The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1876-10-07

6N ~HAN ShbNA oDOh AAC ulSI supply.
The NECESSITY of speedily providing a new
inter-island steamer to take the place Of the
well-wOrn Kilauea, is acknowledged on all sides
and now that the Act ct promote Inter-Island
Steam Communication - places the requisite
authority in the hands Of the government, it is
hoped and expected that this public business will
edone without any further delay than may be
absolutely inseparable from its being well done.
The Act provides frst-that the Minister of the
Interior may contract with responsible parties to
maintain in the service n suitable steamer of not
less than 500 tons register, for q period not to
exceed ten years, at an annual subsidy to be paid
monthly of not more than fifteen thousand dol
lars and failing to enter into any such contract
by the first Of December next, the Minister is
authorized to contract for the delivery at this
port of a steamer, within one year from the first
of January, 1877, at a cost of not more than
800 900. The other portions of the Act are
mainly matters of detail, but the gist of the
measure is given above, whereby it will be seen
that the government is authorized either to con-
tract with private parties to perform the service
for a subsidy, or itself to purchase or contract
for the building of Il steamer to be run on IFS
own account.
10 discussing this question in the past we have
advocated the building of the steamer here, on
the ground Of the benefit that would accrue to
our OWE people by affording employment to
mechanics, and to the community at large by
putting our own money in circulation at home
instead of sending it out of the country in a
lump for the purchase Of a steamer abroad and
we see no reason to alter these views, even
though the expense of building here should be
somewhat larger (as it doubtless would beg than
to buy at second hand. In the former case We
should know to a certainty what style of vessel
we had got, and run no risk of being defrauded
by spectators.
But we go farther, and maintain that 1t will
be preferable for the interests Of the country at
large that the steamer, for the present at least,
shall be owned and run by the government. A
good deal Of cheap sentiment has been ventilated
of late about the great injustice of government
interfering with private enterprise by running
the inter-island steam service. The abstract
principle is a sound one that, all things being
equal, government should never undertake any
business or trade that private enterprise can and
will do as well and as cheaply for all concerned.
But the conditions here have been and still are
such, that private enterprise never has yet sue
ceeded in supplying our inter-island steam COM
munication, and will not for some years to come,
without government aid. Should the time ever
arrive when the travel and trade will be such as
to render it profitable for private parties, unaided
by a subsidy, to run steamers between these ISL
ands, the parties will most assuredly be found to
perform the service and reap the harvest. Until
then, either the government must maintain the
steamer at its own risk, or subsidize private par
ties to do it, which may be very much the same
thing so far as the expense to the treasury is con-
~cerned-though we by no means concede that the
| service need to cost the government the sum Of
SIS, 900 per annum over and above receipts.
The Act under consideration provides for a sub
sidy not to exceed that amount, and of course we
may understand that nothing less than that
amount will be paid, if anything. If we will
consider for a moment, it will be seen that who
ever obtains the contract provided for by the Act
will have a perfect monopoly of the inter-island
steam service for a period of at least ten years
for under almost any possible or probable changes
that might occur in business and trade during
ten years, (and ten years, let us remember, is in
this latter half of the nineteenth century a long
time) no second party could expect to succeed in
running an opposition TO him who held the sub
sidy and additional privileges. But on the other
hand, if the government owned the steamer, it
might at any time take advantage of favorable
circumstances, such as a large increase in the
inter-island trade, and sell to private parties who,
under such improved circumstances, could afford
to perform the service without a money subsidy.
In illustration of our position that it will be
for the interests of the country at large that gov
eminent should for the present run the steamer
rather than that it should be in the hands of pri-
vate enterprise, we will suppose a very possible
case. Mr.. ", let us say, is the owner of tract
of land suitable for the cultivation of cane, but
| situated in a locality distant from the usual and
stipulated ports of call, and being about to estab-
lish a plantation, is DESTROYS Of having his ma
chinery, etc., conveyed to the nearest point of
debarkation by the steamer. TO accomplish this
in the way indicated signifies the saving of a
great deal of time, which in his case is emphatic
ally money and to the inhabitants of the district
in which the proposed mill is to be erected, it
means all that is implied in the speedy opening
up of resources of prosperity that will otherwise
lie dormant and thus the personal interest of the
planter is but secondary in real importance to
the interests of the country at large. Well, Mr..
x applies to the parties who have the ten years
contract for running the steamer, to have his
8: plant " landed at a given point in say, Hama
kua, on the island Of Hawaii, (where is found
abundance of fine land for cultivation Of cane,
now unimproyed). He is told that that partieu-
lar point is an out of the way place, on an extra
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