That so vast and costly an undertaking could also be done without graft, kickbacks, payroll padding, any of the hundred and one forms of corruption endemic to such works, seemed almost inconceivable at the start, nor does it seem any less remarkable in retrospect. Yet the canal was, among so many other things, a clean project. No excessive profits were made by any of the several thousand different firms dealt with by the I.C.C. There had not been the least hint of scandal from the time Goethals was given command, nor has evidence of corruption of any kind come to light in all the years since.
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