[Congressional Bills 110th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 936 Engrossed in House (EH)]


                In the House of Representatives, U. S.,

                                                        March 12, 2008.
Whereas President Thomas Jefferson commissioned his Secretary of the Treasury, 
        Albert Gallatin, to provide a new vision for transportation that would 
        unite the young Republic;
Whereas 2008 marks the bicentennial of the national plan, known as the Gallatin 
        Report on Roads and Canals (Gallatin Report), presented by Secretary 
        Gallatin to President Jefferson;
Whereas the Gallatin Report proposed transportation improvements not as ends in 
        themselves but as means to further national unity;
Whereas transportation improvements were part of the promise of the American 
        Revolution, as James Madison, writing in The Federalist No. 14, 
        emphasized, ``Let it be remarked * * * that the intercourse throughout 
        the Union will be facilitated by new improvements. Roads will everywhere 
        be shortened, and kept in better order; accommodations for travelers 
        will be multiplied and meliorated; an interior navigation on our eastern 
        side will be opened throughout, or nearly throughout, the whole extent 
        of the thirteen States'';
Whereas Madison's words have served as a worthy reminder of the needs for 
        transportation infrastructure since that time;
Whereas the Gallatin Report incorporated the improvements to the Postal Service 
        that Benjamin Franklin bequeathed to the Nation, including Franklin's 
        route surveys, his placement of milestones on principal roads, and his 
        development of shorter transportation routes;
Whereas the Gallatin Report called for an inland waterway navigation canal from 
        Massachusetts to North Carolina, which was the precursor to the modern 
        day Intercostal Waterway system;
Whereas the United States, as a result of Gallatin's legacy, has a record of 
        successful infrastructure developments, including--

    (1) the Erie Canal, which vastly reduced transportation costs to the 
interior;

    (2) the transcontinental railway, which united the Nation;

    (3) transit projects across the Nation, which promote freedom and 
opportunity;

    (4) the National Highway System, including the Dwight D. Eisenhower 
System of Interstate and Defense Highways, which fostered interstate 
commerce, national unity, and broke down barriers between the States; and

    (5) the Tennessee Valley Authority, devised by President Franklin 
Delano Roosevelt as a ``corporation clothed with the power of government 
but possessed of the flexibility and initiative of a private enterprise'', 
which brought electricity, conservation planning, and opportunity for 
thousands in the Tennessee Valley and across the Nation;

Whereas to be regarded as a success, any national planning endeavor must address 
        and reconcile the needs of different regions of the Nation;
Whereas the genius of the Gallatin Report was its alignment of the hopes of the 
        Nation with the opportunities presented by access to new markets, 
        populations, and territories;
Whereas the United States currently faces new challenges in financing the 
        transportation infrastructure that is necessary for the future economic 
        needs of the Nation; and
Whereas if the United States is to succeed in a world of increasing 
        international competition, the United States must have a new national 
        plan for transportation improvements to provide for the Nation's future: 
        Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
            (1) reaffirms the goals and ideals that formed the impetus for 
        Albert Gallatin's national plan for transportation improvements 200 
        years ago;
            (2) calls on the Federal Government, States, localities, schools, 
        nonprofit organizations, businesses, and the citizens of the United 
        States to mark this important anniversary by recalling the important 
        legacy of public investment in infrastructure, which connects and 
        enhances the economies, communications, and communities of the several 
        States; and
            (3) supports the creation of a new national plan for transportation 
        improvements to align the demands for economic development with the 
        resources of the Nation.
            Attest:

                                                                          Clerk.