The Lumber Lobby Scores a Panama Canal Win
Pacific coast lumbermen outmaneuvered the Panama Canal Commission to exempt deck-loads from tonnage fees, signaling the power of regional industry over federal regulation.
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The Pacific coast invasion of the Atlantic coast via the Panama Canal got a big boost the other day when the Panama canal commission made its peace with the west coast lumbermen and agreed not to count lumber deck-loads as part of the tonnage that must pay dues for the use of the canal. Other commodity deck-loads are counted. This distinction is attributed to one of those unsung deals by which the wheels of government are kept turning. The commission had been trying to get a bill through congress revising the scheme of tonnage charges, but the lumbermen could always pull more legislative strings than the commission. Now they have made a pact, and the commission will take it out of the less adroit shipping interests.
“The lumbermen could always pull more legislative strings than the commission.”
The leverage of Washington's timber industry over maritime transit corridors mirrors today's debates regarding port infrastructure and who bears the tax burden for regional logistics. Like the 'unsung deals' of 1923, local infrastructure policy remains a battlefield of competing industry influence.
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