The Portland daily press., 1874-06-13
The Geneva Award.

During the debate on the Geneva award, the
Congressional Record was filled with dreary
columns of statistics and presidents that may
carry conviction to the superior intellects in
Congress, but for brief, terse and practical
presentation of the equity of the case, we think
that our Congressman, Mr. Burleigh, exceled.
The following are Mr.. Burleigh's remarks:
Mr. WILSON, of Indiana. now yield seven
minutes to the gentleman from Maine, MIR.
Burleigh.]
Mr.. BURLElGH. Mr.. Speaker if any gentle
men residing in the interior of the country
think that they have no interest in this ques-
ton, that only those who are concerned in nav
igation on the ocean are interested in it, de-
sire to say to those gentlemen that they and
their constituents have as much interest in this
award as three-fourths or nine-tenths of my
constituents have. The gentleman from New
York MIR. Tremainl had said that these ship
owners who present their claims here are all
rich, worth on an average $4,000 each. Why
did he not say to the House that the own
ership of many of these vessels is cut up into
eighths, sixteenths, perhaps thIrty-seconds or
sixty-fourths If the gentleman will come to
my state, will show him how these ship-own-
ers live, aud what many of them are doing now
And then let the gentleman go with me to
where he is accustomed to go, into the gilded
palaces in which the insurance companies do
their business, on Broadway and State streets;
and into the brown-stcne front houses on Fifth
Avenue and Beacon Hill,
Mr.. Speaker, when the first vessel was cap
tured by rebel cruisers-a ship belonging to in
dividuals in my state-there was great interest
throughout the country among ship owners to
know whether the insurance companies would
pay that loss or not. The ship-owners had in
sured their property against the dangers of the
sea and they claimed that the companies were
liable for the loss. The insurance companies
on the other hand claimed that such loss
was extraordinary and that the companies
were not liable. The court sustained the in
surance companies; and the companies did not
pay any losses of that character until they had
collected from the ship-owners war premiums
sufficient in amount to cover the losses as they
occurred.
Then was the time. Mr. Speaker. that the
ship-owners OF this country were between the
upper and neither milestone, as it were. TO
lose their ship was ruin; to pay the extraordi-
nary and, as it proved to be exorbitant war
premium, was also ruin. Many of them per-
haps were compelled to put their ships under a
foreign flag see their property vanish like
the dew before the morning sun. Others,
more patriotic, having sailed under the old flag
all over the world, could not consent to see
their vessels go under a foreign flag; they paid
out their money and had their vessels captured
until their whole property was swept away.
Thus the merchant marine of this country, that
had before the war done the larger share of
the carrying trade of the world, that had been
the nursery for our seamen and the envy of
other countries, is now classed in regard to
numbers as fourth among the maritime nations
of the earth.
Sir, my people conceive that the Geneva
award was given to this country to remunerate
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destroyed by the rebel cruisers fitted out and
sailing, in a manner, under the protection and
IN the interest of Great Britain.
Now, sir the question before us is, who shall
have this money? Shall the people who had
ships and now have neither ships nor money,
be excluded? Sir, many of these men who are
to-day struggling in poverty on account OF these
losses would, if they had their own again, club
together and once more launch their banks up
the treacherous element.
Mr.. Speaker, these men should be paid, at
least they should not be left out in the cold.
They built up our merchant marine; they main
tanned a nursery for our seamen without any
expense to the Government; and when the
hour of conflict came they were too patriotic
to abandon the flag, but paid out their money
until it would have been better for them if they
had allowed their ships to sink or be captured
Sir, we hear good deal here about law.
Now, sir, understand that we here are law
makers, and that we have special case before
us. Let us SO make the law that it will do JUS
tice in this case 1t is in the interest of the
nation; it is in the interest of those that favor
cheap transportation; it IS i'll the interest of
those who favor deep water at the mouth of
the Mississippi river; it is in the interest of
every member upon this floor and his cOnstit-
uents plead, as well as in the interest of those
who have done business upon the water and
who go down to the sea in ships. If the strong
hand of the government shall succeed in giving
these people their own again, it will build up
our merchant marine again to be our pride and
the envy of the world. 1t will be the means of
maintaining nursery of seamen for our navy
without tany expense to the government. 1t
will dot every sea with our white sails and
build up our trade and commerce in every part
of the world, among civilized and uncivilized
nations, and fly those "Stars and Stripes I'VE al
ready love so well to see wherever we are, the
flag of our common country, now, thank God!
no longer counted as the emblem of a nation
of slave holders.