Staunton spectator and vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1896-1916, 1901-03-15
ISHIP SUBSIDIES.
Ex-CONGRESSMAN JOHN DE WITT
WARNER EXPOSES THE DEFECTS
OF THE PENDING BILL.

Protested Aims of the Bill Are
Shams-SIow Ships Useless For Aux
fIiary Cruisers or Mail Carriers.
Futile Provisions For American
seamen The Shipbuilding Which
the Bill Is Supposed to Encourage
Is Already Largely Under Construc-
ton or Ordered.
In the current issue of The Review
of Reviews eX-Congressman John De
Witt Warner of New York sets forth
the following objections to the ship
subsidy bill:
OF course the bill pretends that Its
authors are concerned for the farms,
factories, mines, forests and fisheries
of the United States" and for the pro-
vision Of vessels, officers, engineers,
machinists, electricians and seamen"
for United States commerce and de-
Tense.
Framed as it is exclusively by those
who propose to hire themselves at
their own price and who did not admit
to their elaboration any representative
either Of agriculture, wage earners,
seamen or our navy or war depart
ment, we should expect to find just
what we find here-that the professed
aims Of the bill are shams set up to
distract attention from the raid plan
ned.
AS to export trade, late amendment
expressly provides that to get full sub
sidy ship need carry out but half
cargo load; while she gets the main,
or ''speed," subsidy though she do not
carry pound of cargo. Furthermore,
the highest subsidies are specifically
given to the classes Of ships that not
merely do not, but cannot, carry much
export cargo but which export" tour
lists and import" immigrants the In
ternationaps fast passenger steamers,
for example, getting II times the sub
sidy in proportion to cargo that does
a standard freighter.
The vessels now building by our gov
eminent average about % knots speed.
OF all ships in existence that would
draw this subsidy there are but four
above 20 knots, and its friends admit
that no others will be built. 1t is plain
how useless would be transports and
cruisers that could neither fight nor
run and how fatally would fast war
vessels be impeded by the company Of
slow ones. Furthermore, the ships
that would get most subsidies are al
ready under mail contracts, which put
them at the disposal of our government
under requirements more rigid than
proposed by the pending bill-which
expressly permits cancellation Of pres
ent contracts.
It is ludicrous to estimate that
against the 100000 per annum
should be Offset any considerable sum
for the free mail carriage provided by
the bill. AS noted, the bill induces no
construction Of new ships over II
knots, and its inducements for speed
stop at p knots on test run. This is
SO far behind the practical needs that,
though the International company
(Which would get the greatest share of
speed subsidy received last year two
thirds of the total paid by the United
States for carrying foreign mails from
New York, the postoffice had to hire
British and German steamers at half
the cost to carry three or four times
the mail it committed to the Inter-
worthless than the right to have mails
carried free by ships already too slow
to be trusted with them.
AS to American sailors, the bill pro-
vides that subsidized ships ~ have
one-fourth their crew citizens or in
boy be employed for every 1000 tons
shipping, and 81 that fishermen serving
on ships Subsidized for the year at 81
per ton, in case they run three months)
be given 81 per month while actually
employed. AS to these: % is nullified
reasonably get one-fourth Americans
he need not; (2) is made worthless by
proviso that the American boy need
be paid only what his work is worth,
and as to g., there being no minimum
wage, our government would simply
pay 81 of ordinary wages for which the
American fishermen would still work.
Finally, the ships which would get
most Of this subsidy are now compelled
under their mail contracts to have half
American crew and to employ the same
number of American boys, but to treat
them as petty officers; so that the effect
of the subsidy bill, which releases these
ships from their present contract,
would be to lessen the number Of
American sailors and American boys
employed.
AS to ship owning, the bill leaves in
tact our navigation laws prohibiting
importation of ships or obscene litera-
ture, letting in for American registry
only few vessels that the authors Of
the bill and their friends had already
bought. AS to shipbuilding. our ship
yards, without subsidy, are already
crowded to their utmost capacity, and
the most advanced types of steamers
larger than any heretofore built
have lately been contracted for here at
prices lower than foreigners would
build them.
Worst of all, in respect Of securing
new shipbuilding, the bill is largely
sham. For example, the owner of an
American ship now running. on giving
bond for $4,000 to build new tonnage,
might draw $4,000 in subsidy before
the bond became available.
Again, as the United States shipping
commissioner notes at page so of his