The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-05-02

one thing that does make city. a real, large city. and that's diversified man ufactories. The first city at or near the Gulf of Mexico that makes itself the cen- ter of diversified manufacturing enter- prises will be the first city down south
 to reach the 1.ooo.ooo population mark. It takes men to make a city and I think youv got 'em here.
 We do a great deal of boasting about
 our trade. but it is so small compared
 with what We ought to have. We grow
 three-fourths of the cotton. as you know.
 The United States, nor any country In
 the world. ever had six months food sup
 ply in store. If the harvests were to
 fail to follow the planting of the seeds
 we'd be eating fried kittens inside or SIX
 months
 Wherever there is food for the hungry
 people they will come for it. It must
 be had and they will go anywhere in
 the world to get it. We have needed
 no merchants and merchant marines to
 market our food products to starving
 world Two or three years ago three
 fourths of our food products could be
 piled on any wharf in the United States
 and the world would come for fl before
 it spoiled.
 Surplus Manufactured Articles We don't stop to think about mar ketng our surplus manufactured articles. We think that all we have to do is to produce thing and it is marketed. There is money enough represented in this room to build plant to manufacture an auro- mobile exactly like the Ford but you could not sell it. It is one thing to pro- duce and another to sell.
 ''We are all of us in favor of subsidies. Why. right here in Alabama you are sub sidizing your farmers when you take steps to prevent the onslaught of the boil weevil against your cotton Don we dredge rivers and harbors? That 5 subsidy. Why is it not subsidy? Are not the people who use the rivers and harbors for transportation purposes re- ceiving the benefits of the dredging Are | they not subsidized?
 We are substituting now the commerce of the world by building the Panama canal. and we are doing it in order that somebody else besides the United States will be benefited because the United States has no ships in the merchant serv- ice. The first thing the democratic party ever did was an appropriation from the 1 treasury for the Delaware canal. When l the republican party came into existence | 1t caught the spirit of the times and subsidized railroads by grants of land; and other concessions, until we had a great railroad system stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific New states were
 
 and more roads were built. Now we don't subsidize railroads. as 1 understand it. We have struck the other extreme. "It does not follow that we should sub sidize ships. Everything that we have aided in this country has succeeded There is not another country that does not aid l its shipping interests Back in Madi- sons time a law was passed limiting the | coastwise shipping to American-owned, American-manned and American-built vessels. That law is never violated. For eign ships carry American produce to | foreign countries. but if a man would l ship goods from New York to Boston it Is l done on American vessels. We have no | foreign-going vessels.
 Stands With Wilson II am absolutely in favor of what our | good President has recommended in re- | gard to the repeal of the free tolls pro- vision of the Panama canal act. "If we ever get the markets we are naturally entitled to for our manufac- tured products, we will have to go after them in ships. I am decidedly in favor of merchant marine. We have none now. Our commerce 100 years 1 ago was only one-fourth of what it 1 is now, but we then carried four times as much tonnage. I think those fig ures are correct.
 Japan has now about 1000 merchant ships, everyone of which is under con- tract to quit the sea of commerce and enter the sea of carnage at an instant s
 notice from the government Our coun-