Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-01-08
TO SUBS|DHE SHIPS
Senator GaIIinger's Plea for
Government Aid.
OUR FLAG SELDOM SEEN
Vessels of Other Nations Garry Our
Commerce.
HANDICAP IN CONSEQUENCE
HANDICAP IN CONSEQUENCE
Experience of England, France and
Germany What the Pending
Legislation Aims to Accomplish.

The debate on the shipping bill was today
opened IN the Senate by Senator Gallinger
chairman of the merchant marine commits
sion. The pending bill was framed by the
commission and has been reported to the
Senate by the committee on commerce.
Senator Gal1inger quoted from President
McKinley's last speech at Buffalo In which
he deplored our inadequate steamship serv-
Ice. especially to South America, and urged
the upbuilding of the merchant marine. He
also quoted President Roosevelt's annual
message of December 1903, urging the ap-
pointment OF joint commission for that
purpose
Ihe practical question now before u.s.
Senator Gallinger went on to say is VIII
Congress heed the admonitons of Presidents
Mckinley and Roosevelt, or will 1t con-
tinue to, neglect this important industry
until the remnant of our once prosperous
merchant marine is driven from the seas?
aooay atone OF all the nations ambitious
Tor mercantile expansion the United States
neSlects Its ocean shipping Our coast and
lake fleets, protected by federal statutes,
are the most prosperous and the greatest
I In the world. Taking the coast lake and
river ships together we have a merchant
navy OF 5,5Oo,OO tons. six times the size
OF the poor shrunken feet of $4,000 tons
registered for foreign commerce. The grad
bankruptcy Of our ship merchants, the loss
Oh our skilled mechanics and seamen,
though a calamity and a great one. Is far
less serious than the cramping and wither-
Ing effect of our lack of American ships on
the export trade Of the United States.
William McKinley's prophetic vision in that
final address of his to his countrymen saw
that without ships of our own to convey
our goods to our customers we should be
mere and more hopelessly Handicapped
against our maritime competitors in the
neutral markets of the world
No Merchant. So Neg1ectful.
"TU4take familiar, but just illustration,
what department store in any American
city, engaged in a sharp contest for bust
ness, would dream of intrusting to rival
store the delivery of its goods to its Gus
toners? Is 1t not fundamental princi-
pie of such keen competitive business
with which the rivalry of America and Eu-
rope in international commerce may not
inaptly be compared-is 1t. not the prime
instinct of every successful merchant In
such business to maintain an active and
comprehensive delivery service Of his own3
W ould any merchant conducting-suCh
store sell or lay up his own wagons and
neglect to provide others, even II his COM
petitor offered to do the work more cheap
ly? 1t would be a poor judge of human
nature, indeed, who would consent to such
a. proposition. His fellow merchants, part
ners or assignees in the bankruptcy pro-
ceedings that would certainly ensue would
have grave question of his sanity.
Our formidable competitors are Great
Britain and the two continental nations
that front on the North Sea and the Bay OF
Biscay What Great Britain, France and
Germany have done and are doing is OF
very live significance to the United States"
| British Steamship Subsidies.
Senator Gallinger went on to speak of
the generous British policy of steamship
subsidies, beginning in 1910 with the Cunard
line.
'At that time and for years before the
entire transatlantic packet service in sail
ships was conducted by Americans" he
said, but the British subsidized steam
lines beginning 10 drive our packets or the
ocean, the United States, under the initta-
tive of President Polk, and by vote OF
democratic Congress, met this attack by
the offering Of generous mail subsidies TO
American Transatlantic lines, Of which the
Collins line became the most famous and
successful The new American steamers
were larger and faster than the Cunard
ships, but Mr.. Golden, Mr.. Gladstone ana
tho other British statesmen, who were now
proclaiming on land the transcendent viz
tues of free trade, nevertheless continued
to vote lavish subsidies to the inferior
Cunard ships, that but for the subsidies
would have been straightway driven from
the passage. What the end Of the rivalry
would have been If the United States hello
on can only be conjectured, but the I'M
happy feud between the north and south In
Congress led TO the canceling of the mail
subsidies in 1853 at the very crisis of the
contest, and for thirty years after 1851 the
the British flag retained mastery of the
north Atlantic.
in the south Pacific also the British gov
eminent subsidized the Pacific Steam Navf-
CATION Company, which was started by an
American, Mr.. William Wheelwrght, who
had unsuccessfully sought TO interest his
own government in the enterprise. Besides,
parliament, by a generous subsidy of ST.
POO, 600, created British steam line to the
West Indies, the isthmus OF Panama, Brazil
and Argentina So effective has been this
British maritime protectionism that in the
ports of Chile, Bolivia, Peru and Brazil the
stars and stripes flying from an American
merchant steamer are now never seen,
while British commerce, which these sub
sides were given to promote, far surpasses
ours IN every one of these Latin American
republics.
Germany's Example.
Until quarter of century ago German
sea power was insignificant. A free-ship'
policy was in force under which there had
been no real growth in the German fleet,
German tonnage increasing only from l.
Oas 600 in 1873 TO 81 217 900 In 1881 In Ger
many, as in France, free ships tested
alone without national aid and encourage
ment, had utterly failed To bring any sub
stantial increase in the commerce creating
power of the national marine. In 1881
France, 1ismayed al the results of free
ship policy, turned to subsidies and boun-
ties to save her shipbuilding and navga-
ton. Bismarck urged upon the German
parliament to follow the French example,
pointing also TO the splendid results the
British had secured by the long-continued
and generous policy of substituting ocean
mail lines to the chief markets of the
world.
Germany had under the protective sys-
66Vpl0ppi IT'S mannf9p furinv
sources that, like the United States It
found the need of foreign outlet more
and more imperative Bismarcks plea for
German ships to deliver German goods to
| foreign customers won from the reichstag
a mail subvention Of 100000 marks (S1,-
| Oh O0 a year for fifteen years for a Ger