Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Winter 2007 - (Page 28)

The Great Ouachita OUACHITA PARISH DIGITAL ARCHIVE, OUACHITA PARISH PUBLIC LIBRARY, MONROE South Grand Street was the main thoroughfare from south Monroe to the downtown area, laid out parallel to the Ouachita River. It therefore took the brunt of the flood damage. flooded by the Army Corps of Engineers. Later, a revised Flood Control Act of 1936, introduced by Louisiana Senator dictates of the Fifth Amendment, be purchased by the John H. Overton, compelled the government to abandon government prior to use. In Federal District Court for the the Boeuf floodway. Western District of Louisiana, Judge Ben C. Dawkins ruled The Ouachita, however, caused the damage in 1932. in Kincaid’s favor. In a series of late-1929 decisions, he “Let’s put the blame for our present predicament where it acknowledged that the government had the right to belongs,” railed the Ouachita Citizen. Five years earlier, on appropriate lands it deemed necessary for federal use, but November 11, 1927, responding to damage from the ruled that landowners must be compensated for that use. summer flood, the police jury passed Ordinance No. 979, Dawkins issued an injunction against the project until a which zoned West Monroe as Gravity Drainage District No. monetary settlement could be reached. 1. The Board of Commissioners for the new district As the floodwaters in Monroe rose, however, the submitted a proposal that called for a system of canals, Supreme Court chose to disagree. The money that so many retaining walls, pumps, floodgates, and spillways. The farmers hoped for never arrived, as a unanimous Court, project was to be funded by a $125,000 bond issue to be in an opinion written by Justice Louis Brandeis, paid over 25 years. On February 7, 1928, the measure removed the injunction, maintaining was defeated in a popular vote of that the Fifth Amendment did not property owners in the district. The require payment in advance for lands Between 1930 and 1935, total people made “their choice between that might be taken. The opinion also immunity from overflow and liability assessed property value in questioned whether occasional to overflow,” railed the Citizen. Ouachita Parish plummeted flooding even constituted “taking.” If, Some of the voters rejected the tax wrote Brandies, the floodwaters did because they wanted federal action, from almost $65 million to destroy Kincaid’s land and a court some because they assumed that a just over $43 million. The deemed that destruction “taking,” he flood like 1927 could never again area’s agricultural income could then sue for recompense. But no occur, and some because the flood had fell by almost 65 percent. sooner. left them with no money, no property, The Morning World placed a and little hope for the future. “The Similar drops in total payroll positive spin on the decision, same proposition that was defeated in and retail sales stood as emphasizing that Brandeis still upheld 1928,” crowed the Citizen, “would be testaments to the economic the right of payment for exporpriated overwhelmingly approved in 1932.” devastation in the region. lands. In addition, the polarizing The West Monroe newspaper nature of the case, coupled with the endorsed the 1928 local plan of a simultaneous suffering of those in and floodwall along the Ouachita as the around Monroe — even though the damage came from best protection plan for the future, noting “the time to another source — led the House Flood Control start it is immediately after the present emergency.” Committee to hold hearings as a preparatory measure to revising the 1928 Flood Control Act. Representative Riley J. BRACING FOR THE WORST Wilson, a Democrat from nearby Ruston, vocal in his As January progressed, the present emergency showed displeasure with the Republican administration’s response no signs of abating. An anonymous article in the Morning to his state’s 1927 disaster, chaired the committee. Under his World compared waterlogged West Monroe to Venice. “Of leadership, the hearings resulted in an amendment course,” it noted, “there are vagaries in any comparison.” authorizing payment of private citizens for land potentially 28 LOUISIANA ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES\Winter 2007-08

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Winter 2007

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Winter 2007 Contents Friends Editor’s Column Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities Katrina: Days of Terror, Months of Anguish Paintings by Rolland Golden The Historic New Orleans Collection The Great Ouachita River Flood of 1932 Jazz Notes Louisiana Architecture Louisiana: Where Land Meets Water Louisiana State Museum Through A Lens Sharply: An Interview with Michael Lewis MR-GO: A “miracle” mired in controversy Louisiana Foodways Louisiana Association of Museums New Orleans: An Autopsy Bookstand Sound Advice Forum

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Winter 2007

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