬
clusion in regard to the scheme aside from anything
which I may have said upon the subject.
Those gentlemen are, as I believe, firmly convinced
that the proposed Nicaragua Canal is an impracticable
scheme, and they have reached that conclusion from
their own knowledge of commercial affairs.
If the real nature of similar appeals for endorsement
of the Nicaragua Canal made during the last ten years,
in the course of an astounding propaganda, had been
as clearly exposed, that scheme would never have
gained the endorsement of a single Chamber of Com¬
merce, Board of Trade or political organization in this
country.
But why does Mr. Atkins so studiously avoid coming
down to the practical question as to the tonnage likely
to pass through the proposed canal? Like other advo¬
cates of the canal, personally interested in it, he evades
that issue by again quoting the fraudulent and absurd
estimate prepared for Count De Lesseps, the state¬
ments prepared by persons interested in the canal, and
guesses of* distinguished gentlemen who are not and
never were regarded as authority in such matters.
Indeed, the scheme from its inception has been builded
mainly upon distinguished names.
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But the whole question at issue can be put in a nut¬
shell. Adopting the fanciful and unphilosophical ex¬
pression of the Canal Company, ^^zone of its attrac¬
tion," we can find only about 416,000 tons of shipping
in all our Asiatic and Australian commerce, nearly all
sailing tonnage, and in the traffic of our Pacific Coast
States with Europe only about 627,000 tons of ship¬
ping, of which 99 per cent consists of sailing tonnage.
All the remaining tonnage in the so-called ''zone of
attraction" amounts to only about 600,000 tons. This
gives a total of about 1,600,000 tons for the assumed
"zone of attraction." But it is demonstrable that not
more than one-third of that total amount of tonnage
could be secured by the Nicaragua Canal. Besides, the
conditions which determine the course of the develop¬
ment of commerce within the assumed " zone of attrac¬
tion " tend inevitably to turn commerce from the
Nicaragua Canal to other routes. The real "zone of
attraction " of this impracticable scheme is the extent
to which the persuasive eloquence of its chief propo¬
nents has deluded chambers of commerce, boards of
trade and political organizations into the error of en¬
dorsing it.
Years ago, in the course of my studies of commer¬
cial and economic questions, I arrived at the conclusion
that the Nicaragua Canal, if constructed, would be, in
a commercial sense, the weakest of all the transconti¬
nental lines from Panama to British America. For the
purpose of verification I communicated upon this point
with the best informed managers of the transcontinen¬
tal railroads, and found that they concurred in my
view. It will be an easy matter for any committee of
Congress to satisfy itself upon this point.
Mr. Atkins seems to think he has refuted my asser¬
tions in regard to the practicability of navigating
jailing vessels through the Nicaragua Canab My
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quotation from Lieutenant Maury was taken from a
statement made by an eminent American Civil Engi¬
neer. What Lieutenant Maury said about the Nica¬
ragua route has no point in the present controversy for
the following reasons : His statement in a letter
written in the year 1866, was made upon the basis of
data collected by that learned and highly gifted man
prior to the year 1861, when the screw propellor was
still an experiment, even upon the Atlantic Ocean in
the trade between the United States and Europe. The
first transcontinental railroad was not completed when
Lieutenant Maury wrote. The conditions of ocean
commerce and of traffic between the eastern and west¬
ern sides of North America have radically changed
since the year 1861. Besides, officers of the Navy and
others familiar with the Nicaragua route have declared
to me that it is not a practicable route for sailing ves¬
sels. What chance has a sailing vessel on the eastern
side of Nicaragua where the rainfall amounts to 25
feet a year and where the rain usually comes straight
down. Besides I am informed that there is less wind
on the Pacific side than on the Atlantic side of Nica¬
ragua. But consider the utter impracticability of tow¬
ing sailing vessels in from sea, towing them for 170
miles through the canal and lake, and then towing
them out to sea again. The expense attending such
necessary towage proves the idea of employing sailing
Vessels on this route to be absurd. Let the Nicaragua
Canal people join me in the request for a thorough in¬
vestigation of this question.
Mr. Atkins declares that I am attempting to induce
Congress to accept my assertions, official and unofficial,
as a demonstration of the whole question at issue. In
this he is mistaken. All that I desire is that Congress
shall make a thorough investigation of the project in
its corpmercial, military and political bearings, and
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thus, at once, put my statements and the statements of
the Canal Company to an impartial test.
The Secretary of the Maritime Canal Company of
Nicaragua still harps upon the success of the Suez
Canal as though it constituted a reason in favor of the
Nicaragua Canal. There are canals which are useful,
and canals which are practically useless. Many canals
have been abandoned. What would be the condition
of the Suez Canal if it had half a dozen railroad
competitors between the principal centers of commerce
in Europe and Asia, each railroad half the length of
the Suez route. The receipts of the canal in such case
would not be safficient to pay its current expenses.
But such would be the condition of the Nicaragua
Canal in competition with the trans-continental rail¬
roads of this country. The fight between these rail¬
roads and the competing Panama and Cape Horn
routes may have been an ugly fight, but there is a con¬
siderable degree of ugliness in commercial struggles
generally. The freedom of commerce is the freedom
of struggle.
The inuendoes, slurs and attempts at sa.tirical witti¬
cism in which Mr. Atkins indulges are the subterfuge
of debate to which men have recourse when baffled
upon the main issue. He charges on page 1 of his
pamphlet, that I have made an open and undisguised
attempt " to influence the Nicaragua Canal Commission
and to influence Congress. That is a soft impeach¬
ment. The press of this country is to-day engaged in
^^open and undisguised attempts" to influence Con¬
gress. So are thousands of writers on public questions.
It is an inalienable right of every American citizen
to discuss public questions with that object in view.
I hope that I shall never be betrayed into any attempt
to influence Congress which is not open and undis¬
guised," and whenever a Senator or Member of Con-
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gress shall give attention to any utterance of mine I
shall be highly complimented.
Mr. Atkins intimates that I am serving rival interests.
That is untrue.
The main question now at issue in regard to this
entire matter is, Shall the Congress of the United States
commit this countrv to an enormous financial obliga¬
tion for the construction of a work in a foreign conn-
try, without first ordering an official investigation of
its merits from every practical point of view ? It
would be sheer madness to neglect to do so. In an
article from my pen which appeared in the Forum for
March, 1896, I have earnestly recommended such an
investigation as to the commercial, military and polit¬
ical aspects of the project. The recent Nicaragua
Canal board has also recommended a more thorough
investigation of the engineering problems involved.
The proponents of the Nicaragua Canal project deny
the accuracy of my official report of 1880, the only
official report made as to its commercial merits, and
they deny the accuracy of the recent report of the
Board of Engineers as to its engineering features.
They are besides making strenuous efforts to prevent
any investigation whatever as to the feasibility or com¬
mercial value of their scheme. It is now or never
with them, and they know it. They also realize that
an honest investigation by disinterested officers of the
Government as recommended by me would expose the
utter falsity of the representations upon which their
scheme has been floating during the last ten years, and
that such investigation would be its death-blow.
Again I plead for a thorough investigation of the
commercial possibilities of the Nicaragua Canal before
the Government of the United States shall become re¬
sponsible for its construction.
JOSEPH NIMMO, Jr.
1831 P Street, Washington, D. C., March 18, 1896.
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