The Hays free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1908-1924, 1922-09-07
AMERICAN SHIP PROTECTION

Protection of our ships in foreign
trade has been waged in Congress.
The battle is now on with all of the
viEor of the days of Senator Hanna
and Representative Payne, of Senator
Frye, of Senator Gallinger and of
Representatives Grosvenor and
Greene. Senator Hanna was con-
WINGED at the threshold Of his Sena-
tOrial career that the policy of dis
eliminating duties, which the Repub-
Iican National Platform of 1896
periodically declared for and which
MAJOR Mckinley most warmly COM
mended in his letter accepting the
Presidential nomination, could not be
adopted, besides which he was led to
believe that through subsidies Pro
lection such as is required could more
effectively be secured for our ships in
foreign trade. The policy declared
for in the national platform, there
fore, was discarded or ignored, al
though the success of the Republicans
at the polls made of their platform a
in 1898 the fight for subsidies began
IN real earnest. It has never ceased.
1t is on even now, more strongly than
ever. What Senator Hanna with vast
Republican majorities in each branch
of Congress found it impossible to do,
President Harding and the Shipping
Board are now attempting to do. A
more complete Ship Subsidy Bill than
that now pending was never drafted.
It has other features than direct sub
sidy intended to increase the Protec-
ton of our ships.
The whole weight of the Harding
administration and all of the in
fiuences it can command are back of
the pending Ship Subsidy Bill. Never
was a President more in earnest in
behalf of a special policy than Pres
ident Harding is in behalf of sub
sides. 1t is generally felt that if a
Ship Subsidy Bill cannot now be
enacted it never can. But, to say the
least, Congress looks askance at the
bill.
Chairman Lasker of the Shipping
Board testified during the hearings on
the Ship Subsidy Bill that the policy
of discriminating duties would be
more effective and Infinitely cheap
err for the Protection of our ships
than subsidies. Six weeks after his
Board was appointed it unanimously
declared in favor of discriminating
duties. AS Ship Subsidy Bill after
Ship Subsidy Bill has failed of
passage, on three different occasions
Congress has enacted bills designed
to retore discriminating duties, but
each time Executive opposition pre-
vented their enforcement. This was
in the Dingley Tariff Bill, in the
Underwood Tariff Bill and in the Mer-
chant Marine Act of 1920. There
was no violent opposition at any time
in either branch of Congress to Pro-
lection for our shipping according to
the successful policy that was in eff
feet between 1889 and 1850. 1t is
the natural way. 1t is the way every
thing else is protected-through the
Tariff. 1t takes no money from the
National Treasury, on the contrary,
properly applied, it would add mil
lions to the National Treasury, and at
the same time adequately protect our
ships against foreign competition.
There is a general feeling in Congress
by no means confined to any single
party, that it is time that all of our
existing antiquated and more or less
obsolete trade treaties and conven-
lions should be abrogated and new
ones negotiated that are more up-tO-
date than those now in force. There
is a growing feeling that our ships
should again be protected in the same
way and by the same fundamentally
that our other products are protected
the Tariff. There is a belief that
Protection can be more effectively ap-
piled to our ships indirectly than
directly, and that once the policy is
restored it would be continued indie
finitely, just as a Protective Tariff is
continuously in force.
By placing higher import duties on
goods coming in foreign vessels than
are imposed on imports in our own
vessels, and by placing a higher ton
mage tax on foreign than is imposed
on American vessels as was the vogue
from 1889 until 1850, not a cent will
be taken from the National Treasury,
our ships can be adequately and fully
protected in that manner, and, in ad-
dition, as stated, millions of dollars
can be added to the nations income.
Why, then, should not this old policy