The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1902-08-17
SHIPS WITHOUT SUBSIDIES.

SHIPS WITHOUT SUBSIDIES.
The very general impression ap-
! pears to be that ]. P. Morgan and
Lewis Nixon have defeated the ship
subsidy bill-that is. they have brought
about conditions which make it mad
visable to bring forward the ship sub
| sidy bill again. Mr.. Morgan, as is
| well known, has formed a combination
of the Atlantic steamship lines and
Mr.. Nixon has effected a combination
of seven great shipbuilding plants of
/ this country. Under the circumstances
/ it would probably be impossible to get
/ Congress to aid shipbuilders or ship
owners by means of subsidies.
While the shipbuilding trust which
| has been organized by Mr.. Nixon does
not include the largest shipyards in
this country. namely, Cramps and the
! Newport News yards, it does include
some of the very best equipped yards,
and the man at the head of the trust,
Mr.. Nixon, has proven himself to be
not only a first-class shipbuilder, but
also business man of great ability.
The United States have been lag
ging in the rear for more than a quar-
ter of a century in shipbuilding. but
now there is every reason to believe
they will soon be abreast of England
and Germany in this respect, The new
shipbuilding combination starts off
with an immense amount of business
in hand. 1t is asserted, on what is
considered good authority, that it has
in hand contracts for work amounting
to $4,000 600 and has in sight con-
tracts for $13,O0O,OOO more. With such
showing as that there is every rea-
son to believe that it will not be long
before the United States will be con-
structing the best ships of the world,
and, that too, at a price that viii en-
able them to compete successfully with
the foremost shipbuilding nations of
Europe.
There will be no regrets from the
people if the ship subsidy bill is not
again heard of: The bill was never
a popular one. The idea seemed to be
that shipbuilding would thrive better
without government aid.
Our ship builders labor under one
disadvantage, and that is they have
to pay considerably higher wages.
as an offset, however, they get their
materials for less than they can be
aimed elsewhere in the world. And
cheap as materials are now the in
dications are that they will be cheaper
Min the very near future. Means of les
SEEMING the cost of making steel are
being discovered all the time, and dis
coveries are made in this country Of
tener and sooner than in any other.
There is no doubt of course that we
could greatly increase our trade with
South American countries and with
South Africa if we had lines of steam
ers of our own connecting us with
them, but the first thing to be done
towards getting their trade is to make
them acquainted with our manufac-
tured products. That can be done
not by establishing steamship lines
though that might help, but by com
plying with their custom in packing
! goods and in the matter of credits.
! When there is a demand for our goods
steamship lines for transporting them
! will be established. We have the
plants for building the ships and ships
will be built. Thus far no ships have
been built in our yards for the trade
to the south of us or for that of South
Africa for the reason that we haven't
enough of either to make steamship
lines profitable. Our merchants and
manufacturers, however, are begin
ming to recognize their opportunities
and to take advantage of them.