the part which the Departments of Agriculture and
of Commerce and Labor may play in ridding the markets of Europe of
prohibitions and discriminations against the importation of our products
is fully understood, and it is hoped that the use of the maximum and
minimum feature of our tariff law to be soon passed will be effective to
remove many of those restrictions.

The Panama Canal will have a most important bearing upon the trade
between the eastern and far western sections of our country, and will
greatly increase the facilities for transportation between the
eastern and the western seaboard, and may possibly revolutionize the
transcontinental rates with respect to bulky merchandise. It will also
have a most beneficial effect to increase the trade between the eastern
seaboard of the United States and the western coast of South America,
and, indeed, with some of the important ports on the east coast of South
America reached by rail from the west coast.

The work on the canal is making most satisfactory progress. The type
of the canal as a lock canal was fixed by Congress after a full
consideration of the conflicting reports of the majority and minority of
the consulting board, and after the recommendation of the War Department
and the Executive upon those reports. Recent suggestion that something
had occurred on the Isthmus to make the lock type of the canal less
feasible than it was supposed to be when the reports were made and
the policy determined on led to a visit to the Isthmus of a board of
competent engineers to examine the Gatun dam and locks, which are
the key of the lock type. The report of that board shows nothing has
occurred in the nature of newly revealed evidence which should change
the views once formed in the original discussion. The construction will
go on under a most effective organization controlled by Colonel Goethals
and his fellow army engineers associated with him, and will certainly be
completed early in the next administration, if not before.

Some type of canal must be constructed. The lock type has been selected.
We are all in favor of having it built as promptly as possible. We must
not now, therefore, keep up a fire in the rear of the agents whom we
have authorized to do our work on the Isthmus. We must hold up their
hands, and speaking for the incoming administration I wish to say that
I propose to devote all the energy possible and under my control to
pushing of this work on the plan