Pamphlet, Highway to the Pacific…Speech of Mr. [Thomas Hart] Benton. Delivered in the Senate of the United States, Dec. 16, 1850
In this speech of December 1850, Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri argued for a central route with its eastern terminus in his home city of St. Louis. Though Congress ultimately chose a central route, its eastern point was not in St. Louis, but in Council Bluffs, Iowa.
Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress
![Pamphlet, Highway to the Pacific. Speech of Mr. [Thomas Hart] Benton. Delivered in the Senate of the United States, Dec. 16, 1850](/sites/default/files/styles/zoom_image_thumbnails/public/images/exhibitions/artifacts/D-0596-225_00_00_0.jpg?itok=PI34LmtI)
Debating the Rail Route
In 1853 Congress authorized funds for the Army Corps of Engineers to survey four possible routes for a railway from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. Members of Congress recognized the potential for commerce and development that a transcontinental railway would bring, and they advocated strenuously for their own regions. Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri was an outspoken proponent of a central route. Secretary of War Jefferson Davis, a former and future senator from Mississippi, favored a southern route.