Editorial Note

The distance between Norfolk and Louisville, at the Falls of the Ohio, is about 525 miles; but in the 1780s the question was not how remote the extremes of Virginia were from each other, but whether these distant points even belonged in the same empire. In tidewater Virginia there was much feeling that navigable rivers from the foothills of the Alleghenies would draw western produce to eastern ports, lessening a dependency upon the Ohio or the whims of Spaniards who controlled the Mississippi. JM had turned the matter over in his mind until convinced that trans-Allegheny Americans had to depend upon rivers flowing west and south. George Washington was typical of the other kind of Virginian, however, who wanted a network of deep river channels and canals extending into gorges that would link the transmontane region with Atlantic ports. Thus convinced, Washington traveled to Richmond in the fall of 1784 while the General Assembly was in session, the ostensible purpose of the visit being a meeting with Lafayette, but in fact the General went as a lobbyist for a Potomac canal project. With great delight, Washington reported to Lafayette on 15 February 1785 “that the exertions which you found, and left me engag’d in, to impress my Countrymen with the advantages of extending the inland navigation of our rivers, and opening free and easy communications with the Western Territory (thereby binding them to us by interest, the only knot which will hold) has not been employ’d in vain” (Fitzpatrick, Writings of Washington description begins John C. Fitzpatrick, ed., The Writings of George Washington, from the Original Sources, 1745–1799 (39 vols.; Washington, 1931–44). description ends , XXVIII, 72).

Passage of bills which permitted the creation of public corporations for canal-building projects on the Potomac and James rivers was the cause of Washington’s optimism, and the credit for their enactment was chiefly his. As Madison explained to Jefferson, the subject was tossed in the legislators’ laps by Washington when he wrote a persuasive letter to Governor Benjamin Harrison, who in turn relayed the message to the House of Delegates with a strong endorsement. The governor’s covering letter spoke of Washington’s arguments as conclusive, and expressed hope that the General Assembly would move forward by “setting on foot the surveys recommended as a necessary preparatory Step to the undertaking” (ibid., XXVII, 471–80; Executive Letter Book description begins Executive Letter Book, 1783–1786, manuscript in Virginia State Library. description ends , pp. 412–13).

With such powerful support, aided by the petitions from citizens whose signatures attested their belief in the efficacy of canals as harbingers of prosperity, the legislative course of necessary bills was sure and steady. JM was chosen as one of the floor managers for the program, and a model for the Potomac canal project was prepared and forwarded to Richmond by Washington after it had been revised and passed by the Maryland legislature (Laws of Maryland … at a Session of … 1784 [Annapolis, 1785], chap. XXXIII). Washington had gone to Annapolis to further the scheme and although his head throbbed he reported the altered bill had passed “with only 9 dissenting voices” (Washington to JM, 28 Dec. 1784). Everybody in the Virginia legislature must have known that the Potomac bill soon to be introduced in Richmond came via Mount Vernon.

Before the model act from Maryland had reached his hands, however, JM had already introduced the bill printed below and it had gone through all the steps for enactment except Speaker Benjamin Harrison’s signature. As JM told Jefferson in his letter of 9 January 1785, his bill would have financed the canal by borrowing money on a 10 percent loan guaranteed by the credit of the commonwealth “inviolably pledged for both principal and interest.” The arrival of the Potomac bill from Maryland changed the whole complexion of the legislation, for the Annapolis-passed measure created a public corporation with shareholders subsidizing at least $222,222.22 in construction funds (Hening, Statutes description begins William Waller Hening, ed., The Statutes at Large; Being a Collection of All the Laws of Virginia, from the First Session of the Legislature, in the Year 1619 (13 vols.; Richmond and Philadelphia, 1819–23). description ends , XI, 511). The House decided to drop JM’s bill and use the Maryland statute (almost verbatim). Surely the appeal of a corporation with no risk of public money must have held its allurements. Thus, “it was found advisable to pass a similar one in favor of James River” and JM’s energies were turned to a new channel. William Grayson handled the borrowed Potomac River bill, JM took the assignment for the James River version, and after several tries the companion bills survived a House-Senate conference committee to become law on the same day—5 January 1785. To guard against future disappointment the bills took cognizance of past failures and ordered that the work begin within a year and be finished within ten “under the penalty of entire forfeiture” (JM to Jefferson, 9 Jan. 1785). Washington, the optimist, told Robert Morris of the Potomac project and added that if he were inclined “to encounter present inconvenience for a future income, I would hazard all the money I could raise” (Fitzpatrick, Writings of Washington description begins John C. Fitzpatrick, ed., The Writings of George Washington, from the Original Sources, 1745–1799 (39 vols.; Washington, 1931–44). description ends , XXVIII, 55). JM, the realist, was more cautious. “These acts are very lengthy,” he wrote Jefferson, “and having passed in all the precipitancy which marks the concluding stages of a Session, abound I fear with inaccuracies.”