Los Angeles herald., 1910-02-25
2 CITIES JOIN
FIGHT FOR U.S..
STEAMER LINE
Oakland and San Diego
Urge Necessity of Fed
eral Service
HOPING FOR RELIEF
Government Owned Ships
Only Remedy for Con-
ditionS on Coast
HOPING FOR RELIEF

HI wO NEW and important names
have been added to the long list
II of powerful organizations on the
Pacific coast which are boosting Los
Angeles plan for a federal steamship
line. Dispatches received here yes
terday state that the chamber of
commerce of Oakland has adopted res
olutions urging all civic and CONNER
cial bodies on the coast to appeal to
congress for relief from the present
traffic onditions-obtainable only
through federal service.
Secretary A. p. Fleming of the Los
Angeles harbor commission announced
yesterday that San Diego, which until
recently opposed the plan for a gov
ernment-ow steamship line for the
relief of the Pacific coast and Panama
traffic is now vigorously boosting the
project, and has gone on record at
Washington in favor of the adoption
of such means as will speedily over
come the effects of the gross discrimi-
nation of the railroads. which has
worked to the injury of California's in
dustrial life for many years.
The San Diego chamber of COM
merce has instructed the Los Angeles
harbor commission to represent it in
promoting the project at Washington.
This is an important advantage, for It
places San Diego in line with every
other port on the Pacific coast, south
of Seattle, in favor of the federal
steamship plan.
San Francisco, San Diego, and one
or two northern port cities formerly
objected to the plan for reasons which
they afterward learned were erroneous,
and as a result the entire Pacific coast
may now be said to have come to the
aid Of the undertaking launched by
n d Flint and nmanAC-
ing from the people OF Los Angeles.
Railroad Discrimination
Like San Francisco. the city of San
Diego is convinced the only salvation
of Southern California is in the fed
eral steamship project. The railroads
have grossly Disseminated against Los
Angeles and San Diego, and otherwise
have proved inadequate to handle our
vast citrus and other outputs.
81 brought this fact forcibly home
| to San Diego" said Mr.. Fleming.
when in citing the report of Special
! Commissioner ]. L. Bristow, appointed
by Roosevelt to investigate the con-
| ditions of Pacific coast ports in con-
| nection with the Panama railroad L
| called the attention of the city to the
| fact that the loss of one item of SNIP
ping alone, consisting of 99,SSS bales
| of cotton, received at San Diego in
two years prior to the discriminatory
combine of the railroads, should exem-
plify its need of a federal steamship
| line, for the loss of that cotton to San
Diego meant also a financial loss or
many thousands of dollars.
Commissioner Bristow, in his re-
port, said the combination of the rail-
roads closed the port of San Diego to
all foreign trade except BaJa Califor-
MIA and Mexico, just as it closed the
port of Los Angeles practically TO the
world.
Before the railroads entered into
| the agreement whereby the vast vol
ume of business that should come by
water and could be carried thus at
comparatively low rates and with nu-
merous advantages not to be had in
railway transportation, the traffic of
| the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and OF
all Europe and the Orient, logically
oceanic traffic, was monopolized by the
railroads, who acquired immense
profits by transporting it via the inter-
! ior-an absurd and costly method.
1.-The commerce of South and Gem
trail America, Panama and Mexico, to
whose first handling Los Angeles ana
San Diego are entitled by virtue or
every known fact, was given to San
| Francisco.
"No wonder San Francisco had been
able so rapidly to rehabilitate from its
fire and earthquake.
"San Diego, which handled $2,25S,0 900
worth of cotton in two years before
the combine, surrendered this ana all
the other traffic it had handled by rail
from the Mississippi valley. And San
Francisco got it.
Los Angeles Suffers
LOS Angeles, to whose port millions
of dollars of the worlds commerce
was and still is directed, also suffered.
Commerce that should have come to
our harbor, came by ridiculous
roundabout way over deserts and
mountains, to the railway yards OF
San Francisco, thence to Los Angeles.
And the people of Los Angeles nave
paid out millions of dollars for those
extra miles of unsatisfactory railway
transportation, while our harbor has
been shorn Of ships and deprived OF
its sustaining patronage.
"And while San Francisco has bene-
fted by this unjust treatment of the
southwest, she has awakened to the
fact that she also loses far more than
she gains by the monopolistic methods
of the Pacific Mail Steamship COM
pany, and that if she would command
further commerce, commensurate with
her harbor and facilities, she must
promote the federal steamship project.
"I,et the railroads of the interior
handle the freight of the interior, but
let the ships of the sea handle tne
commerce of the sea, and let them
stop at all important ports, just as
trains must stop at all important cit
les. This done, the volume of COM
merce that will pass through western
norts. and into western channels will
prove sufficient to develop all of the
great natural harbors of the west, and
the east will no longer prosper at the
cost of the west.
"The people must realize the tremen-
dous Importance of the great work un-
dertaisen by the Los Angeles harbor
Commission, and when they do it will
not take us long to get relief"
,,o-Aa HtiIEn IN NpAcn