The Saint Paul globe., 1899-02-01
SHIP SUBSIDIES OPPOSED.
Minority Report on the Hanna.
Payne Shipping Bill.

WASHINGTON. JAM 31-The minor
1ty report on the sHanna-Payne ship
ping bill was filed in the house Of rep
resentatives today 1t was prepared by
Representative Handy, Of Delaware,
and is a severe and somewhat personal
arraignment of the measure and those
who would receive under it. The re-
port says:
This bill is one that was prepared and
brought to congress by voluntary commits
sion of ship owners and shipbuilders rep
resenting the gentlemen who will receive the
bounty which the bill proposes to give from
the public treasury. The bill as it is re-
ported to the house is in almost the exact
form and grants to penny the bounties de-
manded by the gentlemen who are to receive
them The bill is. therefore, naturally and en-
tirely satisfactory. to the interests which
have organized this movement to secure the
vast sums carried in the bill as gratuity to
be used in carrying on their private business
and enlarging the profits thereof.
The bill provides not simply for bounties
but for bounties which, once granted, cannot
thereafter be taken away. If this bill be
passed the contracts will be quickly made
and once entered into, no future congress
can, in honor break them or refuse to make
the necessary appropriations to pay them.
TO do SO would look like repudiating a ma
tional obligation.
The twenty-year bounties thus provided
are put in the bill in the language of so
many cents, but when the arithmetical cal
ties by cents will prove to be, when the
time comes to pay them we find that they
must be figured In tens of millions of dol
lars. By careful and conservative estimate
we find that the government would be obIi-
gated by the contracts likely to be entered
into during the first twelve months under this
$165, coo, 900, and this includes only the ship
ping now in sight, and the shipping which
must be built will cost probably not less
than s40O. O.000.O eco.
'.Of this enormous bounty the lions share
will go to the International Navigation COM
pany This company will receive in the ag-
gregate more than $57, 900, 900. This strikes us
as monstrous proposition. In this bill it Is
provided that man who builds great and
speedy ocean steamer shall be paid bounties
in twenty years amounting to twice the whole
cost of the boat.
''It must be conceded that bounties are re-
pugnant to the spirit of our free institutions
by which all citizens should have equal
rights and especial privileges should be
granted. 1t is impossible to give bounty to
everybody, and to all the forms of industry
and it is manifestly unequal and unjust to
tax the farmers, carpenters, blacksmiths ma
sons, merchants, railroad men, miners and
woodsmen of the country to pay bounty to
ship owners for every mile they sail upon the
sea. To build up once, more great merchant
marine should be one of the patriotic ambi-
tions of American craftsmanship 1t can be
done by taking off the shackles and giving
American enterprise American industry and
American seamanship an equal chance. Every
thing needed in building and equipping ship
should be admitted free of customs duty. Ship
supplies should also be the free list Every
American citizen should be free to buy ships
to use in the foreign carrying trade wherever
he can find them cheapest and best. Tonnage
taxes should be abolished"
In conclusion the report says:
This bill is the offspring of mere bounty
beggars, and should be repudiated by repre-
sentatives of both political parties. 1t Is
vicious in principle. 1t is not necessary for
the rehabilitation of our merchant marine to
give hundreds of millions of the peoples tax
money. The bill is wholly unjustifable
Mr. Fitzgerald did not concur in this
renOrt