The Struggle for the Swinomish Slough

Among our telegraphic advices lately received appeared the following: 'The committee agreed to Mitchell's amendments increasing the appropriation for a canal and locks at the Cascades of the Columbia river from fifty to a hundred thousand dollars... but it does look a little suggestive that the above handsome figures are all appropriations for improvements to navigation in the Democratic State of Oregon, while there has never been an appropriation of a single dollar for like purposes in the Territory of Washington. For example, Congress has been repeatedly memorialized for an appropriation of a few thousand dollars to remove the jams near the mouth of the Skagit river, which have for many years almost completely closed against settlement that largest and richest valley in the Territory. Another important channel especially entitled to Government attention is the Swinomish Slough, or South channel of the Skagit. This slough connects the waters at the mouth of Skagit River with Padilla Bay, passing between Fidalgo Island and the main Swinomish Flats. The slough is some eight miles long, affords the main channel of communication along the east side of the Sound from Seattle to Bellingham Bay, on account of the dangers oftentimes attending a passage through Deception Pass. The channel of the slough is very crooked, shifting, shallow and winding. At several places are bars nearly obstructing navigation, yet these obstacles can be removed at small expense if it were not for the continuous shifting of the channel. This requires that the channel be staked out anew every little while. The owners of the steamer 'Libby' have so far been public-spirited enough to do this at their own expense. Yet this being a public navigable channel used by all trading there, traffic worth nearly half a million dollars being compelled to pass one way or another through this slough this year, it is not right to expect one company to do all this work alone.