To James Madison from Alexander J. Dallas, 1 March 1816
From Alexander J. Dallas
Treasury Department March 1st. 1816.
The Secretary of the Treasury has the honor to lay before the President of the United States, the annual Report of David Shriver Jr, the Superintendant of the Western Road, from Cumberland to the river Ohio.1
The Secretary having respectfully submitted to the President, propositions for accelerating the completion of this great national work, deems it proper, upon the present occasion, to add the following statement and estimates of the appropriation, which have been made, and which will be required for that purpose.
1. Statement of past appropriations.
2. Estimate of appropriations required.
| To carry the road to Union town, about the sum of | 117.000: |
| To compleat the road from Uniontown to Brownsville, about twelve miles will require at the rate of 7.500 dollars per mile, according to the estimate heretofore laid before Congress, about the sum of | 90.000: |
| To make the road at and from Wheling on the Ohio to the 113 mile marked upon the Survey of the Commissioners about 12 miles will require at the same rate about the sum of | 90.000: |
| To survey the course of the Road from Brownsville to Wheling, through Washington and Alexandria, will require about the sum of | 3.000: |
| 300.000 | |
| Upon this general view, it is proposed, that in addition to the above stated balance of past appropriations | 101.533.65 |
| there be recommended to Congress a further appropriation to the amount of | 300.000: |
| Making together the amount required for the above purposes | $401.533:65 |
All which is respectfully submitted.
A. J. Dallas,
Secretary of the Treasury.
RC, two copies, and enclosure, two copies (DNA: RG 233, President’s Messages, 14A–D1; and DNA: RG 46, Legislative Proceedings, President’s Messages, 14A–E4). For enclosure, see n. 1. JM forwarded the RC and enclosure to Congress on 12 Mar. 1816 (DNA: RG 233, President’s Messages, 14A–D1).
1. Dallas enclosed David Shriver’s 30 Dec. 1815 report (5 pp.; marked “Copy” and incorrectly dated 1816); printed in , Miscellaneous, 2:297–98). Shriver described the progress made over the last year on constructing thirty-five miles on nine sections of the Cumberland Road and predicted that “the whole of the turnpike east of the Big Youghagany river will be finished.” He also reported that work on building a bridge over that river had commenced and described repairs made on sixteen miles of the first six sections of the road. If progress on the road had not been as rapid as the government might have liked, Shriver attributed the delays to inefficiencies in the contracting system. Contractors submitted bids that were too low to enable them to carry out the work and prevented them from offering competitive wages to laborers. He suggested that the government might “abandon the mode of seperate contracts altogether, and substitute days labor” along with an increase in wages of twenty-five to fifty cents per day. In concluding the report, Shriver requested that Congress make its wishes known whether it wanted the road to be located near the Ohio River and extended beyond it.