The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-03-06
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 Sometimes things don't always hap pen just as one desires. We find this premature feliciltation in a recent issue of The Buffalo News:
 When the record Of the F'ifty-ninth Congress Is made up one of it's Drignt- the shipping bill which passed the House yesterday and will be accepted by the senate. F.
 A step toward the restoration of the merchant marine service IS taken at last and taken in the only direction that is of the least value to the vast industry involved. 1t isn't long step, but it Is step. and the rest of the way ought to be far less difficult than
 to get past the array of hostile in- terests that have fought this measure In every form for decades.
 Every organ of foreign shipping in- terests, every agent of business houses that conduct commerce under foreign flags, every foreign ship builder, near ly all of the free traders, and every voice that is unceasingly hostile to American prosperity has been on the side opposed to tho restoration of our flag to it's old place in world com merce
 In its political aspect the bill is purely a Republican measure. Not a Democrat voted for it. 1t was SUD- ported by nearly every commercial orr ganizafien in the United States, by q vast majority of the labor organiza- volume of business sentiment than any other bill within living memory. But not a Democrat voted for 1t. There the record may well stand
 Ere this time The News has been informed thlt tho steal failed to get through. for which the Senate Is to be thanked and congratulated. For 1t is U steal and The News should know 1t Probably it does know 1t, but the thing was an administration measure and that is sufficient to assure the support of the blind organs of Repub- licanism. It was a bill to give bonus of s2,6oo.ooo year to certain big steamship lines ynder the false plea of enabling the American people to build up trade with South America.
 It is not a question of money, so far as the government is concerned, for it could spend the amount indicat- ed and not feel 1t. but 1t is the man. ner in which it Is to be spent, and the pockets that it goes into that can- not be defended. Neither is the plea put forth an honest one. If our gov- ernment will repeal or change some of it's navigation laws and remove at least a portion of our tariff on foreign imports there would be no trouble about building up a merchant marine, but there's the rub. ship-builders in this country cannot import foreign material because of the prohibition tariff charges. and hence the great trusts which now control the iron and steel industries are able to keep the ship-building business in their own hands. Not satisfied with this unjust they now want Congress to add to their power and profits by the subsidy steal.
 In one thing we fully agree with The News. The bill Ifs purely a Re- publican measure. More than that, it is an administration measure. The President wanted It and his adherents were willing to give 1t to him. True, some of It's most objectionable fea- lures had been removed, but the prin- ciple of the thing remains. That the Democrats, opposed 1t is one of the most creditabie acts of the session. and it is to be hoped that the next Congress will have enough Republl- cans who are opposed to graft to pre- vent the biil's passage in any shape. As The Richmond Journal says:
 The few millions carried by this are of no great moment, but it is the entering wedge. Every year the 'grafters' who profit, and those who want to profit by the abuse, will come back to congress with the ex- planation that the reason that no bet. ter success has attended this method of building up a merchant marine or our foreign commerce was because the subsidy was too small or too restricted. The figures and facts will, of course, be carefully Juggled and perverted to suit their purposes. Thus will the abuse continue to grow, for subsidized industry is as insati- able as the sands of the desert. Like other government fostered trusts and that have been built up and made rich and powerful by in- direct subsidies--that is, by accord ing them the privilege of levying tri-s butte upon the consumers of the coun- try for their own private benefit- these beneficiaries of the ship subsidy will use their power and influence thus acquired to wiring still greater favnrs from the government.