Courier Democrat. (Langdon, N.D.) 1891-1920, 1902-03-27
NORTHWEST WILL PROFIT BY IT
ENORMOUS TRADE WITH ,rKfE ORR.
ENT WHICH LIES WITHIN
OUR GRASP.
NOT TO DESTROY COMPETITION
POTENTIAL BENETICENCE OF THE
ECONOMIC FORCES CALLED
INTO PLAY.

Mr.. J. j. Hill was recently reported
by the New York Journal of Commerce
as having said that the two mammoth
ships he is building for the Asiatic
trade could be operated in successful
competition with foreign ships in spite
OF the higher wages paid to American
seamen if our navigation laws permit
TED a better selection and control Of
crews. The reason for this confidence
Is plain. 1t is because he has applied
10 the construction of his vessels the
same principles which have made the
Hill methods" of organizing transport
tatlon famous as one of the great
moEey- saving inventions of the age
the simple principle that the bigger the
trainload the less the cost of hauling it
per ton per mile. He has made his ships
bigger than any now afloat in the ex-
pectation that they will carry full car
goes and that it will cost but little
more to operate them thus filled than
smaller ships carrying fraction of the
tonnage.
much lower freight rates than have
fore, the pioneers in the development
of the Asiatic trade which will eventu-
ally require a larger fleet of similar
ships. But TO fill even these for regu-
lar trips will require the massing
at the Pacific ports where they are to
be loaded of a much larger volume of
exports to Asia than has heretofore
been offered. The traffic of the Great
Northern alone would not suffice to
sustain them. These ships are a con-
stituent part of the arrangements
whereby the Great Northern, the
Northern Pacific and the Burlington
systems are to be operated in harmony,
and subsidiary to the same general end.
The momentous significance of these
arrangements can only be appreciated
when it is understood that their pur-
pose is to make these two great trans
continental railroads the chief high
way Of the commerce Of this country
and of the world with Asia. 1t is to
carry out in the whole vast field of in
tercontinental traffic the same principle
Of concentration which Mr.. Hill applies
to his carloads and his ships cargoes-
to so increase the tonnage volume by
concentration on this Northern route
as to reduce its cost by land and sea,
and thus-following the law that COM
merce always flows along the lines OF
least re sjstance-turn into this cheaper
channel on the shorter lines of latitude
the main stream Of the commerce of the
world. The full carload is thus the unit
of power in a gigantic scheme Of COM
mercial concentration which will pour
a new and more Astounding flood OF
commercial and Industrial energy into
the six states which it has been recent
ly sought to array against it.
The lawyers and politicians who have
been fretting ana Tuning about the
supposed effects of the so-called merger
on local freight rates have been OBJ
livious to the grandeur and potential
benefcence of the economic forces
called into play by this scheme, and
which will insure much greater re-
duction Of local and transcontinantal
freight rates as a necessary conse-
duence of an immensely increased vol
ume of traffic than would otherwise be
possible.
Our local statesmen are not to be
blamed for the narrow local view they
have taken of this question: or for their
inability to take in the broad horizon
of it's worldwide relations. For but
few who have not studied the question
have any conception of the enormous
trade with the Orient which lies within
the grasp Of American enterprise but
which for lack of an effective organiza-
ton of our commercial power we have
heretofore permitted other nations, and
chiefly Great Britain, to appropriate.
For the seven years ending with and in
elusive of 1898 not an American steam
ship entered Philippine port. Since
the treaty of peace we have done better,
but the major part of that traffic is
still borne in English vessels. In the
ffty-two years from 184S to 1900, in
elusive. the United States lost in their
traffic with the Philippines over $275,-
| 600. 600 in trade balances against us, or
enough to have paid all the expenses
of the Spanish war. And this does not
take into account the Philippine goods
carried to English or German ports and
transhipped to this country.
In twenty years the United States
has heretofore paid out over the coun-
ters of London, Berlin and Paris over u
billion and half of gold due Asiatlc
| nations for trade balances. If this
amount of money had been saved to
the American people it would have
bought out the steel trust and the
Northern Securities company at their
capitalized figures. In the ten years
ending June 3d. 1890, we have lost $l2o,
100000 in Chinese trade alone, exclusive
of the trade of HonglSong. which is a
warehouse for all China, under British
auspices. And our ships have not
carried per cent of the foreign trade
of China or of the port Of Hongkons.
The latest accessible tables OF the
treasury department concerning our
sea trade show that of our Imports
from Asia in 1899. S74,OO0.C00 came by
way of the Atlantic ports and only
s32. 600 900 from the Pacific ports. OF
our exports, 9,6OOO0O went from At
lantic ports and only $1S,7oo.oOo by way
of Pacific coast ports. which means
that 65 per cent of our trans-Paci1'c
trade does not come to us by the way
of the Pacific at all. but rather ny ,he
way of European ports. pe'"s
transhipled a. Liverpool and Ham
burg for New York or Philadelphia
The total trade of China IN 1899 was