711.42157SA29/1316
Memorandum by the Chief of the Division of Current Information (McDermott)
At the press conference at the White House this morning the President said that he has called off all appointments so that he can devote himself to writing a message on the St. Lawrence Waterways Treaty.61 He hasn’t written it yet, but he hopes to get it up by this afternoon. A correspondent enquired whether the President will take a position on the diversion at Chicago. The President answered, yes. The correspondent asked whether the President could tell him what it is. Everybody laughed, but the President astonished them by saying, yes. The President said that the following should be only used as background and should be held confidential until his message goes up. The War Department and everybody else who has studied it feels that the Treaty in its existing form provides for enough water to maintain the flow of Chicago’s sewage and also such navigation as is desirable between Chicago and Mississippi. There is a certain amount of what might be called local opposition in the southern part of Mississippi and around St. Louis. It is an equitable affair that we should divert the water out of the Great Lakes. It can be done only by agreement with Canada. The water isn’t ours; it belongs to Canada and us. [Page 968] You can’t get around that fact. You can’t go ahead blithely and take all the water out of the Great Lakes and divert it to another water shed. It isn’t fair to a neighbor country. Whatever is done must be by agreement with Canada, Chicago to the contrary notwithstanding. The President said there is the general problem of Mississippi navigation, a different water shed. We believe that through a program of national planning that problem can be solved by the control of water, flood prevention, storage reservoirs, etc., which would provide an even natural flow of water down the Mississippi to provide enough water for adequate navigation purposes. When it comes to commerce in the Middle West and Northwest, it is very largely a question of mileage. Suppose you wanted to ship a piano from St. Louis to London, what is the straight line? Through the Great Lakes to the Atlantic and across the Atlantic. The President supposes it would help New Orleans if the piano went around three sides of a square, but it is against nature. The same thing is true of wheat in Montana. The logical outlet is a straight line. It is against nature to have it shipped via Galveston and Houston. That is one of the principal answers to objectors to the treaty. It is a rule of common sense.
A correspondent enquired whether that means the treaty ratification will be on the basis of its present form and no reservations suggested. The President said he does not know of any reservations.
A correspondent said that the War Department report showed that all the engineers felt that it should be left to the Chief of Engineers to increase the diversion at Chicago if necessary, but the Chief of Engineers disagreed with the subordinates. The President said that he thought that is provided for in the treaty. There were several objections by the engineers and the chief of them was that there might be necessity to take a very large flow of water for a short period in order to flush out Chicago’s sewage system. Another correspondent suggested that that would take quite a lot of water. Off the record, the President said he thinks the Canadians will take that into consideration. They know Chicago too.
[The remainder of this memorandum deals with other matters.]
- For text of the President’s message, see Department of State, Press Releases, January 13, 1934, p. 14; also Congressional Record, vol. 78, pt. 1, p. 338.↩