Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 11.djvu/446

416 F. G. Young at the end of twenty years on payment to the company of their actual value/ The state did not avail itself of this privilege, but in 1907 an appropriation of $300,000 was made — renewed in 1909 — conditioned on an equal appropriation being made by Congress, for purchasing the canal and locks or constructing another passage on the opposite side of the river. The constitutional inhibition of the use of state credit for projects of internal improvement has no doubt been salutary. When emergencies arose so that it was necessary to secure the release of trade along natural channels from the throttling grasp of a monopoly the state has found itself able to inter- vene. It has through taxation secured the funds sufficient for portage railways, first at the Cascades of the Columbia and again more recently at The Dalles of the same river. It is very doubtful if the conditions as yet developed are such as to make any participation by it in public improvements with credit financiering advisable. Appreciation of the need of care- ful administration, of the wisdom of using the best expert service, is still an uncertain quantity. Then, too, the conditions are changing so rapidly that any work adequate for today would in a few years need replacement with a structure on a much larger scale, or one adjusted to a more economic process. i General Laws, 1870, pp. 14-17.